Dear Editor:
After reading the article by Chris Morgan entitled “Hate Crimes Bill Not Solution,” I ask people to also read a piece written by Peggy McIntosh entitled “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack.”
Her opening quote was a self-realization that “I was taught to see racism only in individual acts of meanness, not in invisible systems conferring dominance on my group.”
She is white, as is Chris who seems upset his MTV was interrupted with the reality that Chris is privileged and some of us are not!
But we wish to remove the “privileged status” of some and replace it with equal rights for all, and that scares a lot of people.
But how did this “white privilege” come about?
Did it start with Thomas Jefferson, who so eloquently explained to England why the citizens of the 13 colonies were declaring their independence?
He stated how the English treatment of the colonial people gave them the right to rebel, while at the same time he himself and others he was representing held slaves in the very same situation and thought nothing of it.
What of the Southern hospitality and gratitude shown to the blacks returning after fighting in World War II, only to be relegated to nobodies who had to watch their words and actions because a white person might take offense?
This period culminated when the court (judge) ignored the substantial evidence and witnesses and let the killer of Medger Evers walk free for 26 more years, because the killer was white and Evers was a black man who wanted the same rights that white people take for granted.
What of the attitudes of the judges sitting on the bench?
An attitude that, because of their so-called religious upbringing, sees anyone different as a threat to their protected way of life, and thus evil and not fit to be protected by the law.
What of laws that our politicians have failed in their job of properly writing?
What of the laws on which they drag their feet, allowing us “outsiders” some but not all the same rights that the “white privileged” have?
This is the fair law you preach about, but it is the law that recently saw the parents who killed a three-day-old baby born intersexed (hermaphroditic) sentenced to “go seek counseling.”
If the child has been born wholly male or female, the average time in this country they would serve would be 5-10 years.
What happened here? Wish to explain the difference?
Have you ever been denied housing, employment, medical attention in an emergency room or even ambulance service just because you exist?
Have you ever sat in a courtroom while the murderer of a friend went on trial, and as mitigating circumstances they claimed that the decreased was homosexual and a transsexual?
Have you ever felt the anger when the judge disallowed evidence to prove that the defendant frequented gay bars, just because the witnesses were also gay or transsexual, and the judge said their statements would be biased? Then witness the judge pass a six-months-less-time-served sentence on this murderer?
For your information, I served this nation’s military from Vietnam to Bosnia (30 years), so I can say I have fought for your continual rights, as S.G. Tallentrye wrote.
Now you stand up and demand that all minorities, including the gender-variant individuals, gays, lesbians and bisexuals and everyone else who does not fit into the “white privileged” set have the same rights!
Push to take the fact of a person being different from the rest of society and using that as mitigating circumstances out of the legal system. That someone is different is commonly used to justify the perpetrating of a criminal action.
Does your equal treatment mean “maintain your `privileged white’ position,” while minorities get murdered and mutilated by animals claiming their actions are “privileged because they are white” and protected?
Do you want to share in our defense against the Machiavellian laws currently on the books that protect the privileged, or are you going to watch more MTV and only get upset when they show a gesture of reality on the screen?
We need equal enforcement of all laws based on being human, no matter who you are, victim or perpetrator, not based on your status in any group or organization!
You may view the the Peggy McIntosh article online at http://seamonkey.ed.asu.edu/mcisaac/emc598ge/Unpacking.html.

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