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Readers write: porn as a public health crisis; Flint's poisoned water

Letters to the editor for the March 21, 2016 weekly magazine.

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Rick Bowmer/AP/File
Republican Sen. Todd Weiler speaks on the senate floor at the Utah state Capitol in Salt Lake City in 2015. Weiler introduced a legislative resolution that would declare pornography a public health crisis, similar to cigarettes.

Porn as a public health crisis
Regarding the Feb. 22 One Week article “Is porn a public health crisis?”: Hurray for Utah – its lawmakers and citizens – for being the first state to declare pornography a public health crisis! Like alcohol, tobacco, marijuana, and gambling, it does more harm than good. Who needs research when observation and common sense prove the point? Hopefully this will make us think deeper about what we should and shouldn’t be doing to raise the standard of living wherever we live.
Steven Price
San Rafael, Calif.

Politicians on the hook in Flint
Regarding the March 8 online article “Flint families seek financial compensation for lead crisis” (CSMonitor.com): Presidential candidates Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton filled their March 6 debate in Flint, Mich., with full-throated empathy and calls for a substantial amount of money to fix our nation’s crumbling infrastructure. One fact they forgot to point out is that the poisoning of Flint’s water system was the direct result of the Republicans wanting to “run government like a business.” It was cheaper to get the water from the Flint River than from the Detroit water system, especially when anti-corrosion purification processes were omitted. People will suffer a lifetime because of that Republican way of thinking. And who profits? Government fills the needs that a profit-driven market system cannot fulfill.
Bruce Joffe
Piedmont, Calif.

Regarding the Feb. 22 Monitor’s View “Fixing Flint’s water pipes – and the ‘trust deficit’ ”: The editorial states that the people in Flint, Mich., “are now starting to turn their accusing fingers at themselves” rather than at their elected officials. Really? As citizens, we do the best we can to elect honest, responsible public officials. It’s not easy. But whether someone likes it or not, those politicians are accountable to us for their actions and decisions and are not off the hook because we voted for someone who later proved undeserving.
Ellen T. White
Blue Ridge, Ga.

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Dear Reader,

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