letters, 5/28/2003

[May 28th, 2003] WOMEN ARE NOT FOR SWAPPING

I read in Willamette Week that Barfly magazine is hosting a porn swap the first Sunday of every month at Lucky Inn [Night Avenger, May 21, 2003]. I was surprised and confused to hear that WW would promote an event that allows women to be traded like baseball cards. I usually associate Barfly magazine with going out and having a good time--not degrading women.

Kelly Wallace
Southeast 34th Avenue

DRIVING ON THE WRONG SIDE

I could care less what people drive or who they sleep with or what substances they enjoy, but my eye did catch the words of Rich LaSasso's May 14 letter to the editor on the Hummer H2 story ["Endless Hummer," WW, April 30, 2003], and particularly his comment that "it's wrong to own and drive them" (emphasis added).

I am a very liberal person, but once in a while I do enjoy the fact that someone is willing to make an absolute distinction between right and wrong conduct. I pulled my copy of the 10 Commandments but did not see any references to Hummers. I also tried to read my wife's copy of the Koran, but there was no index and therefore I could not find any reference to H2 ownership or use. I don't have a copy of the Torah, but with a name like LaSasso it seems unlikely the author is Jewish (but then again, I have been wrong before). So who, other than Mr. LaSasso, has declared the ownership or use of any particular form of transportation to be "wrong"?

I walk through my local grocery or discount store and see people lining up to buy products made by multinational corporations that are dedicated to screwing the working class and our environment. I hear politicians make speeches that are so full of lies that I almost vomit. I watch my co-workers fall into debt and become slaves of the banks and elite monied class that controls the Republican Party and our nation.

People who choose to drive fancy or large vehicles are no better or worse than the rest of us. Unfortunately, the rest of us are mostly sheep being led to the slaughter. The big boys enjoy distracting all of us with bright shining coins and pointless arguments about H2s. That way you won't be looking when they hit you with the sledgehammer, just like another sheep on the slaughterhouse floor.

Greg Dennis
Vancouver, Wash.

DRIVER'S ED

Letter writer Derek Dillingham [Mailbox, WW, May 14, 2003] suggested that it wouldn't solve many of our car-dependent culture's problems if every SUV were traded in for a Toyota Prius. This got me to wondering. So I looked online and found the Prius gets 45 miles per gallon in the city while the best mileage for a Jeep Cherokee (by no means the worst example) is 19 mpg in the city. I tried to find how many SUVs are registered in the U.S., but I couldn't find national figures newer than 1997. Back then, it was slightly less than 15 million. So I used 15 million and multiplied it by 12,500 miles. Americans drive at least that much a year on average, don't they? Then I divided that figure by 19, and then by 45. Fifteen million SUVs would use 9.9 billion gallons of gasoline. Fifteen million Toyota Priuses would use 4.2 billion gallons. So if I understand Mr. Dillingham correctly, using 5 billion fewer gallons of gasoline a year would not lessen our dependence on foreign oil or cut choking emissions from our atmosphere. Huh?

John Yoakum
Southwest Jackson Street

ABSENCE OF MALLETS

Regarding your listing of bike polo in your I Like Bike summer calendar [May 21, 2003]: Shift to Bikes has nothing to do with bike polo. Only one of their members has ever even attended games, and the description in the calendar is a severe misrepresentation of the game. The correct Web address is www.portlandmessenger.org, and while I am happy to have our sport advertised, I wish it to be sold correctly.

Tad "Spoiler" Bamford
Founder, Axles of Evil
North Minnesota Avenue