Letters

War of the Words

Charles P. Pierce covers most of the issues associated with bad language on the radio ("Hot-Button Issue," July 18), but there's one thing I didn't read: the fact that on sports radio, the discussions often turn away from sports to denigrating women and others. Recenty, my husband, three children, and I were listening to a sports radio show in Texas, to hear news about the Tour de France. The guys on the air, who had been talking about baseball, finished their conversation; within seconds, I heard the word "nymphomaniac."

Children are listening to sports radio, often with their parents, and we expect it to be about sports. My husband says that Texas program has such a good "formula" that it's being copied around the country. The formula is sports with sexist, disgusting, non-sports-related garbage thrown in.

If stations do not adhere to a program's advertised content, I agree with the censorship and the fines, because the broadcasters are misrepresenting themselves to the public.

MARCY L. TANTER, Stephenville, Texas

If it is in fact "dirty talk," as the magazine's cover headline says, why is it on the public airwaves? And what, exactly, is this juvenile fascination with shouting dirty words in public?

ROBERT POWERS, Canton

Beauty and the Beasts

On my arrival at the University of Michigan years ago, the first thing I heard from a group of women my age was that men were pigs ("Tales From the City," July 18). I am now 55 and have spent the last 37 years being told, on almost a daily basis, the very same thing.

OK, those are the cards I was dealt. But I stopped holding doors open for women 15 years ago. Maybe the men in the Park Street T station who didn't bother to help the "drop-dead gorgeous" woman with her suitcase are men who know their value. And they know they deserve more than what they receive.

You reap what you sow.

DANA HAYDEN, Boston

Restaurant Etiquette

Millie Downing apparently feels that restaurant diners should compensate their servers for any stress they cause them ("Miss Behave," July 11). Servers, like any other workers, should learn to take the bad with the good. They should be advised, when bad things happen, to focus on those times when they benefited without making much effort, such as when they collected a 20 percent tip or more for simply taking and bringing an order, then disappearing until it was time to deliver the check.

FRED HARVEY, Natick