Out of the Woods

                                                  Black Lives

Shirley Chisholm

I add a few pictures to remind us of the contributions of Black Women to our country

This week’s blog is a reprint of an article that appeared in the Boston Globe last Sunday. 

It reminds us forcefully that the demands for dignity from Black Lives Matter and other organizations go far beyond the relations between police and people of color.  Persons of color suffer insults all the time and everywhere.

The question we white people need to ask ourselves are: If you (or I) had been on this Delta flight, what would we have done, and what should we have done? How can we as private citizens promote equal treatment, equal respect for everyone?

Sojourner Truth

Here is the story:





“WASHINGTON — Tamika Cross, a physician, was midway through a flight from Detroit to Minneapolis when a passenger emergency sent her into ‘‘doctor mode.’’

Sometime after takeoff, a man two rows in front of her suddenly became unresponsive, she said, and flight attendants called for help.

Cross, an obstetrician and gynecologist, said she immediately flagged down one of the crew members, offering to treat the man. She got a response she wasn’t prepared for.

Angela Davis

‘‘Oh no, sweetie, put [your] hand down,’’ Cross recalled the flight attendant saying. ‘‘We are looking for actual physicians or nurses or some type of medical personnel. We don’t have time to talk to you.’’

The reason behind the flight attendant’s apparent skepticism? Cross says it was because she is black.

It started, Cross said, when a woman near her on the plane screamed for someone to come 
help her husband.

Toni Morrison

‘‘I naturally jumped into doctor mode as no one else was getting up,’’ Cross said in her Facebook post. As she was unbuckling her seat belt, she said, a flight attendant told people on the plane to stay calm, that the passenger was just having a ‘‘night terror.’’

But moments later the man became unresponsive again. This time the flight crew asked whether there was a physician on board. Cross said she raised her hand, but an attendant shut her down. ‘‘I tried to inform her that I was a physician but I was continually cut off by condescending remarks,’’ she said.

Rosa Parks

The crew then asked any physicians on board to press their call buttons, according to Cross. She elaborated: ‘‘I stare at her as I go to press my button. She said ‘Oh wow you’re an actual physician?’ I reply yes. She said ‘let me see your credentials. What type of doctor are you? Where do you work? Why were you in Detroit?’ ’’

Soon, Cross said, a white male came up and told the crew he was a physician as well. The flight attendant sent her back to her seat, saying the man had his ‘‘credentials,’’ only to return to her later for advice on how to treat the passenger’s low blood pressure, according to Cross.

Maya Angelou

The man eventually regained consciousness. The flight attendant apologized and offered Delta SkyMiles to Cross. ‘‘I kindly refused,’’ she said.”