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Thursday's letters: We should be the United States

 
Published Aug. 16, 2017

Hate groups of all types active in Florida, bay area | Aug. 16

We are the United States

It's sad that we live in this current world with fights between "left" and "right." But that isn't something I fear.

I have a legitimate fear for the safety of my family. After seeing the events unfold in Charlottesville, Va., it made me realize that something like that could happen anywhere. And what if something like that occurred within a proximity to not only where I am, but where my wife or son are?

I legitimately fear actions from neo-Nazi white supremacist groups. I am Hispanic, I am in an interracial marriage, I have a biracial son.

I already grew up experiencing discrimination to a point that made me resent living. I was bullied for a long time. I was given the nickname "Chico" by someone who would beat the snot out of me at random when I walked home from the bus stop in high school. And then I adopted the nickname to show him it didn't bother me in hopes he would stop. It's a story I never expressed because I feared for my own life at that time.

I don't want my son to experience what I did. It damaged me deeper than anything I have personally experienced and left memories that no matter what will never go away.

Words are very powerful, even more powerful from leadership. And someone has taken those words as a call to arms.

The events in Charlottesville are an example of how humanity shouldn't treat one another. But where will the next Charlottesville occur? Who will be victimized? How many more must die over an ideology before the next Civil War begins and we are lost again as a nation.

When will we finally see a United States of America?

Roberto Rodriguez, Clearwater

What teaching taught me

I taught middle and high school band in Orlando for six years and am now in my second year of a master's degree in conducting at the University of South Florida where I teach classes as well. We help shape the lives of future adults. The events in Charlottesville, Va., remind us that, while we continue to take giant steps forward in equality with every generation, there is much work left.

As a white, heterosexual, cisgender, able-bodied woman, I have experienced privileges that many people in our country have not, and really wasn't fully made aware of them until I got my first job teaching. Of the thousand or so students I taught in my six years in secondary school, fewer than 20 were white. I remember, when Trayvon Martin was shot, crying for days thinking about how much several of my beautiful, intelligent, talented, goofball students looked like him and how it could have just as easily happened to them.

I have had many students finally feel comfortable enough to come out as gay, and I both rejoice for their bravery and ache that they have to be brave to be true to themselves. I have a student with whom I was very close come out as a transgender man, and my heart also hurts for him whenever I hear hate spewed from ignorant mouths. I stand with my students, and I want to give a shout-out to educators. Never forget how important you are and how your actions and beliefs will be seen by young, impressionable eyes.

Christi Durham, Tampa

Let protest be silent

I do not endorse any groups that seek to divide our country anymore. I believe the best way to handle any protesters is to not give them the attention they seek. If anyone gives them the right to march, the best way to protest is do not go there, do not give them and the media the publicity they seek. In ignoring them we are showing them we will stand on peaceful solutions against violence.

Phyllis Wright, Sun City Center

Times change; so should we

I am a seventh-generation Mississippian. There's even a town named after my great-great-great-grandfather. Forty years ago I went to Ole Miss and waved rebel flags at football games because that's what everyone did and we didn't think that deeply about it. That was then.

Times change. Words and symbols change. "Gay" used to just mean happy. "Catfish" was only a fish. The swastika began as a religious symbol in India and Asia and got perverted by Hitler. The rebel battle flag represents slavery, racism and rebellion against the United States. Confederate statues are people who rebelled against the United States under that rebel flag.

After we won our independence we didn't put up statues of British military members nor did England put up statues of our founding fathers. The Civil War is part of our history and while we should always remember it, times have changed and it's time to remove those statues and either destroy them or move them into museums.

Howard Taylor, St. Petersburg

It's a non-partisan election | Letter, Aug. 15

National issues are local

A letter writer criticized St. Petersburg Mayor Rick Kriseman for being too partisan. I disagree. I am happy we have a mayor who will stand up against white supremacists. I am happy we have a mayor who talks about climate change, especially when we have a president who ignores scientific evidence. I am happy we have a mayor who supports LGBT rights, especially when we have a president who disrespects transgender members of the armed forces.

Does the writer believe that speaking against white supremacists has no effect on race relations in St. Petersburg? Does the writer really believe that climate change and rising sea levels will not effect our storm water system and our water front? Does the letter writer really believe that ignoring our president's disrespect of transgender Americans has no effect on our local LGBT community?

I am glad we have a mayor who has dealt with local issues on the pier, the new police station, the Tampa Bay Rays, and our aging sewer system and at the same time addressed national issues, especially when they have a direct effect on St. Petersburg.

Richard Feigel, St. Petersburg

Monument debate persists | Aug. 16

Destruction there and here

Remember how the Taliban destroyed ancient statues in Afghanistan, and how ISIS did so in Syria? Now we are destroying monuments here.

Philip Thompson, Tierra Verde