March 27, 2013 |
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| Online Letter To The Editor |
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| Asheville Citizens Times |
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| Asheville, North Carolina |
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Dear Editor:
I cancelled my subscription with the Asheville Citizens Times, (ACT), after it refused to report on our unique heroes in combat, my documenting the lack of stories on the Web.
That was in 2007.
Now it's 2013, and I believe this is the first letter I have sent in about five years. You should know I had no intentions of ever writing any further letters to your publication. But from the news that was released today, your readers need to know how their newspaper stuck it to the Western North Carolina community in the name of political correctness back in 2004 when the ACT was claiming to be the Voice of the Mountains.
Around eight years ago I wrote a letter to the publisher about my disappointment in the Asheville Citizen Times not using the 2004 prediction of the Center for Disease Control, (CDC), as an real opportunity to bring together the 1.) local media, 2.) Buncombe County's excellent medical community, and 3.) concerned parents for the purpose of educating teens about the disturbing spread of STD's on their generation.
The CDC had predicted at that time that by age 25, 50% of teens in 2004 would have an STD. Also reports were coming out on the Web that 45% of black teenage girls already had an STD, while 33% of whites and other minorities in college were reported to also carry the disease.
When I received no response from the ACT, I sent a certified letter to Gannett executive management with the complaint, asking why their corporation was giving awards to their Gannett-owned newspaper in Asheville.
I asked,
"Didn't Gannett know this newspaper refused to advise the community of the warnings of the CDC, the ACT instead placing the important health story in a small box on the left hand side of a page just ahead of the comics? In other words, the newspaper buried the story so it wouldn't offend its progressive readers."
Gannett executives never responded to me, the ACT opining on its front page that a subscriber had complained to its owner. Soon after that the publisher of the ACT wrote a responding letter to Gannett, Gannett having obviously shared my letter with the ACT. The publisher acknowledge my complaint about the placement of the CDC's warning, writing this terse comment and copying it to me, Well, we did report it.
As an FYI and at the time of the release of the CDC's report, I came across an interesting URL from NBC Channel 5 in Chicago, Illinois, that put together an excellent online chart of known STD's for the public to study. It was good to know that at least some media outlets had cared about the spread of these viruses.
It was good information for those who were concerned about STD's and needed to understand the potential damage to one's quality of life, the expected symptoms, the effects on everyday life, and if curable, all available in an easy to click-on file as shown below. It's still active in 2013 for today's teens and young adults to view the diseases passed through casual sex.
