‘Bugnut’ -- unfair to Christians?

After Penn Jillette’s analysis of why so many political candidates say “bugnutty Christian” things, we heard from a number of readers about putting such a modifier in front of the word Christian, especially in the headline: “Politics and the bugnut Christians.” Reader Larry Taylor of Berkeley wrote:

“What would make you think that calling (by extension, all) Christians ‘bugnuts’ in your newspaper is acceptable, even for an opinion piece?

“I’m a registered Democrat with a doctorate and am under 40 years old. I live in Berkeley. I’ve been watching The Times carefully as an alternative to the New York Times. But if you have so little respect for my religion, even factions thereof, maybe I’d better look elsewhere.

“The fact is, you know that to use such a word with regard to any other religion — Judaism, Islam or others — would never fly.”

Susan Brenneman, deputy Op-Ed editor, replies:

Jillette’s piece contained the kind of language that constitutes “voice.” Granted, he writes with a fairly raucous voice, as one might expect from man who describes himself as “the big, loud guy with the stupid haircut.” But voice is one of the things that gives an opinion piece its opinion.

We plucked a bit of that voice, as an adjective, for the headline, expecting it to do what adjectives do: modify a noun, in this case narrowing a general group down to a particular group.

The headline didn’t describe all Christians. It did signal that the piece that followed took issue with a particular type of Christian thinking. And, because it was a headline, it was only a signal — we expect readers to go further to get the full picture. If you read the article, it was even more clear that all Christians weren’t being labeled as bugnuts. And we hope it’s also clear on an Op-Ed page that the wide range of opinions we present are those of the writers, not the newspaper.

Sometimes, we use quotation marks — single quotes, actually, for design reasons — around unusual words in headlines, and it’s arguable that “bugnut” merited such a device on the basis of coinage alone, as it’s not in the dictionary The Times uses. That might have made it more palatable to those readers who objected.

Would we use “such a word” to describe non-Christian religious groups? It all depends — on the context, content and voice of each Op-Ed article.