Dear Editor,
At a recent meeting of the general journalistic staff at Kaieteur News, I appealed for the end of anonymous letters even including where valid names are given but identity withheld. If at the time I had read a missive in your paper before that meeting I would have used it as an example of how and why not to publish an anonymous letter.
The correspondence in question is titled. ‘A looking glass world’ (Freudian caption when you consider the word ‘looking glass’ is used by a person who is afraid to look in the mirror and identity him/herself) for Sunday, November 14, 2010.
The correspondent takes umbrage at the observation of Dr Madan Rambarran of the Georgetown Hospital that Dr Vishwamintra Persaud only molested one child. The writer went on to say he/she is outraged at Dr Rambarran’s statement and went on to show more vexation in the short letter.
Unfortunately, there was no signature below the letter. I am not concerned with the content of this missive but the principle of attacking national figures while hiding one’s identity. The print media needs to clear up this practice now that we have blogging. Let the person who wrote that letter go on a blog station.
If you know you do not want to be known for your views then don’t publish them. There are billions of citizens in this world who have opinions on public issues but they don’t want others to know how they feel so they do not go on television or give their names to the newspapers.
The emergence of the blog has now paved the way for the fearful ones to have their views known. A difference with your online edition and other newspapers is that there isn’t a set of daily unknown people that blog all the time.
Take any online paper and you will not see the same set of fictional titles appearing daily. Not so with the Stabroek News. These frightened people probably get up early in the morning, grab their keyboard and fire away. Do a survey of your online edition and there is a group of ten pen-names that appear all the time. I have no need to visit your web page because I buy Stabroek every day.
Finally, I know the criticism will be that I write for a newspaper that has a daily columnist that uses a sobriquet – Peeping Tom. I have written more times than I can count that I do not agree with such a masquerade. It is not good for a national newspaper. I know who Peeping Tom is and he certainly knows the disgust and abhorrence I feel about what he does.
At one time this guy used to say nasty things about me too. He stopped when he found out that I had found out who he was. I wonder if his family is aware of what he is doing.
Yours faithfully,
Frederick Kissoon
