To the Editor:
Re “I’ve Informed My Final Trump Joke,” by David Kamp (Opinion visitor essay, Jan. 24):
I encourage Mr. Kamp to maintain telling Donald Trump jokes. Mr. Trump is a critical menace to American democracy and the establishments of a pluralistic society, so I perceive Mr. Kamp’s worry that jokes make the hazard appear trivial.
Nevertheless, alongside each joke geared toward deflating Mr. Trump stands the truth that 74 million Americans voted for him in 2020, and much more could vote for him and autocracy in 2024. Sobering details, sure, however humor can convey consolation to those that oppose Mr. Trump and unite us in opposition because it reminds us not solely of the hazard of handing such a self-absorbed mediocrity energy but additionally that he could be introduced low and defeated.
Actually, Mr. Kamp wants higher jokes than the sophomoric epithet “short-fingered vulgarian,” which merely locations the comedian on the identical immature stage as Mr. Trump. However jokes that remind us of his disdain for democracy, pluralism and decency is usually a highly effective weapon towards Mr. Trump’s marketing campaign.
No joke will flip MAGA supporters towards their messiah, however good ones will remind the remainder of us why we have to vote and work for the re-election of President Biden.
Tony Speranza
Washington
To the Editor:
Simply after watching the “Saturday Evening Dwell” chilly open with James Austin Johnson’s Donald Trump impression and never laughing as soon as, I learn David Kamp’s essay. He expressed my emotions in his eloquent phrases.
It’s positively time to cease making Trump jokes. There isn’t a place for humor about him as we face what lies forward in these subsequent months.
Michelle Putterman
Raleigh, N.C.
To the Editor:
David Kamp’s visitor essay advises, “Let’s simply maintain off on the laughter till he’s defeated.” However I’ll purchase what the columnist Nicholas Kristof prescribed in 2020 below the headline “To Beat Trump, Mock Him.”
Mr. Kristof listed examples of profitable tyrant deflation, ending with an remark about making the eventual downfall “softer and fewer violent.” He quoted the Chinese language dissident Liu Xiaobo: “A clown wants much less revenge than a monster does.”
Steven T. Corneliussen
Poquoson, Va.
To the Editor:
David Kamp reads the room proper. Trump humor is so very 2016. It cushioned us from the grim actuality of the person and the darker actuality of the presidency for fairly a while. We want humor even concerning the presidents we do like. However Donald Trump is not a president and even an atypical presidential candidate.
It was a very long time earlier than many people had been snug with laughing at Hitler (“The Producers” and “JoJo Rabbit”). The dictator in entrance of us isn’t humorous. Even mimicking him contributes to the normalization of him.
There may be nothing regular about this example.
Mary Ann Cherry
Los Angeles
It Was an Riot
To the Editor:
Re “Why Jan. 6 Wasn’t an Riot,” by Ross Douthat (column, nytimes.com, Jan. 12):
What would have been the implications had Donald Trump’s mob been profitable?
Mr. Trump would now be president, having invalidated the lawful election of Joe Biden as president.
The dimensions of the mob doesn’t matter, and the size of the motion doesn’t matter. What was the purpose of the motion? The purpose of Mr. Trump’s motion was to overthrow a duly elected authorities.
That’s an rebellion. Full cease.
Bruce Higgins
San Diego
China’s Concern About Decrease Birthrates
To the Editor:
Re “Beijing Foiled in Drive to Carry the Birthrate” (entrance web page, Jan. 18) and “A Quarter of Humanity Is Affected by Drought” (information article, Jan. 16):
China understands that an growing older inhabitants will cut back financial progress however, like many different nations, seems unwilling to face the truth that counting on countless inhabitants enlargement just isn’t a sustainable mannequin for social and environmental prosperity.
We all know that the basic trigger of worldwide warming is extra human inhabitants. Counting on a perpetual enhance within the variety of infants to gasoline financial progress and assist an growing older inhabitants is basically “Ponzi demography,” a pyramid scheme that privatizes advantages and income with out regard to the ensuing huge environmental degradation that we’re all experiencing.
The drought dealing with 1 / 4 of humanity didn’t come up spontaneously, however is one more stark reflection of humanity’s failure to know the bounds of the planet to assist inhabitants overshoot.
In his 1968 e book, “The Inhabitants Bomb,” Paul Ehrlich echoed the warnings of Thomas Malthus and predicted dire world results of extra human inhabitants. On the time he wrote, the world inhabitants was about 3.5 billion.
Whereas Ehrlich and Malthus could not have foreseen the exact results that our present eight billion individuals are having on local weather, they had been prescient in predicting the scope of the disasters that now face humanity.
Carl Mezoff
Stamford, Conn.
To The Editor:
China’s authorities could consider the nation’s lack of inhabitants progress as a “nationwide emergency,” however from a world perspective, it definitely isn’t. Countless progress just isn’t suitable with planetary limits.
Decrease birthrates usually replicate better bodily autonomy and training and profession alternatives for girls — one thing to have fun reasonably than lament. There’s a downside, nonetheless, when individuals really feel that having youngsters will severely drawback them and expose them to extra injustices. It’s good to see the authors notice that “deep-seated gender inequality” appears to be behind the persevering with decline in China’s birthrate (identical to in South Korea).
Serving to individuals fulfill their desired household measurement ought to exchange the aim of boosting inhabitants progress. Xi Jinping wants to start out listening to girls, and channel efforts into advancing gender equality and enhancing high quality of life. He and different world leaders additionally want to just accept that small household measurement is probably going right here to remain, and put together for inevitable inhabitants growing older.
Authoritarian efforts to roll again girls’s rights will solely backfire and stall financial and social progress.
Olivia Nater
Boulder, Colo.
The author is communications supervisor for Inhabitants Connection.
Debate the Israel-Gaza Struggle in Faculty
To the Editor:
Re “New York Metropolis Faculties to Educate About Bias in Response to Struggle” (information article, Jan. 23):
You report: “Inside lecture rooms, the strategy to discussions of the warfare has diversified drastically throughout the town’s greater than 1,600 public faculties. Some educators have tried to keep away from speaking concerning the battle altogether, anxious over being swept into heated debates.”
However heated debates are a part of the vitality of democracy. Why not equip college students to take part in our democracy by inviting a pro-Israel speaker and a pro-Palestine speaker to wage a debate after which open it as much as pupil participation?
Felicia Nimue Ackerman
Windfall, R.I.
The author is a professor of philosophy at Brown College.
