Questioning the Relevance of the Feng Shui Column

I was appalled that The Times would publish such drivel as Kirsten M. Lagatree’s answer to a question about whether a reader should buy a house where a murder-suicide occurred (“Tragedy in Home Leaves Negative Energy,” June 6).

Somebody should alert homeowners in American cities that have been around more that 200 years that our blood-spattered history haunts us in our private dwellings. Obviously we need to immediately alert hospitals and all persons that might live near funeral homes that they are in immediate spiritual danger.

All science is unproven in the context of time, but some more than others. Feng shui is a belief, and believers will see what they want.

You have convinced me that you are spiritually bankrupt buffoons.

MATT KENNETT

Los Angeles

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A reading of the feng shui column reveals it is superstitious nonsense. It is no more relevant to a major metropolitan newspaper than are reports of space alien abductions.

H. JAMES ROSENBERG

Van Nuys

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Thanks for the column on feng shui. Now I’ll know the importance of installing a mirror on my toilet or pointing my bed in the right compass direction.

I’m still waiting for a weekly column on Elvis sightings and alien abductions.

PAT CAREY

San Gabriel

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The publication of amusing and harmless nonsense has a hallowed place in newspaper history. But your feng shui column goes beyond harmless to ridiculous and destructive and fails even to be amusing.

Perhaps the comics section next to horoscope would be a compatible home. But placed next to articles that I trust to be reasonably accurate and informative, the column strikes me as a disgrace to the paper. In fact, I find myself wondering if the authors of nearby articles are also delusional half-wits.

PAUL PAPANEK

Los Angeles

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Your feng shui columnist says that toilets flush not only waste but good marital relations, money-earning capacity and other good things. Don’t worry; for an immodest fee a feng shui consultant can fix this. Will The Times hawk whatever fraud is currently popular?

JOHN R. MAYNE

Carpinteria

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For one who has been brought up in a Christian church in a land founded on Christian principles, I was astonished to see that The Times has an editor who deals with the New Age garbage called feng shui.

Far better to call on the living God in the name of his son Jesus Christ--or can’t we name God or his son in a paper where feng shui can appear on the front page of the Real Estate section?

How much better to call on God for protection in our home than to hang crystals here and there or to be sure that our bed is not in the “death position.”

May I suggest a reading of the Bible from cover to cover to avoid being ensnared by bondage to such teachings as feng shui?

MAX SPRINGER

Via e-mail