Hello, and welcome to the first edition of Weekend Dialogue, a weekly column where I will go over some reader feedback with the hopes of creating a constructive back-and-forth between myself, the editor of this page, and you, the reader.
This time, I’ve chosen a few comments I’ve gotten over the past week about political polarization and its consequences, as well as some feedback on a recent editorial I wrote arguing that college athletes should be paid directly by schools and universities.
While I received multiple email responses for this first column, I’ve chosen just a few, as I’ll do each week.
Each has been edited for clarity and brevity. Let’s get into it.
I am a lifelong Chattanooga resident and a big fan of our local paper, reading it every day. I am also very concerned with the way our conversations are heading in that we are not able to talk to each other anymore about any important topic because we simply place people in camps with labels. I challenge you to write on and select other pieces from other writers that are thoughtful and steer away from the far left or far right commentary or pieces that simply attack and blame in a way that reads like a cable news segment. Because if not, you would be adding fuel to the massive and growing fire that is caused by the cable news networks and people’s social media algorithms. People lock into the same beliefs and are fed stories to look down on or even hate the other side. If you focus on thoughtful, more down-the-middle commentary or commentary that is respectful, acknowledging good and bad from the other side, you would have a better chance of challenging the reader to actually read both pages.