Eileen Wright‘s letter to the editor (March 3, “Government instills fear to control, manipulate”) has motivated me to respond in a way that might actually accomplish something and lead to solutions as opposed to just calling names.

Wright advises us to “be very fearful of the people we put in power.“ She is apparently fearful and wants us to join her in her fear.

Instead of demonizing or being fearful of people who think differently than we do, why don’t we simply discuss the subject at hand? In this case, government response to COVID-19. Wright’s approach accomplishes nothing other than keeping us polarized as well as distracted from solving real problems.

A better use of our time would be to explore the basis for government and public health response to COVID-19, and see if we can make a fair comparison to what Wright thinks we should do. Never mind that she doesn’t really provide an alternative, other than “be as careful as you feel you should be,“ and states with surety that “you know what is better for you than they do.”

I think it would be more productive to sit down and explore those assertions and examine potential for common ground. We could also examine the consequences of following her advice versus that of the “self-righteous nobodies“ in government and “know nothing“ health department heads.

I believe approaching different points of view this way would be a more worthy use of our energy and may result in understanding each other better.

Frank Lockwood

Durango