Shut Up And Let Her Sing

This appeared in the New York Times today.

To The Editor:

I think that the answer to why Joan Baez was barred from the concert at Walter Reed Army Medical Center is easy – she’s a known demonstrator (“Unwanted Folk” editorial, May 3). And in this country, civil rights notwithstanding, that makes you a troublemaker.

We all talk a good game about how important our First Amendment protections are, but I wonder how many of us simply feel annoyed when demonstrators get in our way, particularly the ones we disagree with.

We ought to admire those who have the courage to exercise their right to protest, especially when so many of their fellow citizens brand them as unpatriotic for doing so. How ironic for this to happen in the land of the free.

Karin J. Lauria
Marlborough, MA
5/3/07

And here are more kindred spirits of Baez who have more than honored her legacy with a song originating from a sense of suffering all their own.



And as far as Baez herself is concerned, here is a sample of what they missed.