Blethen's letter right on the money

I had to laugh when I read Harold Hochstatter’s letter to the editor criticizing Vaughn Blethen. In the process of attacking Blethen for trying to be a “censor,” Hochstatter makes it clear that he doesn’t think Blethen’s opinions have any place in the CBH. So is censorship only bad when it comes from liberals? And were Blethen’s first two suggestions – that the column be moved out of “news” and placed with other advice columns or other religious columns – really censorship? I think she has a valid point.

Blethen’s letter was critical, but it was right on the money. The letter that Jim Daly was responding to had nothing to do with adoption by gay couples – he was responding to a letter about single-parent adoption, yet Daly felt it necessary to state that children belong in “a loving marriage relationship between one man and one woman.” Daly went on to discuss unnamed “academic research” that shows that children benefit from having both a mother and a father, but Columbia University has cited 75 different academic studies that show that children of gay parents fare no worse than those of straight parents, as opposed to only four that showed that gay parents have a disadvantage. Daly is making a religious point based on sparse evidence, and such points don’t belong with the news.

As for Blethen “placing herself over parents... and even over Jesus,” I wasn’t aware that writing a critical letter to the editor was such a serious affront to the nuclear family and to Christianity. I enjoyed reading Blethen’s letter, and I think she’s right on the money with regard to that column needing to be moved.

Steve Close

Moses Lake