To the editor;
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That December 10 Hot Type item lists four different cases as evidence that free speech “can be bought and sold.” One is from a Hollywood movie, of all things, one of those ones that claims to be “based on actual events” (which, as every moviegoer over the age of 12 knows, is Hollywood-speak for “a fantasy world that makes TV sitcoms look like documentaries”). This longtime Reader reader didn’t appreciate being taken for a congenital idiot with an example that ludicrous.
The second one is a court case that in fact sounds disturbing, and worth knowing more about than a one-paragraph summary. Alas, Hot Type instead focuses on two other cases (mostly the Oprah one) which have roughly as much to do with anyone’s First Amendment rights as the Rush Limbaugh Show does with journalism.
This kind of thing just distracts us from, and reduces the credibility of, reporting real erosions of the rights promised by the Bill of Rights. Which the other case mentioned, may very well be–we didn’t get enough info to tell, or even to follow up on our own and look into it. Let the silly red herrings lie, and do what Hot Type does best: cover real issues and topics of free expression and the media, that the dailies don’t touch.
