Dumb Florida ideas, dreadlock discrimination and fossil fuel folly | letters

Crisis and climate

We are in an era of perpetual and interacting global crises that, if allowed, will sustain our “sleepwalking to climate catastrophe,’ as was warned by United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres last month.

The response of developed nations to the Ukraine Invasion and its impact on global fossil fuel supply lines is telling of the challenge we face.

Rather than see this geopolitical crisis as more reason to decarbonize their respective economies, the knee-jerk response by western leaders is to fill the immediate fossil fuel supply gap with increased production — domestically or by OPEC nations — or releases from strategic petroleum reserves.

Fossil-fuel dependence financed this crisis and our solution is to entrench this dependence further?

Increasing fossil fuel production and infrastructure is the very opposite of what climate science says we must do: transition away from fossil fuels as fast as possible.

Our prospects are unequivocal: Without government policies that keep fossil fuels in the ground, like a federal price on carbon or the climate investments of Build Back Better, irreversible climate calamity likely looms by decade’s end.

With it comes a scale of human suffering we can’t fathom, even with Ukraine’s horror before us. It’s time to wake up.

Hair discrimination

My classmates and I are currently looking at bills in the state of Kansas that we think are important for people to see and bills that will be helpful to our community.

We would like to share with our community information regarding Senate Bill 130, also known as the CROWN Act, which attempts to end the racial injustice of discrimination against people because of their hair.

This would create protection around race-based hairstyles such as braids, locs, dreads, and twists.

The bill’s purpose is to create protection for minority individuals who are more likely to be discriminated against for wearing texturized hairstyles at work or school environments.

We have heard far too many stories of people of color being discriminated against simply because of their hair.

There have been similar incidents in our state such when Talyn Jefferson was kicked off the cheerleading squad for wearing box braids at practice at Ottawa University. This hairstyle would have been protected under the CROWN ACT.

Florida connection

Regarding “Meet the Florida think tank behind Kansas bills to restrict elections and welfare benefits” (Eagle March 22), several issues came to mind.

First was, when did we Kansas citizens vote in anyone from Florida to write, or come up with, or make decisions regarding our Kansas laws?

If Kansas elected lawmakers are not smart enough to do their own work and not cheat or plagiarize the work of an out-of-state think tank — in this case Opportunity Solutions Project — then the legislators in question need to step down so another and possibly smarter person can fill the seat.

Second thought on what this article was, if a nonprofit hides its donors, we as Kansas citizens cannot be certain that the offered material is not hugely partisan. There is already too much dark money lingering around our state and federal lawmakers.

It doesn’t matter what the political leanings, openness is what we should all want.

The lack of openness in funding for political purposes can easily lead to a government not unlike that of Putin’s Russia.

Hold all of our legislators to an ethical standard that no one can question.