PelhamToday received the following letter to the editor regarding this week's Hot Take, in which columnist James Culic suggested that the world would be better off without bees:
Can't believe that I am reading this incredibly inaccurate item about not needing bees! The writer is living in some sort of alternate universe. Shocking that you would publish this drivel.
G.S.
Hamilton
EDITOR'S NOTE: Pity the poor humourist when his humour falls flat, buzzing like an injured honeybee flailing in a rushing torrent of umbrage, headed for a storm drain clogged with twisted knickers. Having decades under my belt of dealing with both left-wing and right-wing loons, it was really the Covid pandemic that brought home just how you never know whether seemingly reasonable people secretly subscribe to some nutty conspiracy nonsense—anti-vaxxers broadly, but also the Ivermectin horse paste hucksters, the bleach injectors, plus the comparatively tame anti-fluoride folks, the 5G tin-hatters, the new Flat-Earthers. So while I had no reason to believe that James Culic was an anti-science, bee-pollination-denier, just to be safe I checked in with him. "I didn't think it needed clarifying that it was in jest," he answered. Whew. It was just good old rhetorical exaggeration for comic effect—otherwise known as joking. Now, that said, jokes told with a straight face and no hint of levity do run the risk of being taken seriously, especially in print, where the usual clues of facial expression and vocal tone are absent. No wonder the crying-with-laughter emoji has become almost de rigueur these recent years to assure email and WhatsApp readers that yes, the previous silly statement was meant to be silly. 🤣 We may have to consider seasoning future Hot Takes with shake or two of such emoji sprinkles, just to keep everyone's blood pressure below boiling. Plus it's self-evident that it's actually the sun we don't need. Skin cancer? Global warming? Get rid of the sun, problem solved.
