I believe John Balentine’s Here’s Something column on the Pilgrims and American pride is selectively narrow-minded and incomplete on so many levels (Here’s Something: “Rekindle Pilgrims’ pride this Thanksgiving,” Nov. 19).

Don’t get me wrong. As a Libra, I have the luxury of accepting both sides of an argument at once. So, I’ll give it to you that all the events are mostly right and true. They make our great USA what it is. We should be proud of who we are and what we’ve accomplished. Many times we have defended our liberty – and often the freedom of other countries around the world as well –  but it takes nothing away from us to acknowledge the wrongs we’ve done, some horrific, along the way.

“Woke” is not a four-letter word! It means filling in the blanks about history to make a more complete, accurate and just story, a jigsaw puzzle with all the pieces. It is not revisionism. It is a correction of the wrongs we have been taught. It is not there to make whites feel guilty. It is there to make us aware and more sensitive to the diverse needs of others. We need to know about Tulsa and Wounded Knee and the many other sins in our past. How can we move into the future if we don’t?

Let us acknowledge our past errors. America is way big enough to invite People of Color, women, AfrAms, LatAms, NatAms and LGBTQAs into the fold and celebrate together the things that make America, all America E Pluribus Unum. They just as much deserve to be here. There must be liberty, freedom, justice, dignity, respect and opportunity for all.

Larry Gray
Scarborough