Every week, The Post runs a collection of letters of readers’ grievances — pointing out grammatical mistakes, missing coverage and inconsistencies. These letters tell us what we did wrong and, occasionally, offer praise. Here, we present this week’s Free for All letters.
Sima Bakalian, Bethesda
Our true (primary) colors
Regarding the March 6 front-page story “Trump pulls closer to nomination”:
There are two dominant candidates for the upcoming presidential election, each one competing for his party’s nomination. Yet, after Super Tuesday’s voting gave each man a commanding lead in his contest, The Post’s front page spoke of only one person in large bold letters: the former president. This was not a fair or accurate picture of the primary process.
Ruth Salinger, Bethesda
For Afghan cricketers, centuries and centuries — back in time
The caption for the photo accompanying the March 4 front-page article “Taliban envisions Afghanistan as cricket power” should have started “Boys play cricket” rather than “Children play cricket.” “Children” implies both girls and boys. As the article stated in its 15th paragraph, the Taliban has banned women and girls from playing sports. The end of the article did include more information about the sad situation for female athletes in Afghanistan; the caption should have reflected that reality.
Anne Kaiser, Silver Spring
From making plays to writing them
I don’t know how Charlyn Chu and her basketball teammates at Richard Montgomery High School are going to fare in the sports world after the playoffs, the pressure of which she captured so well in the March 1 entry in her Basketball Diaries guest column, “Senior night was special, but now it’s playoff time” [Sports]. However, as a retired high school teacher who taught journalism and other forms of writing in Northern Virginia schools for 37 years, I can attest that Chu already displayed a gift for writing. I look forward to reading more of her work in the future.
Michael Hoover, Palmyra, Va.
Making a play for bankruptcy
Regarding the March 4 theater review “Financial play isn’t quite worth investment” [Style]:
I go to a lot of theater, and every once in a while, I’ll read a review and wonder whether the reviewer and I saw the same play. This rarely happened in the era of Post theater critic Peter Marks — I might have disagreed with his particular interpretation, but I never questioned his understanding of the playwright’s intent and stagecraft.
But I had to rub my eyes in reading this review of “The Lehman Trilogy.” The financial drama “doesn’t quite work”? The 2022 Tony Award winner for best play is, to paraphrase the review, a wordy slog? If so, was the audience that sat raptly through the play and exploded into standing ovations after each act totally deluded? If so, why have I been talking about the play and urging my friends to see it ever since the Sunday matinee I attended?
The sad part is that had I read the review earlier, I might have decided not to buy a ticket — and consequently missed one of the most phenomenal theater experiences of my life. I hope others will not be dissuaded by a review that “doesn’t quite work,” at least not for me.
Rayna Aylward, Annandale
Fertile ground for grapes of wrath
I was amazed at the headline on Alexandra Petri’s Feb. 25 op-ed, “Congrats, infertile parents: You already have a child!” Couples who must resort to in vitro fertilization to have a child go through the hell of IVF with absolutely no assurance that it will result in a real, live, breathing, full-term, in-your-arms baby. To read a headline that minimized that desire and difficulty when these families find that their only hope at biological parenthood is at risk felt hurtful, even in service of satire.
Anita Heygster, Pasadena
Malpractice by The Post’s spin doctors
Hashem Zikry’s March 5 Tuesday Opinion essay, “ERs have become so efficient, they’re killing people,” was certainly titled to attract attention!
But emergency rooms are not killing people; hospitals, insurers and other systems that strand patients who need admission in overcrowded ERs are the problem. Incentivized administrators want beds filled by elective surgery cases, not low- or no-pay ER admissions. Two decades ago, The Post published a piece I wrote complaining about delays at my Johns Hopkins emergency room, and though I found the title inelegant, it was not inaccurate. Maybe outside writers to The Post should ask to approve all the potential headlines that might appear on their pieces online and in print. The headline of Zikry’s op-ed was so distant from its content that I thought it made for a good reminder to readers not to form impressions from scanning the titles only.
Hugh Hill, Huntly, Va.
Fauna champions deserve their floras
Thanks for the Feb. 24 obituary of Steven M. Wise, the president of the Nonhuman Rights Project who, as the headline put it, “Sought to transform legal system as warrior for animal rights.” This was the second time in a little more than three months that The Post reported the death of a stalwart of the animal rights movement, including the notice of the death of Karen Davis, president of United Poultry Concerns [“Animal rights activist opposed the poultry industry,” obituaries, Nov. 25].
Although their unyielding work and ultimate hopes for the way animals are treated have yet to win the day, both epitomized what Mohandas Gandhi, a staunch advocate for animals, had in mind when he said, “In a gentle way, you can shake the world.”
Ed Mulrenin, Washington
‘Insectile’ … ‘charged’ … ‘vapor’ … Oh, it’s the Firefly Variation of ‘Flight of the Bumblebee’!
Michael Andor Brodeur’s March 6 Critic’s Notebook, “For NSO, a tour de force,” included a description of a National Symphony Orchestra performance in Europe as having an “insectile intensity … which felt at times like a charged vapor.” The word “insectile” stumped and bemused me. That’s okay, I’m no expert in music, vapors or bugs, and the Oxford English Dictionary website says I’ll encounter “insectile” only once for every hundred million words I read. I did comprehend the photos by Scott Suchman, though. He has a great ability to combine composition, storytelling and light in wonderful pictures.
Tim Hurd, McLean
The ’80s called. They want their caller ID back.
It’s worth making sure that a cute phrase, no matter how compelling, is still rooted in fact. In the Feb. 25 Business article “What everyone can learn from the journalist who lost $50,000 to a scam,” the writer claimed “caller ID technology has been around since landlines.” Landlines connected via a switching center were introduced in the Boston area in 1877. Caller ID was commercially introduced in the late 1980s.
Bill McCloskey, Bethesda
WaPo de Subtracter
I was very disappointed to learn that you will no longer be printing cartoons by Michael de Adder. I found his cartoons to be very insightful and right-on every time.
James Hatfield, Encinitas, Calif.
Don’t give feds the boot
I was reading with interest Daniel Pink’s March 5 Tuesday Opinion column, “Why not require a civics test for all Americans?,” until a sentence brought me up short: “Neither a jackbooted federal marshal nor a well-meaning newspaper columnist can revoke that status or force you to renew it by passing a quiz.” There, the piece lost me. In a piece about citizenship, and a time when public service is under attack, it’s a real shame to slur the federal workers who help preserve the benefits of citizenship, even in jest. Don’t we have enough naming, shaming and blaming in today’s world?
Dan Ashe, Rockville
No spoilers, but stay tuned
The Post should include much more local news. On Feb. 26, the Metro section had six pages. Sports had 10. Before he took the recent buyout, John Kelly wrote an excellent Metro column on a variety of subjects. Please hire someone to follow in his footsteps.
Janice Magnuson, Alexandria
