By Michael Miner
“We recognize some people were offended by Royko’s column and regret that they have misinterpreted the intent,” said the Tribune’s prepared statement. I don’t think they misinterpreted anything. The column savaged Mexico as a “corrupt narco-state,” its government as “corrupt pocket-stuffers,” and its people, “who have clearly established that they don’t know what the heck they are doing.”
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Fuller listened. That night the Tribune modified its statement; it now regretted that readers had been offended. This Wednesday the paper did something even more remarkable: it published an editorial saying it was “sorry that many Mexican-Americans were deeply insulted by the Royko columns” and “particularly sorry that the first public statement the company made in the aftermath added to the injury.” The editorial went on to say, “We are not sorry that the Tribune publishes Mike Royko.”
De Lama says the editorial “struck the right tone. It had the right balance.”
“But more recently, sadly, our colleague repeatedly has crossed the line between legitimate political satire and ugly racial and ethnic slurs that have no place in the pages of our great newspaper.
“What if you substitute the word ‘African-Americans’ for ‘Hispanics’ and a cruel racial epithet for blacks for the word ‘beaners?’ Is that an acceptable use of irony in our newspaper?
“This is not about hypersensitivity, a point that, alas, even some of our colleagues at the newspaper have missed. At issue are the core values that guide us, collectively and individually, as we strive to perform our vital mission of informing citizens in a democracy, especially at a time of rising hate crimes and racial intolerance.
