Letters: Everyone has a role to play in BLM movement; Masks show care for others

Everyone has a role to play in BLM movement

I’ve been so heartened to see the turnout for the marches calling for Justice for Black Lives that have taken place in State College the past two Sundays. But I would be even more heartened if I saw at the next march some community leaders that are missing. I’m sure it would be helpful to the marchers to know that they are supported by the leaders of the local religious communities and police departments.

But more powerful yet is something that we can all do, every one of us — and that is, to show kindness and compassion to the Black people we meet in own everyday lives. We can encourage the Black visitor to our church to stay for the coffee hour. We can invite the Black family down the street over for dinner. We can go out of our way to welcome the new Black person at our place of business, and make sure that he or she is included in office activities. We can encourage our kids to invite their Black friends from school over for play dates. We can speak up when someone in our presence uses a racial slur, or tells a joke belittling another race. We can smile and say, “Hi, how’re you doing?” to the Black person we meet on the sidewalk. In sum, we can treat our Black sisters and brothers like fellow children of God — because they are. It is not up to someone else, it is up to US.

Masks show care for others

I live on the fringe of society. My life consists of online shopping and avoiding humans. I disinfect my home, myself, my family incessantly. I dart in and out of businesses, limiting exposure. I am seen lurking, waiting for a curbside pickup. I check COVID-19 reports daily. Paranoid? Germaphobic? Nope. Just immunocompromised.

I am one of the CDC’s “People Who Are at Higher Risk,” those who have “hidden” illnesses — diabetes, a heart, lung or kidney condition, immune system flaws. You can’t tell by looking at me. I appear normal.

Last spring, in a time before the pandemic, I contracted a virus. So minor, my doctor said, it didn’t have a name. This “bug” left me bedridden for two weeks. Another month passed before I recovered. Six weeks lost to a nameless infection healthy people don’t even feel.

Imagine what the coronavirus would do to me, people like me. A lengthy illness, definitely. Death, most likely.

This is why I need to thank every person who puts on their mask. I know you care beyond your own needs. You wear that hot, itchy breath-blocker. You deal with the hair tangles, the ear pulls, the damp fabric against your face. You help protect everyone around you from you. My heroes!

And to the self-proclaimed rebels who choose to not wear a mask: Grow up. Stop being selfish. You are small in numbers, and even smaller of mind. Put on that mask and prove you can be a caring human.

Confusion with defund the police movement

It isn’t the national movement to defund the police that bothers me. Rather, it is the reality that a significant fraction of the population consists of mindless lunatics. More to the point, is the present clamor to defund the police an admission on our part that funding the police has always been to kill citizens like George Floyd?