At no point does she say she was “shocked” to see a majority of white people hiking. Why deliberately misread the article?

She does say “Throughout the long process of its founding, the U.S. attempted to erase the history of the land it now occupies in order to build upon it a new identity which did not include Black, Indigenous and people of color in its narrative.” And that’s mostly (maybe not entirely) true and valid.

This linked write up is very short, and you either did not read it or are willfully misrepresenting what it said. I am going to paste a section of it (like a third of the article; it really isn't very long) so people can judge your tl;dr for themselves.

>What follows is a composite of multiple conversations over the years. A White hiker asks me,

>“Why don’t more Black people hike?”

>I struggle to determine how to approach this question, where to even begin. Some would find the question intrusive. I don’t. I know that the intent is genuine curiosity. But I’m saddened by the ignorance of it. The answers are complex, but they are easily discoverable.

>I respond by flipping the question.

>Well, hmm. Why do you hike?

>The hiker may answer: “Because I love nature! I love being outside, I love physical exertion. Because I’ve been going since I was a kid. Some friends invited me as an adult. I went on a school, group or church outing. I was an Eagle Scout.”

>These responses highlight a focus on individualism and a deep and likely unrecognized sense of belonging in those spaces. A belonging felt so deeply that some might experience it as an entitlement, as a sense of ownership. Additionally, it is a hallmark of both white cultural conditioning and our nation’s value system to over-emphasize individuality and individual choice, even in the face of ready evidence of how our environments, our families, our communities and our shared history impact our realities.

>In this conversation, some hikers would even stop at, “I love being outside” – had they never thought more deeply to examine exactly how they had developed that love? They had received opportunities over the course of their lives to have varied experiences outside, never being questioned for their interest, rather receiving affirmation that what they had just done was strong, brave, cool.

>At this point in our discussion, a humble and open conversation partner sees the direction I am headed in, and I can share some of the ways that People of Color have been historically excluded from access to outdoor sports and even simply to nature spaces. I do my best to explain some of the history and the national ideologies centuries in the making that shape policies and outcomes. I draw on the scholarship of Carolyn Finney in her seminal book, Black Faces, White Spaces: Reimagining the Relationship of African Americans in the Outdoors.

You can agree or disagree with it in whole or in part until you're blue in the face, but don't just make up a bullshit tl;dr.

From the article:

> In Vermont, 90% of the population identifies as white, and the folks who utilize the Long Trail largely reflect that number