Letter: Nation should remember Jan. 6 with honesty

Editor,

In response to Fred Wilferth’s Jan. 11 letter, “Woman shot on Jan. 6 should be remembered”:

In all of his letters, Mr. Wilferth presents us with a child-like, comic book version of reality: Republicans are Superheroes, and all us Democrats are the villains.

He then uses this comic book logic to give us a fictionalized version of Jan. 6: where Ms. Babbitt – who was a grown woman capable of making her own choices – is tricked into “following the crowd,” and we should now remember her for joining the crowd’s violent assault on our nation’s capital.

Clearly, Mr. Wilferth’s version of events needs a reality check, and he needs to pay attention to other voices, besides those in his own head.

Consider: in “addressing the heinous attack yesterday, and to those who broke the law, you will pay … you do not represent our country.” (D. Trump, Jan. 7, 2021); and Fox News’ Sean Hannity pleaded with Trump and staff, “no more stolen election talk” – but we’re still hearing this, in spades, two years later.

And, on the first anniversary of Jan. 6, Sen. Ted Cruz said that those who perpetrated and took part in this violence were “terrorists.”

And, “for those (like Wilferth) raising questions, I want to know where they were … when a Capitol police officer was getting his head bashed in – by an angry mob spun up in no small part by the president’s irresponsible actions.” – Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas)

So, when we hear from these other conservative Americans, we get a far more real and far less childlike version of Jan. 6.

Mr. Wilferth is wrong on another important point: Millions of Americans – of all political learnings – do remember the events of that day. We just choose not to view it through the same fairy-tale looking glass that Fredrick does.

David Freed

Clinton