A place to learn
Monday, December 1, 2008 12:33 AM PST
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E-mail this articleDec. 1 Letters to the Editor
A place to learn
The Lee Wollenberg Gymnasium was dedicated on Nov. 21 as a community center adjacent to the building housing the local area’s Youth and Family LINK house.
Youth and Family LINK is an after-school program for young people in the community who need a home base where they can learn to be responsible family members of a community. It is a place where young people become dedicated students who are self-motivated and who are part of a safe and supportive environment. The LINK space offers a place of positive challenge to embrace self-esteem for young people who haven’t had the chance to realize how valuable they can possibly be.
Nearly 50 years ago, Lee Wollenberg and a handful of her peers, including Anne Minthorn, Helen Hafner, Marilyn Hoehne and others, came together to form guilds of women who believed there was a place in a small town like Longview to address the problem of childhood alienation, existing often in broken families which sometimes lead to dead-end lives. This group of women worked tirelessly to create a place and program that would improve the plight of these young people. That place became the Toutle River Boys Ranch, which evolved into the Youth and Family LINK program. The program now boasts an outreach numbering hundreds of student-clients from kindergarten to high school.
Leslie Roth
Longview
Don’t be quick to judge others
I am so weary of the hate-filled letters of the last week, but Diana Kennerud’s Nov. 28 letter finally put me over the edge. Yes words are powerful and hate-filled words are even more so. Kennerud naively pretends to not understand “hate crimes.” It is quite simple: a crime that is committed against someone simply because of who or what they are is a hate crime.
Kennerud’s specious example of the grandmother at the ATM does not hold water. No one assaulted the woman because she was a “grandmother.” As far as I know there is no big rage against grandmothers. She was assaulted for money, which is a crime, but not a “hate” crime.
I do believe Jesus said “to remove the beam from your own eye before trying to remove the sliver from your brother’s.” She needs to look at her own behavior before judging everyone else. As far as hate speech goes, it is not hateful to carry a sign that says “we love all people” or “we support gays and Lesbians,” but it is hate speech to carry signs demeaning other people or judging other people by saying they are going to hell.
Kennerud’s morals and value system are no more important then the value systems of others. No one has the right to judge other people, period.
Virginia Armstrong
Cathlamet
Girl deserves a reward
In response to the news of Sue Whitman leaving her family in the car, she already feels bad that she did, but she didn’t need it rubbed in, as she also had a sick husband in a wheelchair she had to rush in to help and the little girl that’s a hero.
Yes, a hero doesn’t need to hear things bad about her mother. The mother has her hands full, like last week there was a letter to the editor saying how Sue was helping her husband, also her mother as well as doing a good job being a mother. She showed that there was hope in time of trouble, telling the girl what to do in case of trouble.
That girl needs a big reward for caring for the little brother the way she did, and in just a few seconds — what a quick thinker she is. I am glad things turned out good. By the way, she did this only once — leaving the little ones in the car, and not everyone gets the newspaper.
Maxine Teel
Castle Rock
Lack of coverage
I have heard that our illustrious newspaper has won awards for its top notch journalistic coverage. I disagree. Forty-five years ago John Kennedy was killed — Nov. 22, 1963. There wasn’t a paragraph, a sentence or even a picture to remind people of that awful day.
But I guess what is top notch is in the autumn of 2007 a picture of a Nazi flag was printed along with coverage of the white supremacist meeting, giving them the attention they wanted and praising the police chief for letting them meet.
It goes right along with what Donald Fuesler’s letter in June said about the lack of coverage of the D-Day invasion liberating Europe from the Nazis. He’s probably right; it if wasn’t for him and the other troops at the time, we could very well be speaking German today. Let us not forget 1944 and 1963.
B.L. Panks
Longview
Use your brain
“Well, if it’s good enough for Joe Bob, it’s good enough for me.” Use your brain. “It says so right here in The Daily News.” Use your brain. “I seen it on TV.” Use your brain. “Been a Republican/Democrat all my life.” Use your brain.
Never before has this world had such a tool as the Internet. It is perhaps the first real means of exchanging ideas, finding the facts, learning for yourself — a way to think for yourself, question authority. Do you really trust the corporate media? Really? Do you really trust all the polls, really? Are you really as dumb and stupid as the media claim you to be?
The Brits asked, “How can 59 million Americans be so dumb?” when Bush was re-elected. Well? What would you tell them?
Do you continue to sop up the party propaganda and really believe it to be factual information? Hello?
“In times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act.” — George Orwell.
L.R. Gowdy
Longview
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