To the editor: You suck and everyone that writes for you sucks. The Daily is just a bloody liberal rag covering up the wounds of stupidity. Being gay is wrong, and you just don’t know how it feels to be a ambidextrous dyslexic black Buddhist with HIV on a rural campus such as this. Just thought I’d let you know.

Bob Moron

Freshman

Undecided

Letters to the editor always befuddle me. It’s as if some people just have to write down their stupid ideas and send them away to keep them from saying them out loud sometimes.

I’m talking about the utter crap that passes for an opinion written by someone with absolutely no idea what they are talking about. I’m talking about letters that try to convince gays to turn straight because if they don’t God will personally strike them down with a big bolt of straightening.

I’m talking about letters that are so moronic that reading them makes you feel like homo sapiens somehow split off in to two different species at some point and you got hit with the good end of the Darwin stick.

I’m not referring to the well-researched, thought-out letters that actually do provide a new and fresh point of view.

Of course, if that was all that got printed, then the Daily probably would have run about six letters all semester.

No, really, there are good letters to the editor. The type that point out a huge factual error in a column, hence making the columnist feel like assuming the fetal position for the rest of his or her life. Yes, that’s a personal experience.

Those kinds of letters are what keep us columnists honest and make sure that we don’t make up statistics and the such. In fact, 87 percent of columnists at college newspapers in the United States say that fear of nit-picking letter-writers is what keeps them up at night.

The fact is, good letters to the editor are so very rare that you could almost trade them on the commodity market.

So as a free public service to the ISU letter-writing community (all 30 of you out there), I’m going to give you five simple pointers on how to write a letter to the editor that doesn’t make reasonable people re-classify your humanity.

1) Don’t write in about homosexuals. Nobody is going to read your letter anyway, except the people who have the exact opposite opinion that you do. You’re not going to change their mind, and they’re just going to write another letter trying to refute everything you said. Then you or another one of your letter-writing klansmen will write a response letter to the response letter. And the circle just keeps on rolling.

2) Don’t quote from the Bible. I suppose that kind of relates to the first tip, but I feel the need to point this out specifically. The Bible is a good book, especially if you are a Christian. However, even if you’re Christian, you have to admit that the Bible has seen so many translations and changes that you might as well be quoting from Michael Jackson’s current nose. The Bible is a gold mine, but there is still a lot of rat feces in a gold mine, so settle down.

3) Make a point. No matter how crappy some of my columns have been, I’m always striving to make a point. If you’re not making a point, why are you writing in?

4) Ask yourself if you’ve ever seen this letter before. Write your letter, then read it. Does it look a lot like a letter you saw last week? It probably does, because you’re probably just repeating something you heard somewhere because you’re too dumb to think for yourself. There’s a fine line between writing about the same thing as someone else and writing the exact same letter with a different name at the bottom and one different biblical verse.

5) Don’t expect to change people’s minds. The pen is not mightier than the sword. The sword will break the pen every time. The sword will also break typewriters and computers while it’s at it. The sword is very sharp.

If you really want to change someone’s opinion, hold a sword to his or her neck and they’ll believe whatever you want them to.

The written word can occasionally be very powerful, but not during peacetime in a nearly crime-free region of a free country.

If you’re wondering what makes me think I have the right to tell people how to write letters to the editor, just take a look at your Daily right now.

See my picture next to the words I have written?

I get paid to force my opinion on people. I may not be all that great sometimes either, but the difference is I get paid for it.

And don’t cry out First Amendment here. I’m not saying the Daily shouldn’t run bad letters. I’m a big anti-censorship type of guy. All I’m trying to do is to keep you from embarrassing yourself publicly.

So just keep this in mind next time you feel like venting your thoughts in the Daily. Either apply for a column and get paid to do it, or don’t write in about moronic stuff.

It’s not worth it to let people know you’ve got no idea what you’re talking about for free.

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David Roepke is a sophomore in journalism and mass communication from Aurora.