THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, May 19, 1996 TAG: 9605170007
SECTION: COMMENTARY PAGE: J4 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Letter
LENGTH: Short : 28 lines
I have followed with interest reactions to the planned relocation of PETA to Hampton Roads. These include ``emergency'' legislation and threats of sanctions and even of violence against an organization that at worst is nonviolent and whose stated intent is to expose people to new ideas that are certainly in accord with the highest of Christian principles.
It seems that local sportsmen not only do not agree with what they perceive the PETA message to be but are afraid to confront it in the great American tradition of the Marketplace of Ideas. In so doing they appear to be quite craven; apparently not daring to confront new ideas on their merits but preferring to cower behind hastily constructed laws, which carve away yet another slice of our freedom, lest they meet a different idea.
Intrepid sportsmen indeed. What a bunch of wimps.
CURTISS PETERSON
Rescue, April 30, 1996 by CNB