When I picked up the Feb. 11 Daily, I was surprised to see an article announcing that the three female editors who posed for a picture in the newspaper Toons had been fired. Ms. Hauser rationalized the decision by saying that the editors “depiction in Toons could harm the integrity of the Daily.” Perhaps I’m missing something, but I fail to see what effect an obvious joke could have on the integrity of the Daily.

The readers of the Daily are smart enough to know that Valerie Dennis is not in charge of tomfoolery and fiction, and we are also smart enough to know a joke when we see one. The ability to separate the lives and opinions of the editors and writers of the Daily from the Daily itself is the very foundation on which a newspaper is based.

If Ms. Hauser believes her readers are incapable of making the distinction between editors joking about their jobs and the quality of their work, shouldn’t we also be incapable of making the distinction between editorials and serious news items? Many editors hold very strong opinions on a variety of issues, yet Ms. Hauser herself has defended their ability to put all that aside when they are not writing editorials.

At the same time Ms. Hauser says that editors joking about their work prevents them from doing their jobs. Integrity is gained and maintained through comprehensive, accurate and unbiased articles, not through heavy-handed actions in the name of maintaining integrity. If the Daily’s integrity was damaged at all, it was not because of the article in Toons but because of the actions that followed it.

Brian Lund

Freshman

Computer engineering