Littleton Tragedy

* Being a best-selling novelist and famous Baltimore Oriole fan should not make one a publishable social commentator. Tom Clancy’s April 27 commentary on the Littleton tragedy was pure blather. I would like to know exactly where modern schoolbooks assert that stealing is wrong because you might feel bad, as he claims they do. Worse, he actually goes on to equate rap music and Web sites about Hitler.

He appears to believe that if all kids could just attend Catholic school, be instilled with the pope’s notion of right and wrong and be told that some things are just wrong, all social ills would be eased. For some reason, I would imagine that telling these kids, who had recently been arrested and received counseling, that committing murder “is wrong” wouldn’t have been the most successful intervention. That’s probably why they did it.

ERIC OIFER

Santa Monica

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Clancy is absolutely right. It’s time to realize that there is such a thing as right and wrong, and when people do wrong, they must be punished. Furthermore, we must blame ourselves for creating such a morally ambiguous society.

If we do not lay down moral absolutes, then we have no right to expect people to behave decently and responsibly in our society.

RAYMOND TAM

Monrovia