mathNEWS Issue 95.3: Friday, June 11, 2004

mathNEWS mailBAG

Hello.

I would like to comment on last issue of mathNEWS. As always, I loved reading it and some of the articles were very entertaining.

However, I found certain pieces from the mathNEWS offensive, namely the article called 'Offending People 101' and the cover of mathNEWS about breaking 10 commandments. I have great respect and love for God and my religion, and finding such material on mathNEWS was somewhat unexpected.

I do respect the freedom of speech (or art) and I guess you could argue that mathNEWS is one of the places where people can express their opinions freely. However, I believe that, if people wanted to entertain themselves or others by writing something funny but offensive, I am sure there are other places where they can do so (not that I think it is a right thing, but at least, they will be able to express themselves and not offend lots of people or get complaints like this). I just don't think putting such material on mathNEWS was a good idea.

I enjoy reading mathNEWS, and I don't really expect to find openly offensive material while reading it. People can offend others accidentally... I don't think trying to do so purposely, like the article, was necessary.

I don't mean to put a stop to the writers/artists of mathNEWS from being creative, and I don't have any hard feelings towards the writer and the artist personally. I just wanted to voice my thoughts and hope that you would consider them for future issues of mathNEWS.

Thank you very much for all the hard work you put into mathNEWS.

Sincerely, Theresa Kim



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