Former governor’s racial comparisons
Re: “Lamm’s remarks stir anger,” July 28 news story.
Why is it that the truth regarding race and ethnicity cannot be told in
this society without outcries from the usual suspects? Former Gov. Dick
Lamm, having the audacity to point out that some cultures do not value
education as highly as others, incited cries of “racism” and “racial profiling.”
He did not say that blacks and Hispanics are unable to learn or are
unintelligent, but that those cultures value education less than others.
Of the 65 percent of high school dropouts in Denver, how many are
black and Hispanic?Kids drop out for a number of reasons, which certainly
can be attributed in part to parents who don’t care or would rather gain
income instead of education, evading delayed gratification. That’s not valuing
education. I did not hear Lamm say that all whites value education
or that all Hispanic and blacks do not value education. He was discussing
the issue of cultural values generally.
Carla Beckman, Westminster
Unlike some community leaders, I do not think that Dick
Lamm’s book “Two Wands, One Nation” shows that he is a racist. It does show that he has not done his homework.
Lamm argues that “underperforming” minorities (blacks, non-Cuban Hispanics) need to follow the example of high-performing minorities (Chinese-Americans, Cuban-Americans, etc.) and develop cultures emphasizing self-reliance. Lamm is rehashing neoconservative
“model minority” arguments from the 1980s that social scientists have debunked. It has been welldocumented that the most economically
successful immigrant groups contain large proportions of people from middle-class backgrounds with high levels of education.
The Cubans who fled Castro’s revolution were primarily middleclass and well-educated. Immigrants from Mexico are on average
poorer and less educated. Blaming Mexican culture for the performance gap ignores this reality.
The fallacy of attributing economic success to “good” versus “bad” ethnic cultures is further exposed
when we look at intra-ethnic group differences. Many Chinese immigrants have obtained white-collar jobs in high-tech industries,
but many others work low-wage jobs in garment factories and restaurants. Again, class background, not ethnic culture, explains
the difference.
Antony Alumkal, Denver The writer is an assistant professor of sociology of religion at the Iliff School of Theology.
…
I’ve always admired Dick Lamm for casting aside politcal correctness and speaking as he sees it. What a relief it would be if politicians of all persuasions would worry less about covering their backsides and more about doing what they believe is right.
If Lamm’s comments were converted into an analogy, perhaps there would be less controversy: Ask any auto insurance company about the quality of groups of drivers and they can answer quite accurately. Youth and seniors do not drive as well as the middle-aged. Women are better than men. No one argues it; there’s overwhelming proof. This certainly does not mean that any individual 16-year-old male won’t have a perfect driving record throughout his life, or that the 40-year-old woman won’t cause a pile-up. But as a group … .
Various programs are in place for minorities, from prenatal care through education, housing and career placement. Those programs may have inadequacies, but any improvements are useless without the positive support of an individual’s immediate community.
David Sorg, Denver
…
Can we ever expect anything from former Gov. Dick Lamm beyond hateful, judgmental and, to many people, fundamentally racist commentary? It is difficult to imagine he is contemplating a legacy that is built on such a dubious foundation. If his goal is to sell books, travel and make money giving speeches in which he can entertain the small- minded by bashing people of color, he may be succeeding. If, however, he is hoping to reach fair-minded and thoughtful Coloradans through the wholesale social indictment of millions of people who simply think or look different than him, he has failed miserably.
Angela Padilla, Denver
…
You may not like Dick Lamm’s message, but don’t shoot the messenger. He is not indulging in racial profiling; he is not expressing “sentiments”; he is observing the reality that diverse cultures have diverse values. And these values create the context in which people build their lives. To not see or acknowledge these differences – and their results – is to bury one’s head in the sand. Instead of castigating the observer, we need to build solutions to the problems that surface from these observations. Not only can “success” be defined in many ways; the concept of success is simply more important to some than to others. Differences in culture are one major factor in this equation.
Anne Culver, Denver
Former governor’s racial comparisons
Re: “Lamm’s remarks stir anger,” July 28 news story.
Why is it that the truth regarding race and ethnicity cannot be told in this society without outcries from the usual suspects? Former Gov. Dick Lamm, having the audacity to point out that some cultures do not value education as highly as others, incited cries of “racism” and “racial profiling.” He did not say that blacks and Hispanics are unable to learn or are unintelligent, but that those cultures value education less than others.
Of the 65 percent of high school dropouts in Denver, how many are black and Hispanic? Kids drop out for a number of reasons, which certainly can be attributed in part to parents who don’t care or would rather gain income instead of education, evading delayed gratification. That’s not valuing education. I did not hear Lamm say that all whites value education or that all Hispanic and blacks do not value education. He was discussing the issue of cultural values generally.
Carla Beckman, Westminster
…
Trial of former Qwest chief financial officer
Re: “Feds: Take it easy on Qwest’s Szeliga,” July 27 business news story.
To add up a column of numbers incorrectly is a mistake.
To believe you are going to be a brain surgeon when you hate school and studying is an error in judgment.
To know an action is against the law, to think about it, and then to go ahead and do it anyway is criminal and, in religious context, a sin.
If some crackhead were to break in to former Qwest CFO Robin Szeliga’s home and rip off her family to the tune of $125,000, which words do you think she and her supporters would use to describe the actions of the perpetrator?
Interesting how class and color prompt the language of minimalization.
C.E. Zupancic, Denver
Unwanted baby’s death
Re: “Privacy laws hid daughter’s pregnancy,” July 28 news story.
Let’s place the blame in this sad case where it belongs: with the 17- year-old who hid and lied about her pregnancy and committed an atrocious act of abandonment against a newborn. The privacy laws regarding parental notification are intended to protect a teenager from a parent who might not be as supportive as Cheyenne Corbett’s parents might have been (we have no way of knowing what their true reaction to the pregnancy would have been, nor do we know why Miss Corbett chose to deny the pregnancy to her suspicious family.) Colorado has a safe-haven law to protect unwanted newborns. Parents, schools and health- care providers need to do a better job of informing teens that there are places (fire stations and hospital emergency rooms) where they can safely and anonymously relinquish their babies.
Jill Carlson, Parker
How the natives say it
Re: “When in Rome … ,” July 29 Open Forum, and “State name game: Pronouncing ‘Colorado,”‘ July 25 Open Forum.
I feel I must wade in here, as a native whose family first settled in Colorado about 130 years ago. As any true Denver native (my great-grandfather’s house was way out in the suburbs of Denver, at 25th and Champa) will tell you, the correct pronunciation of Invesco Field at Mile High is “Bears Stadium,” and the way we natives pronounce Interstate 25 is “the Valley Highway.” Finally, those of us who grew up here and cut our beer-drinking teeth on Coors’ 3.2 beer will remember an ad tagline for Coors: “Coors, make it yours.” As the tagline implies, Coors rhymes with yours – but Colorado natives pronounce “yours” to rhyme with “yers”; hence, Coors is pronounced “Cers.” As to how to pronounce Colorado, my guess is as good as “yers,” but try “COLOR- a-dew.”
Peter Hornbein, Littleton
Political attack ads
Recently, I have received three flyers in the mail criticizing legislative candidate Ramey Johnson. I don’t know how much of the information is true or who is behind the the flood of negative information, but negative campaigning turns me off sufficiently that I don’t care who’s running against her – Ramey Johnson gets my vote. Hopefully, if enough people feel the same way, we can get somebody’s attention and get candidates to run clean campaigns. Probably wishful thinking on my part.
Hugh Zeiner, Golden
Editor’s note: Johnson faces Pat Holloway in the Republican primary for House District 23.
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