Pink Backlash
As a former contributing writer to Isthmus, I understand that there is a separation between news/editorial and advertising content.
However, as much as I enjoyed perusing your recent in-depth coverage of the history and artistry of our state Capitol (“The Capitol at 100,” 6/29/2017), I found your un-coverage of a woman in a pruriently pandering photo on page 35 shocking, offensive and outrageous, given the message of social responsibility you generally espouse.
The contribution that Isthmus makes to our community may be endangered by a backlash from your socially aware and activated readership, in which we could powerfully put our pink on to demand that municipal merchants refuse distribution of your publication when it peddles pornography.
Elena (Ellen) Rulseh (via email)
The women in the explicit advertisements in each issue of Isthmus may “choose” their line of work, and even feel “empowered” by getting nude or having sex for cash, but as long as we live in a world where one in five women are victims of sexual violence, and a world in which there is an estimated $810 million spent in the field of sex trafficking each year (most of these victims being women and girls), then at what [point] does individual choice become trumped by human rights? These images you print and circulate each week do not exist in a vacuum, nor do these individuals’ alleged choices.
So, I ask: At what point does Isthmus become accountable for the fact that you feature explicit images of near-naked women on a WEEKLY basis, telling your female readers that their bodies are commodities and (more frighteningly) telling your male readers that the women and girls in this city are here for their pleasure and their purchase? At what point will the humanity of the women and girls who read your paper be considered over some of your readers’ desire for bought-and-sold “consent”?
Bridget Sharkey (via email)
Unfit to serve
Re: “Democracy dies in darkness, Wisconsin edition,” 6/27/2017). Justice Michael Gableman got appointed to the Burnett County Circuit Court bench by Gov. Scott McCallum, who ignored the shortlist of three and dipped into the “reject” pool to find Gableman. That was bad enough, but Gableman managed to achieve even worse. His campaign against former Supreme Court Justice Louis Butler set new lows in Wisconsin judicial elections. Conniff’s report of his present conduct against Justices Shirley Abrahamson and Ann Walsh Bradley can only make us glad that he has declined to run for another term. Frankly, the Court’s conduct makes me embarrassed to be a lawyer in this state.
Gene R. Rankin (via email)