Readers Write: Ethnic studies, gun control, the Pohlads and the Twins

Opinion editor’s note: Strib Voices publishes letters from readers online and in print each day. To contribute, click here.

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As an educator who has witnessed schooling in authoritarian countries, I am troubled by Katherine Kersten’s repeated insistence that our Minnesota schools should avoid honest engagement with our shared history (“Other states hit pause on ‘liberated’ ethnic studies. In Minnesota, it’s fast-forward,” Strib Voices, Sept. 28). Her criticism of lessons on racial housing covenants, for instance, reads as if she would prefer to suppress history leaving the public blind to how such policies shaped our neighborhoods and opportunities. Kersten’s argument betrays the very ideals of liberty and democracy she claims to defend.

Kersten also leans on Minnesota’s low math and reading scores as a reason to halt ethnic studies. This is a false choice. Our students do not fail because they learn about the Black Lives Matter movement, disability rights or the long shadow of redlining. They struggle because our schools face underfunding, unequal access to resources and systemic barriers — challenges that ethnic studies actually helps address by fostering engagement, belonging and critical thinking.

Trying to shield our students from uncomfortable truths may comfort adults, but it leaves young people unprepared. I cheer the educators, community organizers and legislators tirelessly advocating for a more democratic education. Our young people have a right to a uncensored education that empowers them to build a more just future. To do otherwise is not education; it is erasure.

Lindsey Weaver, St. Paul

In the Minnesota Star Tribune on Sept. 28, we find a large collection of gun-control sentiment in articles and Strib Voices. But something very important is missing in all of it. The salient theme of the anti-gun voice is that guns are the cause of crime, murder in particular.

If guns cause crime, why are the approximately 100 million law-abiding gun owners in America today not criminals? Something else is wrong; something else has changed, and it’s not the gun — it’s society, the culture. Guns, knives and automobiles have been around for a long time but weren’t always used to kill people like they are today. Until we look in the mirror, at ourselves, at our culture, we are not going to solve our crime dilemma with gun control. Gun control is tilting at windmills.

Earl Faulkner Sr., Edina

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So state Democrats are calling the AR-15 and similar firearms “weapons of war” and wanted to call a special session to pass a bill that would make ownership of such weapon illegal in Minnesota.

We all must realize one thing: When the U.S. Constitution was ratified in 1788, the weapon(s) that the Second Amendment guaranteed the American citizens the right to keep and bear, at that time, were the same weapon(s) carried by every foot soldier in every army in the world. In other words; the Second Amendment was intended to give the American citizen the right to keep and bear “weapons of war.”

The two commentaries published on Oct. 1 under the headline “Twins fans, quit bashing the Pohlad family” are nothing more than lengthy apologetics for the Pohlads. It’s telling that neither article mentions the low point of the Pohlad era, how Carl Pohlad volunteered the Twins for contraction by MLB after the 2001 season.

It’s not surprising that Brian Short would be sympathetic to owners of sports teams, as he is the son of Bob Short, who moved the Minneapolis Lakers to Los Angeles, and later moved the expansion Washington Senators to Texas. The elder Short faced criticism for both moves.

Jim Hays points out that if Pohlad had invested the $40 million purchase price of the Twins in a Stock Index Fund in 1984, it would be worth over $4 billion today, while the estimated value of the Twins franchise is only about $1.5 billion. Are we supposed to feel bad that the Pohlads have missed out on $2.5 billion in profits? That’s not a compelling argument.

Hays erroneously writes that Curt Flood “took his winning case all the way to the Supreme Court.” Flood’s challenging of baseball’s reserve clause went to the U.S. Supreme Court, but Flood lost the case.

If the Pohlads are as effective owners as Short and Hays claim, how is it that the Twins franchise has a debt of $400 million? The history of modern-day sports ownership is one of billionaires pleading poverty to the public, which does not inspire sympathy in this fan.

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Let me start by saying I know nothing about baseball. There is no room in my head for any more rules and regulations regarding professional sports. I’m still trying to get down all the thousands of rules (or are there more?!) and crazy lingo of football after watching it for 30-plus years (translation: It’s been on in the background as I skimmed a magazine, folded the laundry, washed the dishes …). I only recently realized why I never see my favorite quarterback and defensive lineman on the field at the same time, or that offsides doesn’t mean someone ran off the side of the field or that encroachment is not about a legal issue between one of the players and his neighbors. (Don’t get me started about my understanding of a nose tackle.) As far as I’m concerned, it’s the touchdown dances that make the game worth watching.

However, I don’t need to know anything about any sport to know that they all have one basic truism in common: Neither the rabid fans nor the Monday morning quarterbacks (pitchers? catchers?) can profess to know what went behind any front-office decisions regarding any professional sports team, because we don’t know the complications and nuances that informed those decisions. And, in our ignorance, some of us take out our often intense disagreements with these decisions by vilifying those who made them. More often than not, the vilified are the team owners.

So, in the case of the Twins, the people who are called out are the Pohlads. Fans have taken swings at them since they first took ownership of the team. And guess what? It bugs me! So I’m going to bat for these guys because I seem to know something about them that too many others apparently don’t: They really are a bunch of decent guys with a lot of integrity. I worked with one of them, who will go unnamed because he’s mortifyingly shy and unbearably modest, and he was/is one of the most honest, sensitive people I have worked with.

To those of you who are full of rage over decisions the Pohlads have or haven’t made regarding our beloved Minnesota Twins, may I suggest reading “Complexity and Control in Team Sports” by Felix Lebed and Michael Bar-Eli. That might help decrease your need for a defibrillator next time you disagree with a business decision regarding the team. And if reading isn’t your thing, think back to a time when you had to make a very unpopular decision and how you wished all of your naysayers knew the reasons behind your decision.