Opinion

We always clearly label Opinion Columns to ensure they won’t be mistaken for news. Our Op-Ed writers apply their professional expertise to our community’s unique challenges to promote innovative thought and encourage healthy discourse.

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Opinion: Supervisors Are Busy With Performance Evaluations But Are They Actually Doing Their Job?

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Other Community Voices
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April 4, 2022

Opinion writer Susanne Baremore says that a recent closed session performance evaluation of Public Health Officer Karen Ramstrom is a form of harassment that is out of line with accepted policy and practice. Drawing attention to how Ramstrom has appropriately fulfilled her role in the county, Baremore calls on the Supervisors to fulfill theirs, by learning to govern as a body, while maintaining their individual perspectives, in service to their community.

Latest in Opinion
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Opinion: Don’t Blame the Lettuce
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Other Community Voices
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March 12, 2022

Put simply, finding fault is easy.  Doing the work you’ve criticized, isn’t.

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Opinion: Gender, And the Words We Use, Matter
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Other Community Voices
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January 4, 2022

After losing someone she loves to suicide this fall, Sharon Brisolara reminds the community of the dangers of stigma and the power of acceptance. The words we use, including our choice to use appropriate pronouns, are powerful. Brisolara explains why.

Opinion: This is My Truth: Soy Mexicana and I Carry My Home on My Back
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Opinion
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October 30, 2021

We, the undocumented youth of America are living on borrowed time. We are neither from here nor there. We are wanderers in perpetual purgatory and yet we dream of the highest heavens. But as the well-known phrase goes, “they tried to bury us, but they didn’t know we were seeds.” And so, we rise.

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Opinion: Sorry for Native Boarding Schools? Fund Indigenous Language Revitalization.
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Opinion
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October 23, 2021

Connor Yiamkis, a language educator and member of the Pit River tribe, is working to revitalize the Pit River language which the American government and churches tried to strip from his people during the Indian boarding school era. Citing research that language revitalization is centrally important to cultural expression, suicide prevention, and relationships with people and the land, Yiamkis argues that the American government should significantly increase funding for language revitalization.

white rose on cement memorial with names carved into it
Opinion: Public Remembrances
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Other Community Voices
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September 12, 2021

In this era of information silos and distrust of sources that seem to offer political views different from our own, the purpose of remembrance can also be to assert that events actually happened and that they were significant.

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Opinion: “Return of the Ancestors” Commemorates Pit River Survival During Forced Military Marches
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Opinion
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August 12, 2021

I feel like participating in this walk/run is an act of survivance . . . an expression of tribal sovereignty. When tribes come together and support each other, it builds community and capacity for a brighter future for our children.

Photo by Markus Spiske / Unsplash
Opinion: The Inconvenience of Economic Equality
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Other Community Voices
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July 15, 2021

Sociology forces us to examine poverty as a societal choice and not simply the moral failings of individuals.

Opinion: Healing the Hate Before it’s Too Late
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Other Community Voices
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July 9, 2021

The basics of healing the harrowing hatred harming our nation are not difficult to describe, although actually implementing these steps will require a fundamental resetting of our collective orientation to one another and ourselves.

Opinion: Being Seen: Exploring Life’s Great Questions Through Poetry
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Other Community Voices
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July 2, 2021

On August 6, local Indigenous youth will share their original works as part of the film, Being Seen: Native Youth on Identity, Culture, and Justice. The project was funded through a California Humanities Youth Voices grant.