Insensitivity to How the Other Half Lives

In “Mere Real Estate It Is Not” (Jan. 13), hopefully Barry Sloane was trying to be clever with his comment that “the great unwashed out there are very happy in their tedious houses that I would slash my wrists if I had to live in” and is not as elitist as he sounds. I, along with the majority of Southern Californians who cannot afford to be one of his clients, thought his remark to be quite insensitive and wish he could be forced to live out the rest of his days in just such a place, without sharp instruments.

CARLOS VAN NATTER

Los Angeles

*

Please pardon the mundane among us, Barry, but weren’t those slipcovers on your chairs and couch in the photograph?

STEVE SNODGRESS

Glendale

*

The “great unwashed” are the everyday people of society who cannot afford million-dollar homes. People are happy in their “tedious homes” because they are theirs; they are what they could afford. A snob like Barry Sloane might want to take that into consideration before he goes spouting off again. The “great unwashed” can read just as well as the wealthy!

ANN McENTYRE

Whittier