The poem was scrawled on a postcard featuring a picture of a clown.
The picture should have been the first clue.
“A pox on tubby Jack Knox,” the writer began. Then she called me a runt. Then, because it was a poem, she called me a word that rhymes with runt.
She was angered by my anti-royal views, which might reflect the fuzziness of my writing, because I’m actually a monarchist. In any case, her fiery rocket shot straight to the top of my 2018 list of nastygrams.
Yes, Dear Reader, it’s time again to share the mail I received from those who don’t love my column as passionately as I might hope. Here, without further ado:
• “Keep gargling with vitriol you stupid little man! [Editor-in-chief Dave] Obee too deserves a slap for constantly publishing Jack Knox’s crap. Shame on you both.”
Yeah, Obee’s a dork.
• “You’re not as bad as Les, nevertheless, you routinely compose drivel.”
Better than Les Leyne. #Winning.
• “If you were taking a writing course from me, most of the time you’d get an F for the shallow sh-- you draft.”
But not all the time. #Stillwinning.
• “Does anybody actually read the stuff before you publish/print/post/send it?”
Like I said, the editor’s a dork. What are you going to do?
• Obee hears from some readers directly: “Why do you employ that idiot Jack Knox? He has none of the skills that a newspaper requires.”
None of the skills, but all of the sex appeal.
• From a Trump supporter: “Maybe one day you too will realize how the only thing qualifying you to be a mainstream media reporter is incredibly bad judgment and a massive propensity for error.”
Apparently he didn’t notice the sex appeal.
• “Has Trumpism hit the Times Colonist?” asked a Ladysmith reader after I wrote about the demise of Stephen Reid.
“This is the only explanation that I could come up with as to why the newspaper would honour an infamous (not famous, Jack Knox) bank robber by giving him front-page position on his death. I have to say that I sometimes get upset by what I consider poor reporting on the part of the Times Colonist, but this is an all-time low.”
• After a round-up of the top stories of the year, this arrived from a Saskatchewan reader:
“RE: Colonist artical. Just a note as to your 25 top stories,with mention of some very trivial news items but don’t have the balls to mention one of the top screw-ups by our disgraceful PM who forked out $30000.00 to support ISIS Terrorist as always you are just another liberal propaganda arm for the screwed-up PM’s.”
He’s right. Much better to spend our tax dollars on how-too-right-Gooder-English classes.
• “Jack, as a right-wing conservative redneck, I have had to put up with your put-downs of George Bush, Stephen Harper, The Donald and many other sterling conservative figures.
“Your reasonable sense of humour keeps me reading your column, but now you have sunk to an all-time low, finding the gall to besmirch (love that word) the great Ray Conniff, the man who arranged many top hit songs, including Singing the Blues, which stayed at No. 1 for 10 weeks in 1956. Shame, Jack, shame!”
I stand chastened.
• Others found me a lackey of the right: “Last weekend’s Great Pipeline Debate series featuring the ‘business case’ and ‘economic and environmental arguments’ was one-sided and rigged to favour ever-expanding oil development.’ ”
Yet still no Christmas card from Raging Rachel Notley.
• “The last time I forked over money to pay for a TC was May 3, 1995, and it’s going to stay that way, Jack.”
In case you’re wondering what we ran on May 3, 1995, there was a story about Costco coming to the Saanich Peninsula, and another about Greater Victoria amalgamation. Spoiler alert: Neither happened.
• In a letter to the Kelowna Daily Courier, a Penticton reader who included me in a list of columnists whom he considered “not credible” did so in a letter in which he also posited that Barack Obama escapes criticism because he is “he is a black man and 21st century newspaper editors can not call him a failure because he is black.”
It doesn’t bother me when such people don’t like me. It bothers me when they do.
• Somehow the backhanded compliments sting more. After a humour column about arming teachers: “This is brilliant … Did Jack Knox actually write this stuff?”
Similarly: “Jack, thoroughly enjoyed your column today. Are you sure you wrote it, or have you been taking advantage of the new marijuana laws?”
• Others didn’t like (attempted) humour: “Become serious. You’re a capital city columnist. It’s time to bring forth some capital thought.”
• It also seems readers have noticed my advancing years.
“Like Jack Knox, I’m old … ” a letter to the editor writer began.
When we ran a 1908 photo of the staff of the Daily Colonist, someone posted it online with the caption “Spot Jack Knox.”
One Victoria reader inquired after my health (“How are your bowels these days? Getting enough roughage?”) but only because he feared I might expire (“judging by your photograph you are not getting any younger”), which would interfere with his habit of reading his wife to sleep with my columns.
“If I don’t have light reading for She Who Must Be Obeyed, then there are only two alternatives: heavy incursions into my single malt supply or complete sexual exhaustion,” he wrote. “At 76 years of age I cannot sustain both of those activities, especially given the rising cost of imported scotch and my fixed pension income.”
• Not all spouses thought of me so highly. “My wife does not like your column,” wrote one man. “She thinks your writing is ‘sordid.’ ”
• And, as usual, the general-purpose “You are nothing but a [bleeping] idiot.”
Yes, but a bleeping idiot who knows he is in a privileged position. Thanks for reading.
