Beacon Journal letter-writers ''face anonymous attacks''

The Akron Beacon Journal Sunday informed readers that a man who has been writing to the Beacon Journal for more than forty years found it necessary to seek an unlisted phone number after being "subjected to repeated harassment in the form of early morning phone calls and anonymous hate mail."

From the story:

That's typical for these calls. Always anonymous. Always cynical and sarcastic. Always an attack on the person. Never a reasoned response. Always with the intent of stifling that person's point of view.

Another reader claimed to have received early-morning, profanity-laced phone calls after penning a letter critical of a conservative commentator. (Editors' aside: To read the article, it would appear only liberal letter-writers are subjected to harassment. Anyone believe that?)

The reason this story, by BJ Editor Mike Needs, caught our eye was this:

During 11th-hour debate over what eventually became Ohio's Concealed Carry Law, when concealed-carry advocates protested a provision that newspapers are now abusing by publishing the names of CHL-holders in the newspaper, the Akron Beacon Journal called the idea that criminals might use these lists to target guns for theft a "flimsy presumption". Gannett News Columbus Bureau Chief Jim Siegel said warnings about the dangers of publishing the list of CHL-holders "elevate these criminals to a level of sophistication they very likely do not possess..." At the time, even Attorney General Jim Petro called such a scenario "a stretch".

After reading of the types of harassment these letter-writers are suffering after voluntarily having their names published in the newspaper, is the potential for discrimination by anti-gun employer, or of being targeted for theft, or of a domestic-violence survivor being located and victimized, really such a flimsy presumption after all?