‘It is long past the time when American history means white history’

I am a 73-years-old, white, retired high school teacher. I was one of the people who marched in the Black Lives Matter protest in Warwick.

I am infuriated that Maurice Luftig characterized us as a “mob.”

We were no such thing; we walked peacefully and listened quietly. (We also maintained 8 minutes and 46 seconds of silence, trying to comprehend how long it took for Derek Chauvin to suffocate George Floyd.)

Mr. Luftig quotes Edmund Burke: “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”

That is the essence why Warwick needs the Culturally Responsive-Sustaining Education program.

How many of us know of the Tulsa Massacre?

Or that lynching did not become a federal crime until 2018?

Or what happened at the Edmund Pettus Bridge?

Or that Emmett Till’s accuser recanted?

The list of what a largely white educational establishment has ignored goes on and on.

If, as Maurice Luftig says, Warwick has a “sensible, kind, and wonderful character,” it will welcome a program which includes a more balanced view of race relations in our country.

It is long past the time when American history means white history.

Karen F. Kumer

Warwick