I’ve been trying to fill my head with happy thoughts these past few months, and “Woke on the warpath” (Nov. 19) put a dent in that. I’m not sure how John Donegan derives his pronouncements if not from breathtaking naiveté. The now-scrubbed material from Pete Sysak’s social media went way beyond calling distant protesters “thugs,” it was vile, hateful, and I will not honor it with a description. Someone who hatefully denigrates so many of the same populations that the college is designed to serve has zero business serving in any capacity there. I won’t comment on John’s description of “nontraditional shopping” beyond saying that there are protesters, looters, and rioters. Specific actors in the summer’s protests, educate yourself. Look at the role white supremacists played, if you dare.
Is there systemic racism in our happy place? Yes. Can I load you up with local statistics? I looked for 45 minutes; I’m not giving any more of my life to this rebuke. I will say that you can look no further than the treatments by our District Attorney, Pastor Dan Dow, of a young black woman, Tianna Arata, charged with 13 crimes, while Dow “couldn’t find anything to prosecute” in his examination of Chris McGuire, an alleged white sexual predator and former Paso Robles police sergeant.
Nationally, a Black man is more likely to die in police custody than a white man. He is more likely to be pulled over, suffer violence at that time, be arrested, more likely to be tried and convicted, and with demonstrably stiffer sentences. Blacks have higher unemployment rates, lack access to financing, are offered poorer educations. Tellingly, people of color have been disproportionately impacted by COVID-19. If not for systemic discrimination, how would that be explained?
I’m not going to chase John down his wormhole of Chinese or Russian upheavals, and how that macabre history foretells what awaits our hapless youth. I will say that I am proud of our youngsters, of how they speak up and instigate needed change. There is injustice in our world, inequality is rampant. I’m not sure that any of us on the left want to banish the Pete Sysaks, the Chris Arends, or the John Donegans, we just want you to be respectful. To realize that there are those who have been beleaguered in the nation for 400 years, and to know that the work to be done is to be done by the oppressors, white people. Our society needs conflicting viewpoints to function, to maintain a balance. We just can’t allow you to be dickish about it.
Allen Root
San Luis Obispo
This article appears in Dec 3-10, 2020.
Huh? Right after pronouncing that Sysak “has no business being” at Cuesta College, Allen claims that he doesn’t seek to have Sysak, Arends and myself “banished”. Of course, if we wish to avoid banishment, we must be “respectful” of the intolerant lunacy coming out of some on campus, a respect which certainly isn’t reciprocated by the name-calling, fevered throng. By “respect”, Allen is really demanding cheerful obedience to the ever-evolving demands of his woke warriors.
But I am not too worried about being banished. If you look at the election results, even here in reliably blue California, you can see that, while voters were happy to get rid of Trump, they aren’t buying what the left is selling. Even with heavy media and Hollywood cheerleading, and big money sponsors, voters have no interest in sanctioned racial discrimination, higher taxes, rent control, more regulation, etc.
Even while claiming “proof” of “systemic racism”, all Allen cites are different outcomes, as if that proves it. “Systemic” means something deliberately and formally incorporated into a system. While there may be racism in a few individual cops, like in any group, including college students, what part of the “system” encourages or allows racism?
FYI: Even a casual observer of the justice system knows that there is a BIG difference between prosecuting someone like Arata, who commits a crime in full view of hundreds, and on video, and in prosecuting someone where you don’t have enough evidence to prove a crime beyond a reasonable doubt. It’s that pesky “due process” thing in Constitution that you leftists claim to revere, except when it fails to provide you with the emotional catharthis you seek.
Take your happy thoughts and shove ’em, along with your bovine excrement excuses for “bad actors” of the left leaning crowd. Our present day society has no responsibility for past oppression or persecution the same as modern day Germany has no responsibility for the Nazis. Modern day Russia has no responsibility for Stalin’s murderous rampages through humanity, also more recent to history than America’s slavery years. Is modern day Afghanistan responsible for harboring Bin Laden and sponsoring terrorism, should their grandchildren be held to ridicule for the transgressions of the past? Not a slave is alive today in America nor are any slaveowners. Let the past lie and learn from the mistakes that were made so they do not once again rise. A lot of excuses for “why I can’t!!!”, not solutions and sucking it up to “DO WHAT YOU ARE CAPABLE OF, REGARDLESS OF WHAT STANDS IN YOUR WAY!!!!” Enough of the whiny hypocrisy.
Allen is right about Sysak’s disgusting posts. Any presiding officer of a non-profit, public service corporation – and especially an educational one – who posted the wild, extremist and divisive images that Sysak did would be fired on the spot. But here in MAGA-‘merica, minions like Donegan and “missy” Dogood rush to his defense.
It must frustrate Fuglie that we live in a constitutional democracy where he is not allowed to gather up his fellow brownshirts and silence those who dare disagree with him.