Editorial: Spoil sports

When crowds of students gather outside the Southwest residential area at the University of Massachusetts, the potential for violence, injury and property damage is always present.

Editorial: Slow fight for rights

When California voters approved Proposition 8 in 2008, it became government policy in the nation's largest state to discriminate against people who want to marry others of the same sex. On Tuesday, that retrograde law was struck down by a federal appeals court's 2-1 ruling. It said passage of Proposition 8, by 52 percent of the vote, served no purpose other than to "lessen the status and human dignity of gays and lesbians ... and to reclassify their relationships and families as inferior to those of opposite-sex couples."

Editorial: Believing a victim

She said. And then he said. In the end, after relatively quick deliberations, a Hampshire Superior Court jury accepted the prosecution's narrative of a man who used his position of influence as a mentor to lure a 14-year-old girl into sexual acts to which she was too young to consent.

Editorial: Magazine turns a page

The March issue of Family Fun that goes out to 2.1 million households will contain the same Northampton-grown creativity that has defined it for two decades. But the mouse has left the house.

We hope that under the Meredith Corp.'s new ownership, this publication with its roughly 50 employees can continue to find success nationally in a competitive marketplace for magazines.

Editorial: UMass and our economy

New University of Massachusetts President Robert L. Caret is reassuring western Massachusetts business leaders that the university will continue to help attract new and innovative industry to the region.

Editorial: Take fresh look at park zoo

The Christenson Zoo has helped make Northampton's Look Park a popular attraction. Recently, though, the zoo has come under fire in letters to the editor that have question its purpose.

Writers have wondered whether the zoo's animals are properly cared for. Some have called for improvements to the facility; others just want it to close.

Editorial: Amherst's sports quandary

With a former star member of Amherst Regional's football squad about to play in the Super Bowl, this is a heady week for fans of the high school's athletics programs. Beyond the buzz from Indianapolis, it is also a troubled one.