Recently, the Minneapolis Star Tribune featured a page in their op ed section on transgender issues. In Minnesota, our governor and our attorney general have stood up firmly for transgender rights. This is my response to the two strongly positive articles on this page: Thank you for devoting the Strib Voices page on October 16 […]
President Trump has somehow decided that he should resurrect a subject that has been largely resolved now: team mascots, and the use of Native names and images. Bottom line: those who are being portrayed in these racist ways get to say if it’s ok or not. And the answer is definitively, it is not. It […]
Shortly after Roe v. Wade went into effect, I was sitting at the kitchen table with my mom and my grandma. I asked them what they thought about abortion. As I expected, my mom said she thought it was wrong. But my grandma surprised me when she said she was in favor of legal abortion. […]
It feels like people often think about empathy in terms of understanding other people’s pain, suffering or hardships. And that is an important component. The #MeToo movement asks us to listen to women’s experiences of being sexually harrassed, assaulted or debased, and to try to understand their feelings and how this has affected them. Black […]
As we come to the end of a very difficult year, 2020 stands out as a time when we lost an extraordinary number of souls who should not have departed this Earth this year. We remember and honor those who lost their lives to the global Covid-19 pandemic. We remember and honor those who lost […]
Has the pandemic increased or decreased empathy in our lives and our world? As usual, the answer seems to be, both. At the local level, within our own neighborhoods and communities, we are seeing outpourings of compassion for those we know and live with. Empathy is strengthened by connections, so when we see on our […]