Field makes a point, but not everyone agrees

I am deeply troubled by censorship exhibited during Fox’s Emmy go-round. It seems disingenuous to believe Sally Field should be bleeped simply for combining the words “God” and “damned” within a single phrase. Surely, these words have been paired before on network TV without offense?

In truth, I suspect Fields’ comments were bleeped because of their antiwar content by an awards show controlled by News Corp., which, of course, owns the conservative Fox News Channel and the Fox network. With News Corp.’s recent purchase of the Wall Street Journal, I fear for free speech in a country where control of our news can be bought and sold on Wall Street.

The right to dissent should never become a commodity controlled by the highest bidder.

Max Ember

Los Angeles

IT’S not surprising that the Emmys had dismal ratings this year, because Americans have grown weary of childish actors using the stage to give their political opinions. Sally Field was typical of that group, asserting that, if mothers were in power, there would be no more (expletive) wars. I guess her writers forgot to put Golda Meir (Yom Kippur War, 1973) and Margaret Thatcher (Falklands War, 1982) into her script.

John Tintle

Nipomo, Calif.

SALLY FIELD is absolutely right about the stark gender divide between peace-loving mothers and war-making fathers. The benign nature of all female-dominated enclaves is clearly borne out by mothers/grandmothers who head families that hardly ever produce gang members, and guards at women’s prisons who carry flowers, not firearms in their holsters.

Enough of this cheap sloganeering. There’s plenty to answer for in this life no matter who you are or what genitalia you’re sporting. What’s next from Field? Perhaps the hat-trick of a future goofy acceptance speech at the Tony Awards?

Bob Bennett

Costa Mesa