ANONYMOUS CORRESPONDENCE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23974, 24 November 1939, Page 13

ANONYMOUS CORRESPONDENCE

TO THE EDITOR Sir, —I find your footnote to my letter intriguing especially as the writer of the letter in question informs me that some 10 days after the election he was discussing with a friend the attacks on Mr Cox. which continued after the election. He showed a copy of his rejected letter to his friend who then wrote to your correspondence column protesting against the. tactics that were being continued He also set out the facts about the filling up of the gully on Councillor Cameron's section at Liberton. speculated on the number of letters that would have been published in your correspondence column if the section had been owned by Mr Cox instead of by Councillor Cameron, and appealed for fair play for all. You declined to publish the letter and on May 23 vour refusal was couched as follows in your "Answers to Correspondents " column:—" 'Another Elector.'—Rather oddly you seem to be aware of the terms of an unpublished letter from a person other than yourself. No insinuation was intended and none was conveyed bv the sub-heading mentioned by vou." In your footnotes to my letters you deny that partiality is shown and that if a reasonable opportunity for reply had existed you would have published such a letter. Why then was the letter of May 22 suppressed? If the section had been owned by Mr Cox or by myself instead of by Councillor Cameron I wonder if the letter would have been suppressed.— I am, etc., D. G. McMillan Highgate. November 23. [The reason for the non-publication of the latter which we received on May 9, 1938, was stated by us at the time and was. as we explained, in accordance with a rule that is always applied by us on the eve of an important election. In these circumstances a correspondent's comment on the application of this rule was justly refused. As will be sufficiently obvious, the second sentence in the answer to "Another Elector," which Dr McMillan quotes, had reference to another matter.—Ed., O.D.T.]

TO THE EDITOR Sir,—As part of the letter of your anonymous correspondent "Alexander McShane" is of the Semple invictive type I do not intend replying to it. but shall confine myself chiefly to the challenge extended to him and his contortionist reply. He accused me of "attributing to him statements he never made " and in reply to my challenge he seeks to justify this charge by writing: "In a previous letter I am charged with claiming that what I do is right, but what the other man does is wrong." What I said was: " Queer indeed are ethics propounded by 'Alexander McShane'! Summed up they amount to a claim that ' what I do, etc'" It was quite clear that this was the opinion I had come to after a perusal of his weak excuses for hiding his identity under a nom de plume. Even a person with a primary school education will realise that this was vastly different from " attributing to him" this statement. I "entirely agree with him that " the attacker, like the spy, has no identity," for he has taken every care to hide his, even to the extent of using a name to which he was not entitled. I am perfectly aware that many authors of high repute use pseudonyms, but never for hiding their identity in attacks on other people. Furthermore, any book of reference on the subject gives their real name, but "Alexander McShane" has taken every precaution to hide the real authorship of his "ethical" effusions from your readers. Why? Surely he is not afraid of receiving threatening letters or insulting telephone messages from his friends in the Labour movement! As expected he has made no attempts to justify the vicious attacks made through the Government propaganda machine, euphoniously called the radio, by prominent members of the Socialist Party against defenceless men and, to their everlasting shame, defenceless women. But. of course, we could not expect him to admit that anything was wrong that was done by them—such is the result of the new "kulture" which has sprung up in the Dominion since 1935! So in saving good-bye to "Alexander McShane" I would suggest to him that he should in future eschew piracy of honourable names as a means of hiding his anonymity when he is attacking others.—l am, etc., Hose Tan.