I agree with the neighbor who writes in a letter to the Beachcomber (June 22) that we need to stop demonizing the families filing suit for trying to put a wedge of light into the blindness and old lenses many of us are looking through. To help, I really encourage people in our community to read “Waking Up White”, a book recommended by Vashon Reads. The way many of us continue “othering” people is so deeply engrained in our culture, our bodies, our beliefs, and our language. Is it possible to pause and look at our own fierce reactions, and question the root? If we do not notice or question ourselves about what we automatically believe when situations occur —we may be operating from deeply seated cultural bias and ignorance that control our opinions, attitudes, and actions towards and against each other. White privilege and hetero-normal privilege are real. If we can’t see that fact, we are likely numbed by our privilege. Waking up is hard to do, and it is an imperative, humbling and enlivening action in these days of intolerable violence.
Karen Chuki Nelson
