Disclaimers up front could save a lot of trouble

By Letter to the Editor on January 31, 2018.

Re: “So sorry, but I am not sorry,” Jan. 22

I think Paul McLennan wrote his last column backwards.

He ends it with “These columns are my personal opinion on the matters of the world … If you do not agree with my opinions, you are probably wrong. But that is just my opinion.”

It is my opinion, this disclaimer should be at the beginning of McLennan’s column so instead of the reader getting all riled up about the purported facts in the column the reader can remain calm and consider his point of view without fear or favour.

Indeed, it is my opinion we should not adopt anyone else’s world view holus bolus but rather seek all the information we can, weigh it as rationally as we are able through our own biased mental filters and form our own opinions. We can then exchange opinions with others with a live-and-let-live attitude. Think of all the enmity we can avoid without the egoistic need to be right.

I wish to thank McLennan for his disclaimer even though — like television shows — the disclaimer should appear before the possibly offending material is broadcast and the viewer has the option of switching channels or turning the television off.

My opinion — and mine alone — is a disclaimer such as McLennan’s should appear before any column by anyone in the News to avoid hypertension, strokes, heart attacks, anxiety, hyperventilation, muscle spasms (twitches included), relational disharmony (including divorce), and various other calumnies too numerous to mention.

I dare say it is the News’ moral and ethical community duty to herewith adopt a disclaimer-first policy for all columns, editorials and especially the anonymous Ticked Off and Tickled Pink offerings. I expect a spectacular plummet in Medicine Hat and district’s crime rate, a parallel drop in visits to the hospital emergency room, crisis telephone lines gathering dust, mental health therapists with only their belly buttons left to contemplate and a surge in genuine joy spreading like the flu throughout the forgotten corner of Alberta.

Thanks, Paul, you’ve saved all us dolts who don’t think like you from ourselves.