'Toxic Rhetoric' Discussion Comes to City Council

A group of people that protested “toxic rhetoric” in American political discourse at a brief demonstration in front of a legislator’s office last week came to City Council on Tuesday night to spread their message.

Gloria McVeigh urged Council President Robert Donchez to take several steps geared toward controlling disruptive speech at council meetings, which are generally not all that heated.

Nonetheless, McVeigh referenced the recent Arizona shooting that left six people dead and the , a Broughal Middle School technical assistant, who allegedly made violent threats on his Facebook page as justification for her message.

“Last weekend’s arrest of a school district worker for making credible threats against district employees means we can no longer allow ourselves the luxury of thinking that violence can’t happen here,” McVeigh said.

“I believe that a direct line can be drawn, from the hate messages that flood our airwaves, to the increasingly vicious barbs that residents aim at our public officials, to the violent fantasies of an unbalanced public employee, to the shots fired in a Tucson, Arizona shopping center.”

McVeigh had led a demonstration outside of the district office of state Rep. Joseph Brennan, D-Bethlehem, on Thursday in an effort to draw attention to the “hate speech” that led to the shooting of U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and many others who lined up outside a supermarket to meet her. Brennan had approved of the venue.

McVeigh and a handful of people stood outside of Town Hall on Tuesday night before the council meeting to deliver a similar message. Inside, only McVeigh spoke.

She urged Donchez to bar anyone from using council’s courtesy of the floor portion of the meeting if they have been previously arrested or removed from a council meeting for disruptive behavior.

McVeigh also suggested that Donchez “gavel down any speaker who addresses council members as ‘idiots,’ ‘morons,’ ‘thieves’ or any other pejorative term.”

She also said Donchez should “especially discourage attacks on younger or female members of council. Here in Bethlehem it seems, women and younger members of council are considered easy targets and can suffer harassment without restraint. This is shameful.”

There are two female council members, Karen Dolan and Jean Belinski. J. William Reynolds is the only council member who has not yet turned 30 years old.

“Pushing back against thuggery is the job of every person who cares about our democracy,” McVeigh said. “It’s no longer about distant places like Tucson, Arizona. It’s about Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.”