Kevin Kelly
1 min readFeb 5, 2023

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I’m not saying that you specifically are trying to do so, but the “hurt feelings” claim is often used to dismiss the sincere concerns of white people about certain “anti-racist” initiatives. For example, the concerns of white students’ parents, whether legitimate or not, regarding the teaching of Critical Race Theory are often written off as “hurt feelings” when really it’s better described as a desire to avoid vilification as a racial group. Also, there have been cases in which white people have lost or were denied jobs and even physically attacked on account of their race. This is not to minimize the struggles of many non-white people - indeed, the killings of Tyre Nichols, George Floyd and others remind us what many black people face thanks to the intergenerational effects of slavery and segregation. It’s only to counter the claim among many - again, not you necessarily - that white people’s concerns boil down to hurt feelings.

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Kevin Kelly
Kevin Kelly

Written by Kevin Kelly

Poetry & opinion writer, nature lover and Upstate New Yorker.

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