I submit it may be only semantics, yet an important linguistic factor, as time and time again I have read in many articles in our newspapers (including The Royal Gazette editorial), and on some of our daily radio talk shows when discussing race related matters, people refer to the different races as (white race/black race), etc.

There is but one race of people on earth, the human race. Not a black race, a white race or an oriental race! For the reason of clarification if we must distinguish differences, there are nationality differences only. The study of anthropology being one of my pastimes, I can state this view is shared by myself (from reading only) and a number of well renowned anthropologists.

In this letter I will use one brief argument of support for this point of view (there are others).

The doctrine of Christianity supports the world began with two people, Adam and Eve.

To further achieve political and social equality, I suggest we all refrain from referring to the terminology of the different races.

ROBERT C. SMITH City of Hamilton Turning the tide February 29, 2000 Dear Sir, There is reason for concern about the quality of life in our small island but the drastic measures hinted at by Arthur Hodgson and Dale Butler need to be refuted. King Canute of England, hundreds of years ago, allegedly tried to stop the North Sea by Royal Decree! The clock cannot be turned back by decree either. Bermudians would no longer accept "fish and taters every day'' with no car, no office block etc. They are well-paid, well-fed and well-travelled and they know why.

I have a simple solution to even up the rising imbalance of foreigners to Bermudians by allowing more deserving foreigners to become Bermudians. This can be controlled quite easily. Every other successful nation has done this.

The short-term effect is to reduce the imbalance. The long-term effect is to improve the gene pool. A win-win situation.

TONGUE-IN-CHEEK City of Hamilton P.S. Let us concentrate on real solutions like smaller cars, better public transport, smaller civil service, better attitudes etc.

Parenting is key, too February 29, 2000 Dear Sir, I am writing to express my thanks to your correspondent who signs as "An Employer'' and whose letter appears under the heading of "Education is the key'' in yesterday's Royal Gazette . He or she has expressed concisely and precisely the problem we all face when trying to provide any sort of professional service to the public.

None of us would ever willingly go through what only can be described as a convoluted obstacle course at the Department of Immigration, and the almost impossible and harrowing task of providing reasonably priced and decent accommodation, if suitably educated local applicants were available.

I would add, that no matter how good and dedicated the teaching staff in our schools, if children are parenting themselves and living in dysfunctional and, sadly often, abusive homes, no amount of Government spending on schools will produce educated and motivated young members of the work force.

Until this insular society -- especially the teenaged component -- regards every unborn child as having a fundamental right to both mother and father within a stable family unit, we are doomed to continuing problems of youngsters finding themselves frustrated, excluded and following a path of personal disappointment leading in the worst cases to violence and substance abuse.

FOREIGNERS NOT TO BLAME Pembroke Cannabis debate needed February 25, 2000 Dear Sir, It was refreshing to see Sen. Calvin Smith's call for a public debate on marijuana use with a view to decriminalising weed.

Homosexual activity was illegal for over 2,000 years but when Dr. Stubbs suggested changing the laws, homosexual activity was legalised within months.

During the amazingly short public debate on the Stubbs bill, I heard nothing from Shadow Health Minister Kim Young with regards to the Stubbs bill sending mixed messages or needing to be stubbed out.

On the other hand, marijuana has been illegal for some 80 years yet Ms Young wishes to stub out talk of legalising marijuana use. A bit draconian, Kim, don't you think? Sounds like Ms Young would like to just lock up all of those pot-heads and throw away the key. Get real, Ms Young. Being able to garner 350 votes doesn't make you an expert in all things. Maybe Kim Young and her fellow UBPers could learn to listen while in opposition instead of just spouting off expert judgments, or you could just get used to the Opposition benches.

SPANISH POINT VOTER Larger cars are unsafe February 27, 2000 Dear Sir, The Minister of Transport proposes to increase the size of cars allowed on Bermuda's roads. According to newspaper reports, his proposal has been made for safety reasons. Firms were said to import cars whose bumpers now had to be removed and refitted in order to reduce their size. That risked making them unsafe. The Minister thought this undesirable and argued that if the size was increased the risk could be avoided. Such an argument is misconceived. All that will happen is that cars even larger than the new size limit will be imported and that their bumpers too will have to be removed. If it is indeed unsafe to modify cars in this way the only sensible course of action is to refuse to license cars which have been so modified.

It would be interesting to see some statistics. My guess is that an important cause of accidents is drivers crossing the yellow line or driving too close to the vehicle in front. I believe that the risk of human injury caused by wider cars is far higher than the risk of injury caused by weakened bumpers.

A large proportion of Bermuda's drivers are habitually on or over the yellow line. In my opinion, until people learn the width of their present cars, and therefore how to keep to the left of the centre line, they should not be allowed wider ones. A public education programme in driving and road courtesy would have far more effect on safety.

Speed, of course, is the major cause of accidents and always has been. Until the perception of drivers is that the risk of being caught is not worth taking it will go on being so. Wider cars will only make speeding cars more dangerous to themselves and others.

MARGARET LLOYD Pembroke The Sun is a tabloid February 28, 2000 Dear Sir, Sanders Frith-Brown, in his latest missive, takes your paper to task for calling the Bermuda Sun a "tabloid''.

Perhaps he should spend some more time reading than writing as the Bermuda Sun is most certainly a tabloid.

Mr. Frith-Brown ought to be aware that there are two sizes of newspaper: broadsheet, of which The Royal Gazette is an example; and tabloid, into which size category the Bermuda Sun fits.

Whether or not the word tabloid was used pejoratively, it was not incorrect.

JAMES COLLINS Paget Love has no colour February 23, 2000 Dear Sir, I felt I would like to write a letter stating my views on all this racism being talked about in Bermuda. I hope the readers will listen and understand where I am coming from.

First of all, I was born in Canada, and adopted into a family with an Italian mother and Scottish father. From the day I can remember, my mother, who adopted two other children, would line us up and give us this lecture: "Don't you ever, ever judge a person for their colour of skin, (race) creed, religion, sex, etc.'' She instilled this into our lives regularly. She would always say there is good and bad in every race. Even though I grew up in an all white neighbourhood, my mother's friends were from every race, etc. When we would watch TV and there were injustices done because of a race she would be so upset, and again we would get our lecture. When I was 18 years old I came to Bermuda, met a black man, and got married and had two sons. I can honestly say I never thought anything of it because of my mother's talks, but I understood first hand that other people didn't hold the same views as I.

When we visited the States, we were in an all-white neighbourhood staying with friends and a neighbour called up our friends and said: "Get that n*** off your property.'' Well you could imagine how I felt, my mothers words came alive in my mind. Why were they doing this? I cannot say I know how it feels to be black, because I don't, but I felt so embarrassed as a white person. I could understand how a black person could hate a white person. There were many more incidents that I experienced such as that, too numerous to write about.

Even though my children are very light skinned they have been called names many times abroad. When my son was in Canada in school, he had a problem with his landlord and his landlord called him a n***. I was horrified.

So why am I saying all this? Because I want black people to know not all whites are your enemies. I am very sorry for what the white people have done in the past, (slavery, abuse, etc.) or present. But where do we go from here? I feel we should all learn a lesson from what my mother taught me. Let's go on in love towards one another and raise our children to like all races, and not to judge a person for their colour of skin, because Love, which is from God, has no colour.

PEACE Southampton