Letters to the Editor: September 2012

City Council shouldn’t let Carl Mumpower and Chad Nesbitt bully them into taking away another freedom from women.

It’s hypocritical enough that the same people who usually rant about too much “nanny state” regulation are now demanding the government protect them from being aroused by the sight of female breasts.

But by caving to these political publicity-seekers and calling on state legislators to suppress women’s equality in this way, Council is simply making the situation worse.

What till now has been an attention-getting stunt staged by the Raelian cult could henceforth balloon into topless protests organized by principled libertarian Ashevillians angered by government-enforced prudery.

It wasn’t long ago that many towns banned miniskirts because the sight of women’s bared legs supposedly incited lust and divided the community.

All such bans succeeded in doing was to make wearing a miniskirt a fashionable and easy way to defy authority.

Moreover, for the Raelians, public female breast-baring is a religious practice (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raëlian_beliefs_and_practices).

Outlawing this nonviolent, nondestructive act simply because some people find it objectionable would violate the First Amendment’s prohibition against government interference with religion.

Avoid stoking the fire, and the annual topless rally would fizzle out on its own once locals got bored with it and the Raelians decided it isn’t recruiting enough converts. (This year’s attendance was already down from last year.)

But taking away a right from all Asheville women just because one religion’s exercise of it stirred controversy disrespects the people of Asheville, and could provoke a backlash that will, in turn, just generate yet more publicity for our two local right-wing exhibitionists.

The recent topless rally in Asheville is almost as egregious as the city officials granting permission to allow such degrading, inappropriate behavior in the downtown area.

While I did not attend, there are reports of children and young teens in attendance being exposed to the debacle of women displaying partial frontal nudity to the catcalls, lewd comments and touching/fondling from some in the crowd in the name of equal rights.

It seems absurd to hold a rally in protest to something already legal, which to many, should be illegal on all accounts.

I cannot imagine eating a fine restaurant in Asheville or attending a Tourists’ game and worrying if children or grandchildren might be exposed to someone who wants to show up topless as it is legal, after all.

This behavior brings discomfort, confusion, and degrades women on every level. In protest of this insanity, a boycott movement is occurring in the outlying communities that provide Asheville with financial profits to this fair city.

Perhaps if enough of citizens from Brevard, Waynesville, Pisgah Forest, Hendersonville, Mills River, and others spend our money elsewhere, change will occur.

I cannot imagine with the unfortunate economical hardships facing many Americans that Asheville would want to lose significant revenue from decent citizens who are within equal driving distance to Greenville, S.C.

Remember, many of us support doctors offices, restaurants, shopping centers, breweries and other places that provide many jobs and income for your citizens.

It is my hope that all citizens will see the danger in allowing such a rally to occur again. Unless those of us who favor decency and morals will take a stand, it is highly possible some will begin to accept other inappropriate behavior (such as public urination, full frontal nudity for all, and coitus) and begin to plan time to travel to Asheville to watch a public “pissing” contest or bring our children to watch overt sexual acts by the water fountain.

As for my family, we will spend our money elsewhere and will encourage family and friends to vacation anywhere but Asheville.

Sept. 19, 2012 will be the first anniversary of the closing of one of the best bookstores in Asheville — BooksAMillion.

I and others are still angry over this closing. This bookstore was there for 20 years, so what gives?

I and others want you to know that we miss you and also thank you for all your service and respect to all customers.

I wish I could thank you all in person, but you seem to have left the planet, as I have not seen any of you around. Take care. You are great people.

Terry O’Keefe’s recent column (in the Asheville Citizen-Times) has given me hope that someone is radically changing our education system for the better.

Using technology and thinking outside the box, our educators might make progress moving into the 21st century ... years after business discovered better ways of doing things.

For the last 50 years, our educators have called for more money, more teachers, and smaller classes with no measurable improvement in public schools.Whenever an idea like charter schools, vouchers or virtual classrooms came up, there was resistance from the public education system. Ideas threatening the tenure or seniority system and NEA membership giving control to parents and students was anathema to educators.

This revolutionary concept from Gene Wade, and Sebastian Thrun using the Internet to expand opportunities to students, results in a significant cost savings (and a significant reduction in teachers).

They can hire only the best teachers and pay them well, unencumbered by administrative bureaucracy. All of this work is being done in a private education environment.

The United States was the biggest provider of weapons to other countries, last year. In terms of how much money it moved, it tripled its 2010 purchases and moved $66.3 billion worth of arms.Russia, by the way, was the second biggest seller with $4.8 billion in agreements.

The USA now provides THREE-QUARTERS of all the arms trade on the planet. And they gave Obama the Nobel Peace Prize??

We NOW sell three times as much weaponry as two years ago. Of course, jobs in those military-industrial sectors are soaring (Boeing for example).Proud of this?

Thank God we don’t live in NYC. Only this morning (Aug. 24), a lunatic, laid off a year ago, decided to shoot someone in downtown New York City.

Mind you now that NYC has the strictest gun control laws in the country thanks to the Sullivan Act unconstitutionally imposed more than 100 years ago in 1911 in the wake of a notorious Gramercy Park blueblood murder-suicide. Poor innocent New Yorkers!

This morning, New York’s doofus mayor Bloomberg related how the shooter shot his victim three times with his .45 Auto (it’s so AUTO it almost shoots by itself with no help from the shooter).

Then Bloomberg explains how a citizen who followed the shooter several blocks and, en route, identified the shooter to police.The cops, catching up to the shooter, unloaded upon and killed the shooter, blasting nine other innocent bystanders in the process and sending them to local hospitals.

If gun laws in NYC were like those in Texas and many other states and cities in the U.S., the “perp” would have been downed by a bystander — no harm to innocent bystanders.

I appreciate your coverage of my recent talk on electric vehicles, photovoltaics, and the power grid, but I must correct one glaring misrepresentation of my views: My comments on independence and interdependence were in response to a question about “preppers” anticipating the total collapse of the electric grid, not about transportation choices.

I don’t worry about losing my freedom to drive sports cars, or about being forced against my will to ride the bus or carpool, because such coercion is extremely unlikely.

Over 200 million American drivers own over 250 million vehicles. We love our cars. Even here in liberal Asheville, anything remotely resembling automotive prohibition would be political suicide.

Improved funding for transit and sidewalks is not a first step onto some slippery slope toward Stalinist restrictions on driving, no matter how much politically overheated wind shrieks otherwise.

Absent another elective war in the Middle East, all four of the necessary steps toward sustainable transportation (VMT reduction, better vehicle usage, powertrain electrification, and distributed PV) will be taken voluntarily, by individuals, at our own pace.

EDITOR’S NOTE: The Daily Planet stands by its story, but appreciates Erb’s expanded views on individual freedom.

EDITOR’S NOTE: The following letter to the editor, which appeared in the the Asheville Citizen-Times on Aug. 10, is reprinted here because of its relevance and by permission of the author.

A friend I respect surprised me with this: “I’m a conservative, and as I read your columns, you think conservatives are bad people.”His criticism was disturbing to me. I write columns and letters to make people think. If I offend people, I defeat my purpose.

Conservatives are good people, especially conservative Christians. No question about that. But they are misinformed, terribly misinformed. Too many of them read, watch and listen to people ─ the bad people in this context ─ who sacrifice truth and sanity in their war on Barack Obama, Agenda 21 and world governmen. Obama’s schemes to cancel the election and establish dictatorship. “Personal freedom” through extreme capitalism. Global warming a hoax. Non-stop nonsense. And Obamacare.

For goodness sake, the Obamacare model was born in the conservative Heritage Foundation (Google “wall street journal obamacare’s heritage”) and pushed by Newt Gingrich in the 1990s (WSJ piece has Romney-Gingrich debate quote).

Conservatives loved the personal responsibility the plan requires ─ until it was proposed by Obama. Then it became a plot to take away our freedom.

I’m sad that so many good people believe the bad ideas and distortions that are circulating around today. That’s why I write.