To the editor: As a 67-year-old black woman whose extraordinary life journey includes the demeaning, infuriating, polarizing and the never-ending need to navigate racial bigotry and discrimination, I thank Dahleen Glanton for her instructive column “Lawsuit over cake not on the same tier as racial intolerance.”
While I fully support the gay rights movement, the baker’s refusal to a make a cake using religious beliefs as grounds is not equal to racial discrimination. This insensitive and dismissive argument is like comparing apples to kumquats, and minimizes our country’s cruel and abiding history of racial hatred, terrorism, and the unparalleled injustice of institutional racism.
— Deborah Harrington, Chicago
Power in numbers
To the editor: All minority groups must stand together. If we are divided into factions, we lose power. In a democracy, power is in our numbers. I respectfully disagree with Dahleen Glanton’s “Lawsuit over cake not on the same tier as racial intolerance.” We do need to use historical cases in order to argue future cases or put things in perspective for those who too have suffered or are suffering.
Discrimination is discrimination in any form. If one group of people shouts “this doesn’t count” because their suffering is viewed more quantifiable, we will lose the greater battle of discrimination in any form.
Step by step things are getting better, but we must support other minority groups or there will be no one left to speak up when our civil rights are yet again challenged (and they will be). United we stand; divided we all fall.
— Susan Landwer, Wilmette
