What’s implied?

PAUL BROWNFIELD’S article on Heidi Fleiss was interesting [“Fleiss Can Still Ruffle Feathers,” June 26. However, something he wrote prompts this question: Why was it necessary to identify Fleiss as the daughter of a “Jewish doctor”?

Why was the religion of her father of any relevance whatsoever? Was it to imply that her story is all the more startling because she was raised a nice Jewish girl? If she had been the daughter of a Catholic doctor (and, rumor has it, there are a few of them around too), would Brownfield have identified her as the daughter of a Catholic doctor? I suspect not.

This is a bone I have wanted to pick with journalists for a long time. Jews are routinely identified by their religion in articles when faith has nothing whatsoever to do with the story. What, then, are you trying to tell us, as readers? Is this code, so that we understand some sort of subtext the writer cannot openly articulate? I just don’t get it.

Nancy S. Niederman

Studio City