Replies to the Mike Kelly 'article' on Deadheads & Katz murder
REB - Select * from net_people where flame=null
In the Bergen Record from 11/7/1989 there were a whole slew of letters to the
editor about Mike Kelly's "article" of a few days ago. At least one of the
writers is a net.person - David Fischer! Below are the responses.
reb
Main page headlines:
Deadheads got a bum rap... ...The band deserved better
It spilled to a second page which had the heading:
Kelly's column on `Deadheads' was simplistic'
At the top of the main column was a picture of Bobby w/Jerry in the
background. At the bottom was the following quite: "Mr. Kelly might not like
our music, but maligning isn't how we do things here in the U.S." - Lawrence
Weinreb Grateful Dead Fan
The letters:
Editor, The Record:
In response to Mike Kelly's column of Oct. 24, "Seeing No Evil," I was
shocked and disgusted by his referring to "Deadheads" as "animals" and
"strange."
Though I'm a far cry from the type of fan Kelly describes, I would consider
myself a "Deadhead." I enjoy a wide range of music from rock to jazz to blues
to new wave, but I derive my greatest musical pleasure from the Grateful Dead.
Having over 100 live Dead cassettes, as well as 700-plus records, I think I
know _something_ about music.
I've attended over 150 concerts and sporting events in the past. I recently
returned from Oktoberfest in Germany. Many, many times I have witnessed people
either so drunk or high that they didn't know their own names. Not just kids
either. Usually the adults are a lot worse. Is it the Deadheads' fault that
beer is no longer sold at Monday night football games at the Meadowlands?
If Mr. Kelly considers the Grateful Dead to be "lousy music" and "below
average rock and roll" how can he account for the 22-plus years they have
toured? And can he explain five recent sold-out concerts, two stadium shows
last summer or the 11 [sic] sold-out shows the Dead performed in New York in
September, 1988? The Dead's influences from rock, country, jazz and Indian
music provides them with a sound that cannot be found anywhere else.
I would like to express my sympathy to Adam Katz's family, and I applaud the
authorities for their action in this case. I hope the whole affair can be
brought to a swift close.
Steve Lineweaver - Waldwick
Editor, The Record:
As a longtime fan and follower of the Grateful Dead, I feel compelled to
respond to Mike Kelly's column regarding "doped-out Deadheads." Mr. Kelly is
of the opinion that most of the fans at the Brendan Byrne Arena were too busy
having a good tome to notice a murder. What he forgets to mention is that
these "doped-out" Deadheads were inside the arena enjoying a concert while
Adam Katz was being bludgeoned to death outside.
No rock band in the world has a more kindred relationship with its fans than
the Grateful Dead. This feeling of _family_ pervades everything the band and
its fans do. The Grateful Dead and their fans are involved in many worthwile
causes such as Greenpeace (to preservethe rain forest) and the Rex Foundation
(to help the homeless). Deadheads are not too busy or apathetic. As an article
in the same edition of the paper [as the Kelly article] describes, the Bergen
County Prosecutor's Office is being swamped with telephone calls by Deadheads
hoping to help the investigation in any way possible.
It may be true that a small number of less reputable individuals trail the
Grateful Dead around the country. However, to assassinate the character of
many responsible, considerate people based upon a few deviants is prejudicial
and unfair.
Kevin Nennecke - East Rutherford
Editor, The Record:
I was greatly disturbed by the column "Seeing No Evil," written by Mike
Kelly. Although it was mentioned that there are two different kinds of fans at
Grateful Dead concerts, you chose to describe one Deadhead follower of the
band. He said that he had sold LSD in order to get to the concert. His type of
person does not account for the majority of people at the concert.
But selling and dealing drugs is not what a Grateful Dead concert is about.
These people only account for about 1,000 people year round. What about all
the other fans that managed to buy enough tickets to sell out five shows at
the Brendan Byrne Arena?
Tara Brock - Upper Saddle River
Editor, The Record:
Re: Mike Kelly's "seeing no evil" column, Mr. Kelly believes Adam Katz's
murderer(s) will never be caught because "The only witnesses to the killing
may have been doped-out `Deadheads' in the arena parking lots ..." Yet he
fails to mention that the witnesses also may have been "gamblers" from the
[Meadowlands race] track, or even the security officials.
Mr. Kelly implies that he knows a lot about Deadheads from the afternoon he
spent in the parking lot. He says these people "just like lousy music." The
Grateful Dead contains six world-renowned musicians. If Mr. Kelly ventured
into that arena, he would also see the exhilirating way the Dead can turn on a
full house. From the moment they come on stage to the moment they leave, people
of all ages are dancing and having a great time.
Granted, Mr. Kelly is correct in his condemnation of drugs, but he creates
the unfair implication that drugs are _only_ sold at Dead shows. Go to any
rock concert and you will find the same, if not worse. What Mr. Kelly fails to
state, is that the majority of the Dead's fans are non-violent people. They
are just looking for a place to come together and have a good time.
The column also states that Adam Katz's mistake was "his desire to listen to
a below-average rock band." Mr. Kelly should leave the reviewing to someone
with the knowledge of the Dead and their music.
Joanne Torre - Closter
Editor, The Record:
Granted, Mr. Kelly does not like the Grateful Dead, but please let's have
some _objective_ coverage of this news event. This article was filled with
gross and malicious exaggerations, vile innuendo, and outright lies.
I am a computer operator, and my wife is a registered nurse. to say that all
Deadheads are unemployed drug abusers is a far cry from the truth. In the 17
years that I have been going to Grateful Dead concerts, I have observed a very
peaceful, non-violenmt group whose main interest is enjoyment of the music. Is
this, as Mike Kelly implies, some type of anti-social perversion?
I served my country in the U.S. Coast Guard for four years. As a productive
member of society and as a veteran I take strong offense to Kelly's article.
if he wants to assassinate a group of Americans,he should at least get the
facts straight.
I believe a printed retraction is in order. Mr. Kelly may not like our
music, but maligning innocent people isn't how we do things in the United
States. How about an apology?
Lawrence Weinreb - New York, N.Y.
Editor, The Record:
I was so disgusted and dismayed by an article recently published in your
paper that I was compelled to write. At best this piece of bigotry and hate
should have been placed in an opinion section, because it contains no facts. I
insist that you publish a retraction and an apology to the community of
Grateful Dead fans.
Leora lawton - Providence, R.I.
Editor, The Record:
In a recent column, Mike Kelly mentions what he calls the "common
denominator" linking all Deadheads: "rio-offs and drugs." I have attended
three grateful [sic] Dead concerts within the past year, not as a Deadhead or
even a Gratefil Dead fan (I am neither) but as an observer, curious about an
experience I had heard much about.
Undoubtedly, there were few drug-free people at the shows I attended. But
what interested me more than Mr. Kelly's mention of drugs was his reference to
"rip-offs"; I read his column in its entirety, but found no explanation for
his use of the term (that is unless Mr. Kelly, a "professional" journalist,
would use the terms "rip-off artist" and "drug dealer" interchangeably).
Perhaps I should not be surprised by Mr. Kelly's sloppy approach to his
craft. After all, his black-and-white portrait of the Grateful Dead phenomenon
is so simplistic it is not enough to respond to his generalizations with the
cliche, "He paints with a broad brush."
Mr. Kelly dismisses more than two decades of Grateful Dead music with such
crudity that I suspect he abandoned the "brush" altogether in order to engage
in the journalistic equivelant of finger painting. His glib use of the terms
"lousy" and "below average" to describe the Grateful Dead's music reveals
little beyond the writer's own ineptitude.
Gavin Stewart - River Edge
Editor, The Record:
Mike Kelly's column was the most biased and most misinformed piece of
journalism I have ever seen in The Record. Mr. Kelly seems much more concerned
with making disparaging comments about the Grateful Dead and their fans than
he is in getting to the bottom of the sensless murder of a college student.
Since the people he talked to one afternoon in a parking lot were strung out
on drugs, Kelly suggests that all Grateful Dead followers are. Using that for
logic, if he went to a Giants' football game and talked to a few drunk people,
everybody at the football game would be a drunk.
Until Mr. Kelly gets his facts straight and investigates all the sides of
the story, he should refrainm from making absurd allegations concerning a
topic he seems to know nothing about.
Richard H. MacDowell - Emerson
Editor, The Record:
Mike Kelly's column was the most biased, subjective article that I have ever
read in a newspaper that professes to serve the general public. Kelly shows
his true ignorance of the situation and exposes himself as the closed-minded
bigot that he must be. By making sweeping judgemental characterizations of
large groups of people whom he knows nothing about, Mr. Kelly has insulted any
intelligent open-minded person who carefully read the article.
As far as Kelly's statements about the music of the Grateful Dead, this is
totally irrelevant. If he doesn't like the music he shouldn't come to the
show. I'm sure many people whould be much happier if he'd stay very far away.
David Fischer - Highland Park
Editor, The Record:
Mr. Kelly's statement that "Deadheads don't make good witnesses to anything"
is ludicrous. How can a reasonable judgement be made about a vast and diverse
group of people by one seemingly small-minded man, who admittedly spent only
one afternoon with several dozen Deadheads?
Also curious are the assumptions that all fans of the music are doped-out,
rip-off artists who have dropped out of work, school, or their families. Wrong
again, Mr. Kelly.
Also irrational is the concept that Grateful Dead attracts only two types of
fans. How absurd! The only possible way this many people could accurately be
categorized into two groups would be basic biology -- yes, that's right --
male and female. This is a gross generalization and yet another obvious
demonstration of Mr. Kelly's lack of knowledge on the subject he chose to
write.
Jeanne Gibbons
Steven Praser - Warwick, N.Y.
That's all, folks!
reb
r...@rtech.com reb%rtec...@lll-winken.llnl.GOV
h:861 Washington Westwood NJ 07675 201-666-9207
Three things never to discuss:
religion, politics and the Great Pumpkin - Linus van Pelt
david.fischer
> In the Bergen Record from 11/7/1989 there were a whole slew of letters to the
> editor about Mike Kelly's "article" of a few days ago. At least one of the
> writers is a net.person - David Fischer! Below are the responses.
Well, at least _two_. Leora Lawton's letter is there, qualifying
as the furthest city from which a letter was received to a
supposedly _local_ paper (but actually global, thanks to the net!).
BTW, I don't know about the other letters, but they only took
excerpts from mine. The rest of it was alot more nasty ;-).
--
Dave Fischer att!hou2h!davef or da...@hou2h.ATT.COM
or various combinations of the above
yabl...@biovax.rutgers.edu
|At least one of the writers is a net.person - David Fischer!