This letter is in response to Ms. Possley’s article regarding my father, John W. Henry, the man who died on campus during Thanksgiving. While I do understand a student’s death is worthy of being published on the front page of the student newspaper, I do not agree with the method used to portray my father. Only good things should be said about the deceased, and anything negative that was involved in his death should be dealt with in good taste, not to mention with complete accuracy.

To start, I do not feel it is right to discuss personal medical matters in any instance, especially if the author cannot seem to get the details of the story correct. The issue of my father’s dependency on prescribed anti-anxiety (not anti-depressants as the article states) and his treatment for those addictions are no one’s business but my family’s. Good taste would tell someone information such as that should not be published, regardless of whether it was a quote from the coroner. The front page article treated my father like a strung-out junkie who did nothing more than pop pills all day. For his unsuccessful drug treatment to be referred to as being “dried out” shows no respect to a person whose family was trying to help him become a productive member of society.

Secondly, when we got to the continuation of the article on page 9, we saw more inaccuracies in the article. My father never taught drama classes; he was a drum instructor. An article regarding someone’s death should tell about the good things that occurred in a person’s life and not the inaccuracies that were put in as obvious filler at the end of an article to make a space quota.

While some students are as unlucky as me and have to deal with the death of a parent at a very young age, not every student has to read about it on the front page of the paper and is forced to look at her classmates with the embarrassment of having her father broadcast as a failing drug addict and suicidal junkie. I did not appreciate my father’s death shoved down my throat in the midst of my personal grieving. Ms. Possley, did you ever stop to think, just once, what John Henry’s family would think if they could read your words? Obviously, you didn’t. More than likely, you just assumed no family members of his would read your words, and you could belittle his life first and foremost and then add quotes from the tasteful article that was written about him before everyone knew the results of his autopsy.

While my father did have his problems and was taking medication, he also suffered from alcoholism, which is what led to his death. My father did genuinely care about the world and did love this university. For the paper of the university he cared so much about to talk about him so horribly would cause him to turn over in his grave. While I agree the death of my father is front page news, I do not believe my family’s or my father’s personal problems is front page news. If anyone wants to know the true story about my father and the real person he was, why don’t you ask his daughter?

Anna Henry

Junior, sociology major