Columnist holds no bias against Spanish or Spaniards





To the editor:

As I’m sure you can imagine, Lindsay Schniepp’s letter in the Aug. 13 edition of the Irregular (“Column was small-minded,” page 3) stirred up many fierce emotions amongst Karen Pease’s supporters. As her sister and a highly educated, articulate (young?) woman as well, I feel the need to come to Karen’s defense.

Anyone who has had the pleasure of knowing Karen would attest to her kindness, generosity and acceptance of all people. They would also know that Karen is smart enough to enjoy “playing dumb” and often deliberately errs in order to see if anyone catches the goof. Karen is self-deprecating by nature, and her “tirade” was meant to poke fun at herself, not to offend another culture.

I don’t believe that Ms. Schniepp read the column in the spirit in which it was intended. Karen was commenting on her frustration over her inability to understand packaging, not degrading the Spanish speaking population of the United States. She was complaining about her hair, not making fun of other cultures.

While Karen’s opinion that only English should be spoken in the United States may not match my own, I contend that she is fully entitled to hold any view she desires.

As a person who has lived away for a number of years, I have found that demographics do not matter when it comes to opinions. A small town will have conservatives and liberals; speakers of English, Spanish, French and Gibberish, just like a larger city.

What Ms. Schniepp fails to realize is that condemning and disparaging another’s opinion because it doesn’t match your own is not the way of a truly open-minded person.

I hope this letter clears up any misunderstanding of Karen’s column to those occasional readers who are unaccustomed to her writing style, her grasp of geography and her knowledge of Mexican food.

As an eventual teacher of Spanish, I assure you Karen has bias against neither the language nor its speakers. She does, however, detest the Hollandaise.

Peg Lane

Scarborough


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