Hi, Susan. I would disagree that the book has succeeded in opening up discussion. Instead, it has polarized us more than ever as every person who has an ax to grind with the UUA is coming out of the woodwork to embrace Eklof’s rhetoric as their own. None of these people were ever censored. In fact, most of them were already high profile before the controversy.

And I strongly disagree that we shouldn’t apologize every time we realize we could have done something better. To quote Beverly Engel in Psychology today, “[Apology] is an important ritual, a way of showing respect and empathy for the wronged person. It is also a way of acknowledging an act that, if otherwise left unnoticed, might compromise the relationship.” Apology has a use, and UU World apologizing for their mistakes was an important signal that they realized they did wrong and wanted to do better in the future.

I also find it disturbing this trend of minimizing when people report to have been harmed. We would rather wordsmith the words people use to describe the emotional experience they had regarding an event than actually listen, empathize, and show compassion. This is exactly what BIPOC and other marginalized groups have been reporting for decades: they can’t talk about how actions and rhetoric are harming them without a white person coming in and just saying, “No, it’s not.” We can’t even have the conversation because we’d rather believe we’re good people because of our intentions than flawed people who exist in a system just like everyone else.