In a Jan. 9 op-ed, Jim Lemieux, president and CEO of Sebasticook Valley Federal Credit Union, asks: “How many people vow to give back more in the new year?” (“If you can, make 2025 the year of giving back“).

Questions of this form, like “Have you stopped beating your wife?,” contain an implicit assumption. If we give back, it implies that we have taken, presumably in an unlawful manner. And for most of us, that simply doesn’t hold. Most of us have not taken from our neighbors, the state or the federal government, and so “giving back” makes no sense.

I have no problem with someone suggesting that I “contribute” to some cause, but do not ask me to “give back.” I didn’t take in the first place.

William Vaughan Jr.
Chebeague Island

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