Reading Vivi’s excellent article on racism stimulated lots of pain and shame in me. I feel our culture and our people are trying to be shamed in Arizona. Shame has really been part of our history since the earliest days of the Spanish conquest. Our mestizo ancestors were seen as a “bastard” race. That does not go a long way toward instilling pride and nurturing self-esteem! We have carried that in our generational programming for the last 500 plus years. Such programming about shame keeps us from our greatness. It keeps us back. We must reverse this or we will not be able to stand up to the Civil Rights assaults that are being thrown at us now.