To the Editor:
Re “Sufficient With the Land Acknowledgments,” by Kathleen DuVal (Opinion visitor essay, Jan. 6):
Eliminating land acknowledgments will serve solely to additional scale back Native visibility in U.S. society. There isn’t exhausting information on the proliferation of land acknowledgments, however I consider that the writer considerably overestimates how frequent they’re outdoors academia and a small variety of nonprofits.
And whereas there isn’t unanimity amongst Native individuals round land acknowledgments (simply as there isn’t unanimity on any problem), I discover it noteworthy that lots of the most pointed critiques the writer cites come from non-Native individuals.
The writer is true that establishments should do extra to ascertain credible relationships with Native nations. But this isn’t an both/or problem of acknowledging the historic and ongoing existence of Native nations or participating with them.
We’re in an important second when many states (and shortly the federal authorities) are attempting to suppress studying about Native individuals in academic and different settings. Now’s the time to embrace Indigenous visibility.
Till Native individuals have the visibility in American life that different teams have, I say we’d like extra land acknowledgments, not fewer.
Robert Maxim
Washington
The author is an enrolled citizen of the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe, and a fellow on the Brookings Establishment, the place he researches tribal economies and id in Indian Nation.
To the Editor:
I actually agree with Kathleen DuVal’s rivalry that “sensible efforts” to enhance the lot of Native Individuals are superior to the sanctimonious advantage signaling embodied in land acknowledgments, which acknowledge that almost all land within the U.S. has been forcibly taken from Native Individuals.
However along with the legitimate causes enumerated by Dr. DuVal to cease land acknowledgments, these actions are hypocritical. By acknowledging {that a} specific plot of land was violently taken from a sure tribe, one means that one is able to treatment that injustice by returning it to its unique house owners.
That sounds good — however in the true world what number of present, lawful landowners would willingly relinquish their property to the descendants of those that misplaced the land by violence and coercion? Virtually none.
We must always keep away from ethical pronouncements that recommend we’re against historic injustices that now we have the ability to treatment, not less than partially, whereas we proceed to benefit from the fruits of that injustice.
Yonkel Goldstein
San Carlos, Calif.
A Capitol Architect’s Outrage Over Trump’s Jan. 6 Pardons
To the Editor:
Re “An Opening Act of Contempt” (editorial, Jan. 22):
It was past comprehension to see photos of the forty seventh president standing in entrance of the 19-foot-tall mannequin of the Statue of Freedom in Emancipation Corridor, simply after his swearing-in ceremony, telling his supporters: “You’re going to see a number of motion on the J6 hostages. See a number of motion.”
On the White Home later that day, the motion included mass pardons and sentence commutations for many who took half within the Jan. 6 rebel on the Capitol.
Because the tenth Architect of the Capitol, from 1997 to 2007, and a member of the three-person Capitol Police Board, I had sworn to “help and defend the Structure of america towards all enemies international and home.” I used to be intestine punched on Jan. 6, 2021, as many a whole bunch of home terrorists rampaged by the halls and corridors of the Capitol, desecrating the image of our nation and the center of the Congress I used to be sworn to guard.
My duties as head of the two,300-person Architect of the Capitol company included the preservation, upkeep and safety of all buildings and grounds on Capitol Hill. To see Emancipation Corridor, the center of that growth, utilized by President Trump as a discussion board to announce the subversion of the rule of legislation and of our Structure speaks of harmful occasions forward for our democracy.
It is a name for every member of the Senate and the Home of Representatives to recollect the oaths in addition they swore and to publicly voice their outrage.
Alan M. Hantman
Fort Lee, N.J.
Kennedy and the A.M.A.
To the Editor:
Re “Kennedy Tried to Quash Photographs as Covid Raged” (entrance web page, Jan. 18):
New reporting about Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s aggressive efforts to ban the Covid vaccine throughout the top of the lethal pandemic needs to be sufficient to definitively reject his nomination as secretary of well being and human companies.
However that’s solely the newest revelation about Mr. Kennedy, an aggressive anti-science conspiracist who, amongst different positions dangerous to the general public’s well being, has unfold harmful misinformation undermining H.I.V./AIDS prevention and remedy in Africa. And his spreading of disinformation about vaccines is one of many major components cited behind a deadly outbreak of measles in Samoa.
It’s no shock that 1000’s of medical doctors have spoken out and signed petitions opposing Mr. Kennedy’s affirmation to guide H.H.S., an enormous federal company with 80,000 workers, a $1.8 trillion price range and large affect over international well being insurance policies and techniques.
And it’s exhausting to think about a secretary of the company who has publicly referred to as for an eight-year ban on infectious illness analysis when the world is dealing with the robust risk of a worldwide pandemic that may very well be extra lethal than the Covid-19 catastrophe.
So with all that we learn about Mr. Kennedy’s actually outlandish concepts, it’s significantly shocking that now we have heard nary a phrase from the American Medical Affiliation and different main medical organizations that needs to be strongly and publicly opposing Mr. Kennedy’s nomination. Now’s their time to guard the nation’s well being — not simply the particular pursuits of their members.
However now, sadly for the nation, the A.M.A. is inexplicably M.I.A.
Irwin Redlener
New York
The author, a pediatrician, is adjunct senior analysis scholar at Columbia College.
To the Editor:
Re “D.C. Braces for a Combat Over R.T.O.” (Enterprise, Jan. 20):
If the federal authorities and different employers need to keep productiveness whereas requiring workers to work within the workplace 5 days per week, they’ll want to take a position extra of their bodily vegetation.
I work for the New York Metropolis Division of Well being, which routinely permits distant work two days per week for workers. I however select to come back into the workplace each day. Why? As a result of I’ve an workplace. If issues are getting noisy round me, or if I’ll be speaking in conferences, I simply shut my door.
Lots of my employees members shouldn’t have places of work. They work in shared open areas with their colleagues, with little quiet or privateness. Because of this, they usually save their “focus” work, delicate calls and comparable duties for his or her distant days.
Sure, the time and expense of commuting are essential components within the resistance to full-time in-office work, however so are the sensible wants of workers devoted to their jobs. Employers should make sure that they supply appropriate, high-quality work environments for his or her groups.
Mary-Powel Thomas
Brooklyn
