Other than to hate mail or rude mail, I respond to all letters I receive—to each and every one. Many thousands since 1998, which is when I got my first newspaper column. Due to time constraints, my replies are laconic. But if a reader has bothered to read my work and comment on what I have to say—then it’s only decent to acknowledge the gesture.
I haven’t always been firm in this resolve, but I try my very best. If a colleague writes, I generally reply, whether I like them and their stuff or not. Ignoring a correspondent is a way of demonstrating contempt for that individual. If such contempt is deserved, well and good. If not; it is the unresponsive “interlocutor” who deserves contempt.
Most opinion-merchants, however, don’t reply to their mail. That smacks of hubris and pride, almost always unwarranted, as most are so uninspiring and mediocre. One wonders what they’re playing at, and why they’re not more humble.
A Golda-Meir zinger comes to mind. It’s a relic from a time when false humility was at least still practiced: “Don’t be so humble, you’re not that great.”
George Will once wrote that “manners are the practice of a virtue. The virtue is called civility, a word related—as a foundation is related to a house—to the word civilization.”
A riff on the Meir quip might go as follows: Can’t be bothered to answer your mail? “Don’t be so arrogant, you suck.”
