In last Wednesday’s Sounder, Timothy Coffey wrote that we should “Stand up in the face of bigotry.” So, OK, I’ll do that: Mr. Coffey your supposedly anti-bigotry rant was about as bigoted a bit of writing as ever I’ve read.

Our founders told us that we must freely permit expressions of all sorts of ideas, including those that are repugnant to almost all of us. That’s what the First Amendment is all about.

You, Mr. Coffey, had no right to intrude yourself into a private conversation, no matter that it was in a public place, just because you found the subject matter to be repugnant. When the people holding their private conversation then told you to stop listening in, and to leave, they were absolutely correct.

Further, you have no right of complaint against those people, their subject matter, or their opinions. Rather, they have a strong right of complaint against you and your Politically Correct desire to stifle them. It is only by airing all opinions, including those which are offensive, that we promote thinking, understanding, and potential change.

We are not snowflakes, needing protection against foreign ideas. All of us think, and many of us think critically. We are capable of winnowing bad ideas from good. We do not need you, Mr. Coffey, to do it for us.

Steve Henigson

Eastsound