Bob Thomas Writes

Our local paper has awriter who is  so bad his writing makes my head hurt!

So I wrote to the Editor and complained. He’s still there!

The Free Press

Kinston,NC

Attn: Editor                   

 Dear Sir,

 I have endured Jon Dawson for as long as I can without speaking up. The boy is just simply bad.

His writing is right up there with a third string reporter on the local high school paper. (My apologies to the local high school reporters) His ‘funny’ style is not funny. I almost feel embarrassed for him. Reading his work is like listening to a really bad singer stand up and sing horribly off-key, but everyone, in an effort to be nice, tells him how good he is as a singer. . . and then we all go and poke our eardrums out!

His content, or subject matter is amateurish and immature most of the time. His columns over the last few weeks proclaiming his candidacy for President did not elicit even a chuckle from anyone I know – especially me. As an editor I would have thought that you would have at least remarked, “What is this crap?” But you apparently failed to read it. At least I hope you didn’t read it! If you did read it and let it pass, then I have lost all respect for you and am dumbfounded by your occupancy of the office of editor! Of course, having been published a few times myself, I have very little respect for editors anyway.

It’s suddenly obvious that he is his own editor and is not being reigned in by anyone with legitimate writing or editing credentials.

If you, as editor, can’t realize his lack of skill, then I have no hope for the Free Press. Of course, I’ve been reading the ‘Freep’ since 1978 and I long ago lost all hope for it ever being a newspaper of worth and accuracy . . . now that I think about it, maybe Jon Dawson fits in just fine with you folks so maybe you should just continue to let him write his trivial nonsense. Besides, no reputable high school editor would print his work.

I, like most of your readers will just have to suffer and try to avoid eye contact with his byline. Or maybe I should consider just poking my eyes out!

Bob Thomas