Don’t blame the victim

Despite the changes in hunting laws in the past 20 years, it is obvious that the attitudes of some people remain in the Dark Ages. For Thelma White of Sorrento (letters, BDN, Nov. 22-23) to continue to imply that Karen Wood was somehow at fault for her death because she was wearing white mittens on that fateful day just perpetuates the stereotype of the ignorant, gun-toting Mainer that filled the out-of-state media reports after the shooting.

We need to stop blaming the victim and start putting the blame squarely where it belongs, on Donald Rogerson. The BDN needs to stop providing him with a outlet to try to shift the blame elsewhere and to elicit sympathy for a tragic event that was his fault.

I am not anti-hunting, and I know that most hunters in this state are responsible when discharging their firearms. Dredging up the Karen Wood tragedy and its very dissatisfying legal outcome just paints all hunters with the same brush; unfair to them and unfair to her.

Susan Plourde

Hampden