Editorial is personal attack, tells only a kernel of truth

A recent Deseret Morning News editorial ("Rocky versus Rockwell," Aug. 7, 2004), laments that there is too much divisiveness in Salt Lake City. And, of course, the editorial writer blames me. (As if the Deseret Morning News is not the greatest instrument of divisiveness in this community, constantly driving a wedge between members of the LDS Church and those who are not members.)

Do I raise issues that some people wish would just go away? Of course. Do I advocate for rights and interests that many oppose? No doubt. Do I go along just to get along? Never have. But do I shoot straight — always trying to understand and correctly represent the views of all, even those with whom I vigorously disagree? I think most would agree I do. I certainly try to, because I believe honesty and candor are crucial for constructive dialogue.

It's too bad the same can't be said for the Deseret Morning News editorial writer who penned the incredibly misleading aforementioned editorial. That editorial betrays the lengths to which some will go to misleadingly tell only a kernel of the truth and to deceptively set up straw men, only to triumphantly knock them down.

The subject of the editorial is what the press has come to call my list of "Seven Freedoms." (The phrase is the media's, not mine. Actually, I never intended to limit to seven those matters which urgently call out for attention by the Utah Legislature or City Council.)

What are those "Seven Freedoms?" You'll never know from reading the editorial. That's because the editorial writer was too busy creating his own deceptive caricature of my proposals, trivializing them as nothing more than "the freedom to dance after 2 a.m., and the freedom to have easier access to alcohol." (How better to divide the Mormons from those who are not?)

As reported a few days earlier in the Deseret Morning News ("The 7 freedoms espoused by Anderson," Aug. 4, 2004, and Brady Snyder, "Rocky is beckoning legislators to freedoms," Aug. 4, 2004), in articles apparently not read, or deceitfully overlooked, by the editorial writer, the "Seven Freedoms" included the following:

• The freedom to be safe from gun violence;

• The freedom for working people to make a decent living;

• The freedom for children without a permanent home and the freedom for potential adoptive parents who are unmarried to build a permanent family together, without the bigoted prohibition against adoption by unmarried parents;

• The freedom to teach children about family planning and prevention of sexually transmitted diseases; and

• The freedom to breathe clean air.