Editor’s Column: Ranger Rick isn’t reality

I had a subscription to “Ranger Rick” nature magazine when I was a kid. It was educational, yes, but it insulated its immature readers from the true nature of the beasts it highlighted. There was a little anthropomorphism (Ranger Rick was, after all, a raccoon … I even had a stuffed version) and a lot of romanticism about nature and wildlife and critters in general.

Imagine my trauma some 30 years later when I heard…