A Webster City newspaper editor called Jane Curtis wrote an interesting column on Nov. 7. Curtis, who is the interim editor of the Daily Freeman-Journal in Webster City, responded to President Donald J. Trump’s lopsided victory with an extremely personal piece.
Curtis started by quoting a story she found online about a badger and how people shouldn’t mess with it. Eventually, she got into politics.
The first declaration was that “many, many” of her friends are “in shock” that America voted for Donald J. Trump. Or, as she put it, “a man whose disrespect for women is now legendary.”
Curtis quoted author John Pavolvitz who said Kamala Harris didn’t lose, America did. By voting for Donald J. Trump, America collectively failed girls and women, the LGBTQ community, people of color, Muslims, Jewish people, immigrants, the sick, the poor, the elderly, the people of Ukraine, Gaza and the planet.
“It’s unthinkable, that instead of being able to celebrate a beautiful, hopeful new chapter in the story of this nation with a leader who appealed to the best of our natures — we will instead be holding a postmortem for democracy as we enter our 250th year, stewarded by a malevolent sociopath who despises empathy and shuns the law,” Pavolvitz wrote.
Curtis acknowledged that many readers would disagree with her for printing the column. That makes sense since 65.58 percent of Hamilton County voters chose President Trump.
But the readers and subscribers of the paper were told to “despise” Curtis all they want.
They were told to despise her because she has Jewish, gay and trans friends. They were told to despise her because she had a miscarriage years ago and underwent a D&C so she wouldn’t die. They were told to despise her because she left a dangerous marriage. They were told to despise her because she was never formally baptized.
They could also despise her for doing her job as editor of the newspaper. Although her admission in the next paragraph makes you wonder if she understands the job of editor.
“You can despise me, say, for never running a pro-Trump political cartoon in the lead-up to the election,” she wrote.
Sounds like an editor trying to interfere in an election by not being willing to run a pro-Trump cartoon.
Curtis then compared the feeling of Trump’s victory to the feeling she had after being raped.
She finished the column by quoting from the story she started with. A warning to people not to corner something meaner than them, including a badger.
Curtis is listed as a 2024 Iowa Newspaper Association Master Columnist.
On one hand, this was obviously a deeply personal piece penned by Curtis. On the other hand, one has to wonder if there’s anyone reviewing Curtis’s work prior to publication.
It’s one thing to have a political opinion, but it is glaring for a newspaper editor to brag she never published a pro-Trump cartoon in the lead-up to the election. And while the opinions about Trump shared in the column are nothing we’re not used to, a local newspaper editor sharing those and applying them to their readers and subscribers is certainly concerning. I mean, two-thirds of the people in the county apparently hate people and despise people — according to Curtis.
If the last eight years prove anything, it is that the media is out of touch with the average American. And it isn’t just MSNBC, CNN, NBC and The Des Moines Register. It trickles all the way down to small-town newspapers like the Daily Freeman-Journal in Webster City.
There is a reason traditional media is dying.
If you’d like, you can read the full piece by Jane Curtis here.
