Feedback 9/5

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Pride issues

On our article on the Black Pride Festival and reader responses to it: Black Pride feels excluded from the main LGBTQ community at large; thus they have their own event. The response was the typical “Marxist,” “intersectionality,” “identity politics.” (Once you state your gender, sexual orientation, skin color, or any other defining feature, you’ve engaged in identity politics; I’ve only read or heard white people use this term).

No one asked why Black Pride felt excluded? No one questioned it but responded with a nod to the Federalist Papers? That reeks of A) I don’t listen, and B) white fragility.

JUAN B. HERNANDEZ

In his call for unity, Andrew Hirsch ends his essay with “Please, Black Pride, do not divide us again.” Such a response is often the way we in the dominant group answer a dis-empowered people’s demand to be heard: blame the victim.

I suggest instead, a call for understanding. It would mean having the courage to re-examine history in the context of systemic institutionalized racism, sexism, and classism, to name a few. It would mean facing white pride and the implicit bias it produces. It would require us to confront our white fragility when our assumptions are questioned. It would challenge us to rethink whether our cultural experiences speak for everyone.

Thank you, City, for acknowledging the issue before us in the LGBTQ+ community and the community at large. And thank you, Mr. Hirsch, for enlightening us as to how far we have to go in our quest for unity.

STEVEN JAROSE

The Dems’ race

On the 136th state Assembly campaign: I’d like to see a shift away from machine candidates. I love that Jaclyn Richard doesn’t owe favors to corporate donors.

Jamie Romeo comes from the Quid pro Joe Morelle machine and was chosen by him to be his successor. If they both won, he could use her to sell access to lobbyists in Washington and Albany.

KEN MCDONALD

Vote for education, not incarceration

For seven years, students, parents, and community members from across New York State have been traveling to Albany for fair funding for our schools. And for seven years Andrew Cuomo has ignored our appeals, choosing to gift big tax breaks to corporations instead of investing in our schools and communities.

Cynthia Nixon has been a part of these regular trips to the capital. She’s seen firsthand how public money flows upward to a handful of wealthy people, while basic needs like education and child care fall by the wayside. This leads to more and more kids being pushed out of school and into a broken and unforgiving justice system.

If New York were a country, it would have the sixth highest incarceration rate in the world. And most people being held in New York have not been convicted of anything. They’ve been denied their freedom because of our broken bail, speedy trial, and discovery laws. Even worse, young people of color who cannot afford bail are often forced into predatory plea deals. They may spend months or years in prison for something they didn’t do.

Every year the governor promises to deliver on a progressive agenda that will make life better for struggling families and communities of color, and every year he comes up short. We need leadership we can trust and who will do right by our families and our communities. Cynthia Nixon is the kind of leader who will stand up for all of us, not just the privileged few.

CARRIE GILROY

Gilroy is a teacher and is co-director of the grassroots organization ROCitizen.

Impeachment? Not now

I am writing to express my opposition to President Donald Trump’s possible impeachment that is being bandied about in progressive circles.

It isn’t wise to overturn the will of the voters on the rules of the game all agreed to abide by.

When President Richard Nixon faced the same fate in the early ’70s, the significant drag – even after winning by a landslide in 1972 – was the very long and inconclusive Vietnam War and the terrible casualties generated by this pointless war.

Rather than have an unelected cabal decide whether Donald Trump should be removed from office, we need to give the voters a say in the matter. If he has done something illegal, wait till he is out of office.

DAVID HENNELLY

This article appears in Sep 5-11, 2018.