By Pedro Payano
“I don’t agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it,” — Evelyn Beatrice Hall
In the City of Lawrence, there is an unparalleled level of intolerance directed by some politicians and their faction of supporters. These leaders have a difficult time understanding how to interpret the slightest criticism and are unable to accept constructive criticism. From the moment someone makes a single objection or notes a difference with them, that person immediately is viewed as the enemy and becomes a target for possible attacks by supporters of that leader.
The recent outrageous slanders against Ms. Dalia Diaz, Director of the Rumbo newspaper, are an obvious example of this unacceptable practice and constitute an affront to free speech and freedom of the press. In this situation, we cannot be indifferent and look the other way to not get into a fight that we think is not ours to fight. To the contrary, every citizen in any society has an obligation to defend the rights of everyone to be able to express themselves without coercion.
What was the “crime” that had been committed by Dalia Diaz? She printed some information in her newspaper about the alleged poor attendance record at the State House of State Representative Marcos Devers, information that the Eagle-Tribune had already published and verified. Yet, Representative Devers’ followers chose to slander Mrs. Diaz when she was just exercising her rights. Nevertheless, they never made any remark or rebuttal against the newspaper that had published it first. I think that’s considered a double standard. They vent their frustrations attacking Rumbo, instead of challenging the power that represents the local English language mainstream newspaper.
If Representative Devers had merely clarified or defended his positon on the matter, we are sure that would have been the end of the conversation. Instead he took the matter to the Spanish radio complicating the discussion and making it bitter. This also shinned a light on the matter and led more voters to find out about his “excessive absences.” It also has the unintended effect of enabling his opponents to use it as a campaign issue.
Weeks later, Dalia published another article with information obtained from “The Office of the State Treasurer” and which questioned Representative Devers’ radio statements. According to Dalia, the evidence was proof that Representative Devers had lied to the people regarding his attendance record.
What was the immediate response from many of the Representative’s followers in the media? They launched a campaign to discredit Rumbo’s Editor so as to discredit her credibility. When there are no convincing arguments to prove a point of view they appeal to fallaciousness in order to confuse and divert attention from the real issue. If they really wanted to clarify that Dalia was incorrect, they could have presented the evidence to support their argument. They could have even written a letter to the editor expressing their opinion instead of attacking an individual’s character.
Sole responsibility of this intolerant practice rests with leaders who allow this type of behavior to occur. They most often seek to evade that responsibility by stating: “I do not control those people”; “they are not part of my team” and use other evasive tactics that demonstrate a lack of character and leadership. The fact that they choose to not address their supporters’ behavior, demonstrates that they condone their actions and mindset.
The irony is that some of them who supposedly advocate for a higher level of political ethics, preferred to submit their convictions over the interests of a political campaign. Without evidence to prove the contrary it would have been better to stay silent.
History demonstrates that men and women are not evaluated by their words but rather by their actions. It is during great trials and tribulations that an individual truly demonstrates his true convictions. It is therefore very important that we always have a vision to guide us; what are really the interests that we must defend, the people or an individual leader?
We hope that the incident that involved the attack on the press, does not repeat itself regardless of the political issue or candidate we support. Mrs. Diaz has all the rights to express her viewpoints just like each and every one of us. This is inherent to us by the First Amendment of the Constitution and the 19th article of the universal Declaration of Human Rights. Dalia Diaz has these rights and we should guarantee it in principle. If we are not in agreement with her viewpoint, respond to it, but do it with dignity and respect.
