Letters: Local resistance | Gender identity | Schools’ focus | Not ready | Private equity | Testament to waster

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Let’s take Trump
resistance local

Re: “Newsom prepares for Trump skirmishes” (Page A1, Nov. 8).

After the results of this election, many of my peers and I had to take a long look at our institutions and in the mirror. Upon reading this article, however, I have gained more knowledge and confidence in our local systems.

Donald Trump threatens California’s protections of a woman’s choice, immigration, the unhoused and LGBT+ rights.

However, it seems that many of my peers do not know that California suing the federal government has resulted in success in protecting these rights.

It is my belief that we need to educate people that this is the case. We may then have a generation less pessimistic about the future — a future where everyone acts more locally to protect our rights no matter the federal election results.

I suggest promoting more reports, studies and education so the public and students are educated on how local and state politics can protect our rights.

Joshua Nisperos
Newark

Young kids ready for
gender identity talk

Re: “District teacher on leave after lessons on gender identity” (Page A1, Oct. 17).

Cupertino Union School District parent Qina Sa said that because children under 5 are still developing fundamental language skills and cognitive abilities, teaching about gender identity could create confusion. Yet research suggests that children up to age 5 can learn and process up to five languages. They are little sponges, ready to absorb many more concepts than adults might think.

And children in families with same-sex parents or parents in biracial marriages, or with siblings with various challenges and sexual orientations, or of various races, accept diversity. For a more tolerant society, the time to introduce differences of all kinds, including sexuality, is the early years.

Karen Lee Cohen
Walnut Creek

Schools should focus
on critical thinking

Re: “Schools to integrate AI into curriculum” (Page B1, Oct. 4).

Seeing students using AI shocks me.

Forbes reports that ChatGPT’s water usage for cooling down servers is is enough to supply thousands of U.S. farms and households. Students already use AI to write their essays, so teaching students to use it may encourage them to be lazier and become dependent on it, hindering their ability to think freely.

Instead, students should use AI in more productive and limited ways or abandon it altogether. When a student relies solely on AI, they start to forget how to write, let alone form coherent sentences. Is this the future we want, students not able to write without computer assistance? Will our children get through college without AI to guide them?

This simply cannot be. We must teach our children to look past AI and think with their brains more effectively, not how to use a computer’s brain.

Josh Buenaflor
Brentwood

California, nation aren’t
ready for EVs only

Re: “It’s time for Californians to go all in on fully electric vehicles” (Page A6, Oct. 15).

Jane Gould and Sue Saunders say California should go all in on fully electric vehicles. I think this is a laudable goal but the charging issue looms large.

Last year, Honda and Toyota, who make more vehicles than any other carmaker in the United States, testified in Congress that their research and dealers say consumers are not ready yet.

So, the authors should consider plug-in hybrids as a reasonable interim step, while chargers move consumers to adapt to all-electric vehicles when more charging alternatives are available. Apartment dwellers cannot readily charge their vehicles when home. It is not practical for them to get their vehicles charged elsewhere while they work.

We may need to move faster, but wishing and legislation won’t make that happen.

Dev Mahadevan
Castro Valley

It’s time to curb excess,
power of private equity

The time has come for private equity’s reckoning. It has penetrated every aspect of our lives — from housing to groceries, from hospitals to care homes, from preschools to funeral homes, from pet care to copper mines. Originally, it had some legitimate use, but now it’s the unapologetic center of blatant greed, lousy service and lame excuses.

Its upper reaches are the playground for obscene displays of wealth. Case in point, Stephen Schwarzman, the billionaire impresario of Blackstone, the world’s largest private equity firm, just hosted a 200-person housewarming party at his $27 million mansion in Newport. Before that, there was his 70th birthday in Palm Beach, and before that, his 60th which cost a reported $3 million-$5 million and featured Venetian gondolas, Arabian camels, Mongolian acrobats and a giant cake in the shape of a Chinese temple.

Enough is enough.

Jim Wolpman
Walnut Creek

Poultry, meat recall
a testament to waste

Re: “Poultry, meat are subjected to recall” (Page A2, Oct. 11).