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About Cottage Grove sentinel. (Cottage Grove, Or.) 1909-current | View Entire Issue (June 20, 2018)
COTTAGE GROVE SENTINEL JUNE 20, 2018 4A The First Amendment O PINION Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridg- ing the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition their Government for a redress of greivences. Letters to the Editor Policy Th e Sentinel welcomes letters to the editor as part of a community discussion of issues on the local, state and national level. Emailed letters are preferred. Handwritten or typed letters must be signed. All letters need to include full name, address and phone number; only name and city will be printed. Letters should be limited to about 300 words. Letters are subject to editing for length, grammar and clarity. Publication of any letter is not guaranteed and depends on space available and the volume of letters received. Letters that are anonymous, libelous, argumentative, sarcastic or contain accusations that are unsourced or without documentation will not be published. Letters containing poetry or from outside Th e Sentinel readership area will only be published at the discretion of the editor. Political/Election Letters: Election-related letters must address pertinent or timely issues of interest to our readers at-large. Letters must 1) Not be a part of letter-writing campaigns on behalf of (or by) candidates; 2) Ensure any information about a candidate is accurate, fair and not from second-hand knowledge or hearsay; and 3) explain the reasons to support candidates based on personal experience and perspective rather than partisanship and campaign-style rhetoric. Candidates themselves may not use the letters to the editor column to outline their views and platforms or to ask for votes; this constitutes paid political advertising. As with all letters and advertising content, the newspaper, at the sole discretion of the publisher, general manager and editor, reserves the right to reject any letter that doesn’t follow the above criteria. Send letters to: nhickson@cgsentinel.com or cmay@cgsentinel.com LETTERS Give facts, not opinion Well, here we go again. God’s out and Ol’ Glory’s on fi re. Right here in Cot- tage Grove, it seems local news paper has become judge and jury. I’m talking about the ar- ticle regarding a new busi- ness in our town and people from out of town, like Port- land, connected to the Anti- fa mob. Th e article in the local pa- per had a very short report of a woman who broke all the front windows of the business. Th e woman even waited around because she wanted to make a statement. She is connected to Antifa and even had the organza- tion's phone number if she got arrested. Th e article said there was no motive and she was a transient. Most of the article pointed to the business and how their son was in pris- on, then went on about the troubled son who is an adult and has nothing to do with this business. For all who don’t know what Antifa is, it is an an- ti-fascist group which came about in the late 20s. Orig- inally, it protest against big government but during the Obama time changed its agenda. Now it’s attacking freedom of speech by dam- aging property, refusing to allow people to speak and spraying people with chem- icals and paint. It won’t be long until they try to stop a business be- cause it belongs to owners who are Christians, Jewish or something else they dis- agree with. I ask Th e Sentinel to give us the facts not opinion. Let the people decide if a business will make it in this town through the power to HOW TO CONTACT YOUR REPS patronize. —Cheryl Mulhall Cottage Grove (Managing Editor’s Note: In the story "Vandalism Targets Main Street Business" publshed June 13, the story made no mention of the suspect, Laura Rose, being a transient. And at press time, the police had not yet verifi ed that the phone numbers found on her were associated with Antifa or the Civil Liberties Union.) Will we succumb to our worst or best nature? cate and inspire — but that it would require us to ensure it would be used towards those ends. “Otherwise,” he said, “it is merely wires and lights in a box.” In the late 1950s, iconic newsman Edward R. Murrow recognized a par- adox developing as the advent of television was transforming news report- ing from the purely word-driven medium of radio into a much more powerful visual medium available in homes across America. Murrow understood that news journalism would never be the same. He also recognized the responsibil- ity that accompanies that kind of power. In 1958, during a Radio- Television News Directors Association and Foundation dinner where he was the keynote speak- er, Murrow spoke of the new television medium and the potential effects it could have on journalism and our society as a whole. Known as his now famous “Lights in a Box” speech, Murrrow explained how the new medium had the potential to teach, edu- But things are different in this era of social media communalism. It’s no small irony that, while we have become increasingly engaged in sharing our thoughts and experiences From the Managing Editor’s Desk Ned Hickson Over the course of the last few years, we’ve seen social media platforms such as Facebook and oth- ers succumbing to the worst — rather than the best — we have to offer as a society. It’s human nature to be drawn to things that dis- turb us. It’s the reason we gawk at the scene of acci- dents; why there are more NCIS spin-offs than any other genre on TV; and why Greek mythology is full of cautionary tales that end in tragedy. We find a certain com- fort in recognizing when the mistakes of others have led to their misfortune — and how we can avoid making those same mis- takes. with more people than ever before, we have simul- taneously come to accept that we are sharing those very things with people we will likely never meet. Through that acceptance we are slowly laying the groundwork for the kind of social disconnect that we have begun to see with live streaming of disturb- ing events — and, perhaps even more disturbing, hav- ing them shared hundreds of thousands of times by others. In a way, social media is promoting a culture of dig- ital-aged peeping Toms, encouraging us to gawk through an endless array of partially open windows into the lives of others — many of whom we don’t truly know. We can leave comments and engage in the conver- sations of strangers with- out consequence or accountability. It’s an era of communi- cation unlike any other, and the ultimate repercus- sions on our culture remain to be seen. In the same way that Murrow expressed the need for us to have a will- ingness to use the medium of television to teach, edu- cate and inspire, we need to ask ourselves what direction we will take with the evolution of social media. Will we succumb to the worst of our nature or the best of it? Will our smartphones and other digital devices be utilized to improve the way we communicate and broaden our understand- ing of each other and the world? Or will they prove to be little more than micro chips and lights in an even smaller box? Oregon state representatives Oregon federal representatives • Sen. Floyd Prozanski District 4 State Senator PO Box 11511 Eugene, Ore. 97440 Phone: 541-342-2447 Email : sen.fl oydprozanski@ state.or.us • Rep. Cedric Hayden Republican District 7 State Representative 900 Court St. NE Salem, Ore. 97301 Phone: 503-986-1407 Website: www.leg.state.or. us/hayden Email: rep.cedrichayden@ state.or.us • Rep. Peter DeFazio (House of Representatives) 405 East 8th Ave. #2030 Eugene, Ore. 97401 Email: defazio.house.gov/ contact/email-peter Phone: 541-465-6732 • Sen. Ron Wyden 405 East 8th Ave., Suite 2020 Eugene, Ore. 97401 Email: wyden.senate.gov Phone: (541) 431-0229 • Sen. Jeff Merkley Email: merkley.senate.gov Phone: 541-465-6750 C ottage G rove S entinel (541) 942-3325 Administration Jenna Bartlett, Group Publisher Gary Manly, General Manager ........................................................Ext. 207 gmanly@cgsentinel.com Jakelen Eckstine, Marketing Specialist ...........................................Ext. 213 jeckstine@cgsentinel.com Editorial Ned Hickson, Managing Editor........................................541-902-3520 ..... nhickson@cgsentinel.com Caitlyn May, Editor. ..........................................................................Ext. 212 cmay@cgsentinel.com Zach Silva, Sport Editor ....................................................................Ext. 204 zsilva@cgsentinel.com Customer Service Mandi Jacobs, Offi ce Manager .........................................................Ext. 200 Legals, Classifi eds ...................................................Ext. 200 mjacobs@cgsentinel.com Production Ron Annis, Production Supervisor ..................................................Ext.215 graphics@cgsentinel.com (USP 133880) Subscription Mail Rates in Lane and Portions of Douglas Counties: 10 Weeks .........................................................................................$11 One year ..........................................................................................$41 e-Edition year .................................................................................$35 Rates in all other areas of United States: 10 weeks, $15; 1 year, $53; e-Edition $35. In foreign countries, postage extra. No subscription for less than 10 weeks. Subscription rates are subject to change upon 30 days’ notice. All subscritptions must be paid prior to beginning the subscription and are non-refundable. Periodicals postage paid at Cottage Grove, Oregon. Postmaster: Send address changes to P.O. Box 35, Cottage Grove, OR 97424. Local Mail Service: Write to Ned Hickson at: nhickson@cgsentinel.com If you don’t receive your Cottage Grove Sentinel on the Wednesday of publication, please let us know. Call 942-3325 between 8:30 a.m. and 5 p.m. Advertising Ownership: All advertising copy and illustrations prepared by the Cottage Grove Sentinel become the property of the Cottage Grove Sentinel and may not be reproduced for any other use without explicit written prior approval. Copyright Notice: Entire contents ©2017 Cottage Grove Sentinel
