Dolezal meant well

I understand Rachel Dolezal. As a young white woman raised in the Pacific Northwest, I traveled to Virginia during Jim Crow times. I was outraged at what the black people had to endure.

They had to ride in the back of the streetcar, couldn’t go to most restaurants or see first-run movies, had to pay a tax to vote, had separate drinking fountains and restrooms, etc. Sometimes I would sit at the back of the streetcar with them, although I could have been arrested or thrown off the car. If challenged, I was prepared to say that there were black people in my ancestry and that entitled me to sit there, although that wasn’t true.

The only time in my life I was ever fired from a job, it was for protesting the way the black employees were treated – and they were treated badly.

You don’t have to be black to hate injustice. As I said, I understand Rachel. She just took it too far.

Dorothy Carter

Spokane