Ban writers for repetition, not for their political views

SATURDAY, MAY 27, 2017
Ban writers for repetition, not for their political views

Re: “Disagreement is the lifeblood of democracy” and  “Attempt to ban opinions betrays dictatorial mindset”, Have Your Say, May 26. 

It was really touching to read the defences of freedom of liberty and speech expressed in two letters on Friday. It almost brought tears to my eyes! However, both writers are barking up the wrong tree in criticising me. 
My intent was not to ban extremist points of view, but to ban people such as Mr Wilcox and Mr Bart, who are always writing letters to this publication.   
It was previously suggested by someone awhile back that all writers should have a quota of allotted letters per year. By this standard, both of the aforementioned individuals have clearly surpassed their quota for the year already. It just so happens that they harbour opposing political views. So when one of the letter writers this past week implied that JC Wilcox should be banned, I stated in my last missive that, for sake of fairness, so should another prolific contributor to these pages, Eric Bart – who coincidentally harbours extreme leftist views. I do not imply that they should be banned forever, only for the rest of the year.
I couldn’t care less about an individual’s political views, but what I do care about is that these pages hear from a variety of voices, and not from the same ones over and over.  
Paul
Khon Kaen