GEORGE Bernard Shaw was, in all senses of the phrase, a great man of letters. He was an enthusiastic correspondent; he is known to have written more than 250,000 epistles in his lifetime, a mark even our most diligent regular contributors cannot hope to match. It seems apposite, therefore, to quote one of his aphorisms: “The secret to success,” he said, “is to offend the greatest number of people.”
I mention this because as Letters Editor, I know that it is impossible to please everyone.
Regular readers will by now have noted the declaration which appears overleaf, underneath our editorial comment: “The Herald is committed to providing fair and impartial coverage of Scotland’s affairs and does not endorse any political party or movement.”
That, of course, applies to the Letters Pages; we strive to publish a balanced and representative selection of our readers’ views.
The mailbag from one day a couple of weeks ago brings GBS to mind: I had just finished reading a letter complaining that we had published “the most unflattering photo of Gordon Brown that you could find”, when I turned to one which deplored the fact that we had carried a photograph which showed the First Minister’s legs when covering her statement on gender equality.
Neither illustration was intended to convey any message, subliminal or otherwise; but surely we are doing something right when we are accused of being biased by two opposing camps.
That said, the Letters Pages are much more than a platform for grumblings. Happily, we are able to provide a forum that is thought-provoking, informative and entertaining. Our mailbag is in robust health, and barely a week goes by without a first-time correspondent being published. I am grateful for your continued support.
As always, the topics we have aired have been wide and varied. Politics has, as is to be expected in a quality broadsheet, been to the fore, especially during the party conference season. But just in the past week we have discussed such issues as the state of our steel industry; the future of our airports; the success of the plastic bag charge; the performance of the NHS; Trident; the contract for the Hinkley Point nuclear power station; Britain’s relationship with China; the right to roam and wild camping; the provision of chemotherapy treatment within Glasgow; the role and performance of the House of Lords; Abellio ScotRail’s Club 50 service; the independence of the Bank of England; opted-out and denominational schools; the Scottish Grand Committee; the Royal Family’s titles north of the Border; the opera singer Patrica Kent; the wisdom of a single business school for Scotland; the private rented housing sector; bi-lingual road signs, and the viability of Police Scotland.
As mentioned above, new correspondents have been joining in, but there is always room for more. As has become almost traditional when I occupy this slot, I should run over some of our conventions (I was asked about this the other day): the maximum length we can accommodate is 500 words; we require full postal addresses for publication, and we encourage robust debate, but do not allow gratuitous personal insults.
Apart from that, pretty much anything goes. Any offence caused is entirely unintended.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
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