Today’s Homicidal Trivia Quiz

Who wrote the following letter to New Republic? The choices are:

  1. Vox Day
  2. Ray Bradbury

Here’s the letter:

Sirs: I am much in your debt for publishing the brilliant article by Douglas J. Stewart. Taking the vote away from old people is great. But, may I suggest an even better alternative? Let us build ovens and gas chambers and really do the job right. The people can be carted from all over the country, once they are old enough, and, before entering the gas chambers and ovens, have the best dentists pull out their gold teeth. A few soap factories might also be built in the vicinity and the best place for the ovens would be Orange County where more old reactionary Wasps reside. There is a danger here; there are quite a few liberal old people about, and we must be careful not to put Marcuse or anyone like him in the ovens. Other than that, the plan is beautiful and I hope Mr. Stewart will join me in this great improvement on American democracy. We can call it the Nazi Party, if he feels that is a good name. 

I have other plans for cripples, the blind, and the Jews, if Mr. Stewart wishes to hear them. Meanwhile, onward and upward. Let’s get that vote, first, and then the life of the Voter!

Answer follows the jump.

Just two weeks ago Vox Day wrote:

I am morally opposed to euthanasia, but sometimes, the bloody Baby Boomers really make it a terribly tempting proposition.

However, as regular readers of File 770 know, Ray Bradbury is the answer to every trivia question. (Well, nearly.)

New Republic is celebrating its centennial by republishing a collection of its most memorable articles such as the 1970 letter to the editor from Ray Bradbury quoted above. Bradbury was provoked to pen this ironic reply after reading Stewart’s recommendation that old people not be allowed to vote because “As a class they are not… wise, benign, and tolerant. … their chief characteristics are greed, cowardice, resentment over the cheats of life that did not turn out as planned, and the consequent desire to punish somebody for it.”

Bradbury was 50 when he wrote the letter and lived for another four decades.

6 thoughts on “Today’s Homicidal Trivia Quiz

  1. Mike: Am I the only fan who reads the NEW REPUBLIC? They haven’t run letters to the editor in at least five years. Martin

  2. Martin: You might win that bet. I’m darned sure Vox Day doesn’t read it, let alone write locs to it….

  3. I was assuming Bradbury. I have read both, and Day has not demonstrated any capacity for that kind of deft irony.

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