Tube Boob To the Editor, Regarding "Out Rage" (Tucson Weekly, May 8): Tom Danehy expresses concern that religious people must now "openly embrace (the gay lifestyle) or be branded a bigot." If I were Danehy, I would be sincerely worried about this bigot label. After all, when the shoe fits, wear it. No one forced him to watch Ellen. No one asked him to embrace anything or anyone. My Southern Baptist relatives prefer to avoid the extramarital sex (including, at times, adultery) portrayed on one of Danehy's favorite sitcoms, Seinfeld. These relatives exercise their constitutional right to turn off the television. I suggest that Danehy do the same. Danehy writes, "I admit I don't know everything there is to know about the gay lifestyle." Let me educate him a bit. For starters, there is no singular "gay lifestyle." Gays and lesbians are our co-workers, our friends, our relatives, and our neighbors. They are all races, all incomes, and all religions. Television, to a certain extent, reflects our society. Danehy doesn't have to enjoy Ellen. He may, however, have to accept that gays and lesbians are among us and that many are no longer silent. --Suzanne Rabe Senior Trip To the Editor, I always read Jeff Smith's columns with a little sadness, because he has a tendency to weaken what often are good and provocative pieces by his compulsive need to throw in scatological words and phrases. It seems to me that he's very bitter about his self-perceived loss of manhood and feels he can prove his virility by writing like this. I've considered writing him and pointing out that real manhood is not necessarily determined by the ability of his nether regions to perform. After reading his diatribe "Hank's Half-Acre" (Tucson Weekly, May 22), though, I've lost all sympathy. So he doesn't approve of Henry Koffler's project--that's his privilege, but why lash out wildly at people whose only crime is getting older? I'll be 67 at the end of this month--I'd like to hold time back, but I can't. My husband is still a professor at the at the UA at age 70--I hope this fact does not trigger another expletive-laden tirade from poor Jeff. Since we have no intentions of retiring to the Arizona Senior Academy, I have a question for Smith. Does the fact that we will not be going there spare us from being characterized as "old farts" and "dried up old studs and brood mares," or does reaching a certain age make it inevitable that we will be so labeled? And why the seemingly visceral hatred of professors? Did one of them once give you what you perceived to be an unfair mark? Or are you convinced that all your grades were unfair? You ask if the word "elitist" comes bubbling to the surface? Not as fast as the word ageist, Jeff. If a group of like-minded individuals choose to go to a certain retirement community, whose business is that if they have saved the required funds? And why should it be a cause of such mouth-foaming hostility? Can it be you are worried about your own retirement prospects after you have committed the unpardonable (but inevitable) sin of growing older? Lastly, I would suggest that a humane editor would have taken a look at these pathetic and self-revealing rantings and sent him home for a week to play with his beloved guns and cool off. And remind him that it isn't the fault of "old farts" that he once took a header from a recklessly driven motorcycle. --Jane H. Schotland To the Editor, I've always felt your paper has added a much-needed dose of community criticism to the city. But let's face it--you lose a lot of credibility when you print something like Jeff Smith's "Hank's Half-Acre" (Tucson Weekly, May 22). What is the point of it? Does he want to stop the Arizona Senior Academy? On what grounds? Is it illegal? Is there anything shady about it? And why all the filth-filled invectives about the "pampered professors?" A great many of them have utilized a long and expensive education to teach the younger generation, often at some economic hardship to themselves, when they could have made a great deal more in industry. Last time I looked, professors were hardly among society's fat cats. This poor lost soul obviously needs some psychiatric help. Like the kid in all the cereal commercials, he "hates everyone." By why do you chose to give him a forum to spew his Lear-like baying at the moon? As far as the "dried-up old studs," I presume most of them can still "get it up," which I fear is the basis of a lot of his rage. Because of his disability, he is pretty much limited to "scratching his nuts and picking his nose," to utilize some of his eloquent nomenclature. He protests too much in saying that he doesn't "give a shit." If that is true, why take the time to vent all this gut-wrenching venom against a retirement community? Don Quixote assumed epic proportions as a tragic figure by attempting to right wrongs. Jeff Smith just comes off as a pathetic cripple with a grudge against the whole world. And an ignorant one, too--it was the Chinese who killed the builders of their emperor's tombs to keep them secret. The Egyptian tombs were all too obvious to this very day. I think this is a vile and vicious letter I am writing. But it is in response to a vile and vicious column, and being called a "dried-up old broodmare" does not bring out the best in me. It is also one of the most sexist put-downs of women I've seen in print for a long time. I think he owes an apology to the entire senior generation of Tucson, too. He sounds like he wants to eliminate them from the Earth, but I would remind him that the Nazis he resembles placed more emphasis on eliminating the handicapped. This is a sick individual who needs to be helped, not given the opportunity to make a public jackass of himself. --Sally Stansfield To the Editor, Jeff Smith's "Hank's Half-Acre" (Tucson Weekly, May 22) was quite edifying. It revealed the following facts: He doesn't approve of the concept of the Arizona Senior Academy. He hates all older people; at what age do they become "farts," Jeffie? He hates all university professors, regardless of their age. He despises all women past a certain age and regards them as "dried-up old brood mares." He thinks it is cute to use vulgar and offensive language so long as you throw in a few long words and French phrases to prove you are "educated." Okay, now that you have revealed all this, Jeff, what do you want the public to do about it? Get together with you and Pat Buchanan and your pitchfork-carrying peasants and storm the gates of academia and retirement communities? I'll follow you anywhere, of course, but first you have to lay out the plans--I presume the details will be forthcoming in your next column and I'll be waiting eagerly. See you at the moat! --Dana S. Brown Return Fire To the Editor, Regarding the letters from the two readers condemning the Tucson Rod and Gun Club and applauding the Forest Service's decision in the closure of the club ("Firing Squad," Tucson Weekly, May 22): First of all, they should get their facts straight. Since when is Sabino Canyon a "sensitive wildlife area" and a "rare riparian area"? Maybe the beer cans floating in the creek are endangered. I submit that all of the hikers impact the wildlife and vegetation of the area far more than the gun range. A good example would be to look at the disappearance of the bighorn sheep. The club is not exclusionary. It is open to anyone who cares to use it and the facilities. It provides a safe, well-regulated place for the public to use guns in a responsible manner. The contention of Neal Savage that an NRA official stated it "would take years and cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to fix the range" is a total fabrication. No one from the NRA ever made this statement. In my view both of these nuts graduated from the same school of higher learning as our great forest expert Glen Shumsky. --Cliff Cox We Want Letters! Thrilled by our brilliant insights? Sick of our mean-spirited attacks? Need to make something perfectly clear? Write: tucsonweekly@tucsonweekly.com

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