OK CHARLES: You could be right in coming to the conclusions you did regarding the "He Said, She Said" incident you detailed in Police Beat [Charles Mudede, Oct 28]. But you may want to know that in the five years I've lived in Seattle, I've taken cabs perhaps 15 times, and have [encountered] about five incidents of the almost exact nature the Georgia woman described. Those cab drivers were UNBELIEVABLY assertive. I've also had angelic drivers, but the bad experiences are not to be dismissed. Being alone in the back of a car with a rude man in the driver's seat is immensely frightening and can make a woman rather bitchy. Drivers like that should be -- must be -- weeded out, hopefully in the job interview process!
Anonymous, Seattle
CHARLES MUDEDE: I was completely appalled at your Police Beat article about the woman in the cab. I can't believe you would allow such racism and blatant hypocrisy to soil your fair pages. First of all, you didn't have to put your "commentary" at the end of the [article]. I can make up my mind about who was right without reading, "...the woman was from Georgia, and so it's believable that she'd call him a 'motherfucking nigger.'" Not all people from Georgia are racist! And "...the cab driver did have a good-looking girlfriend"? SO WHAT?!?!? Does that mean he wouldn't hit on other people?? And the final and most irky one: "Well, as I'm African, I've decided to take a Bob Marley stance on the whole matter and unite with my African brother!" BULLSHIT!!! I am NOT racist, but I AM against hypocrisy, and if it were an African woman and a white cab driver with the same exact story, would Mr. Mudede go with his "African sister"?!!!????
Anonymous, via e-mail
IN RESPONSE TO CHARLES MUDEDE: Like the cab passenger in [his] story, I am from Georgia. I take offense at Mr. Mudede's comment that "the woman was from Georgia, and so it's believable that she'd call him a 'motherfucking nigger.'" We just happen to have a few million "motherfucking niggers" in this state, and, as such, are used to them performing menial labor. It's a non-issue around here. If you were to give me an Oriental cab driver, I might say, "go home, you motherfucking chink," because everyone knows chinks can't drive worth a shit and have no business driving [cars], much less cabs. Please print an apology to Georgians. If you don't, the few of us who can read will have to stop reading your paper.
A Proud Georgian, via e-mail
EVAN SULT: Thanks a lot for writing your piece ["Fight Club Rains Down on Chuck Palahniuk," Stranger Books, Oct 21]. I thought your analysis was perfect. I haven't seen [Fight Club] either, and I don't want to. Fincher's earlier film, Seven, was enough for me -- I found the lovingly detailed shots of people being tortured especially troubling. Fincher and Palahniuk are fascinated by violence, but rather than explore that fascination, they wish to be admired for it. But where is the "argument" for "honest violence," or "consensual violence"? I don't think they can make one, because there isn't one. Or this is it: "I feel like killing someone, so it must be right." And to prove this truth, they take the shallow but commercially successful [route] of glamorizing it with Brad Pitt. Unfortunately, as you point out, people are going to buy this argument because they feel this way too. But does the movie explore why we're pent up except in the most obvious way (too much Ikea and desk work)? Not that a movie has to "explore" anything; the obnoxious thing is this attempt to have it both ways -- to make a cartoon fantasy but market it as philosophy.
Mark Voss, via e-mail
STRANGER: Frank 'n' Bride breeding on the cover of the Oct 28 issue? I am shocked, amazed, and horrified! A hetero couple on the cover of The Stranger? The editorial staff must have had a collective embolism with that one! Now that's scary!
Rachel Rutledge, via e-mail
EDITORS: I'm sick of all your light rail-bashing articles! Dan Savage shocked me with his pissy, whiny, and short-sighted criticism of Seattle's light rail ["Real Fear," Oct 28]. I'm a former Seattle resident, current Portlander, and a Stranger reader forever; however, I'm sick of the dumbass attitude you have toward light rail. First of all Dan, I love you man -- but shut up! For a city that's been voting down transit since before you were born, you should take whatever you can get! It's not the El, but it's a start. It's stupid to expect a system like [the ones in] Chicago or New York to be built in Seattle. Seattle is just a little pimple of a city by comparison. There's nothing wrong with surface trains! That's the way these light rail trains usually run. In San Francisco, the Muni goes underground downtown and on the surface through the neighborhoods. In Boston, the T's Green Line (light rail) runs underground downtown, and on the surface in the western suburbs. That's the exact kind of system you're gonna get. So shut up and like it. The one thing I've learned from watching this community struggle with light rail over the last four years is: Don't pass judgment while the jury is still out. Anytime you feel like complaining, just shut up, sit back, look at the pretty mountains, and let the fucking engineers have a fucking chance to do their jobs.
Cornelius Swart, Portland
EDITORS: The Stranger is home of the knee-jerk of all knee-jerks!! [First], you fucking dickweeds slandered an innocent man with your foul, half-thought-out bullshit (MODEST MOUSE, DUH!). Now I am reading ["Fishy Business," Grant Cogswell, Oct 28] that 10 percent of the king salmon in Puget Sound are caught by the sea-raper [commercial fishing] boats and the other 90 percent are caught by single-hook recreational fishermen and Native American nets! You are fucking misinformed. I fish a lot, and have seen the dumbass net rapists netting salmon. The problem is with their fucking so-called "by-catch" -- when they [catch] bottom fish, true cod, and steelhead! From an angry angler with the balls enough to say something: Do some legwork! Hike the rivers and fish the Sound before you offer an opinion about the way a fucking net can only target a single species of fish as it drags along the bottom of Puget Sound! You idiots are once again flapping your un-informed dickholes. Shame on you dummies! AGAIN!
Anonymous, via e-mail
NATHAN THORNBURGH: Fairport Convention hardly needs to be "risen from the grave" [Up & Coming, Oct 28], since the band has a huge following in the U.K. and Europe, where they draw festival-size crowds and tirelessly promote British folk and folk rock as they have for the last 30 years. Maybe you'd rather see some third-rate purveyor of this kind of music like Cordelia's Dad or the Paperboys. And as for being "better off waiting for" a gig by ex-Fairport member Ian Matthews, you're full of shit, since Matthews played on ONE Fairport album in the early '70s and has been a MOR-style artist ever since. Oh well, it's your kind of ignorance that makes it hard for international touring acts who don't fit into some hip little niche to get a booking in Seattle; they go from Portland right to Vancouver, which is what happened with Fairport.
Will Jackson, Seattle
DEAR STRANGER EDITOR: I am responding to the brief Jazz Is Dead show preview by Nathan Thornburgh [Up & Coming, Oct 28]. Though it is just one little paragraph, it is typical of The Stranger's attitude over the years toward Jerry Garcia and the Grateful Dead. As everybody knows, the Grateful Dead had the most loyal and unique following in modern music history. Why could this be? Simply because they were that good. Their music came from the deepest regions of inner and outer space and touched people's hearts where they'd never dreamt possible. Many Deadheads used sacramental substances (LSD and mushrooms) to literally travel to other dimensions, using [the Dead's] music as a vehicle. And what a vehicle it was -- the likes of which most of you will never know until you die. The experience was so intimate, some even formed something akin to a Guru-Devotee relationship with it. While the rest of America sat around waiting for The X-files to reveal something interesting, we danced our way to realms beyond the stars. I am sick and tired of hearing ignorant music critics complain about what they DO NOT UNDERSTAND. Jerry had the heart of a Buddha and all the frailties and weaknesses of a human being. Now he has left this reality, and all I ask is please, for the love of God: Have a little respect for the Dead.
