Columbia Spectator - Last February, Columbia students spent Black Heritage Month protesting a series of racially charged incidents on campus and the lack of institutional structure with which to address them.
An admirable thing to do. Oppose racism and the school's handling of racism.
The three specific events that precipitated the vocalization of student outrage--the Columbia College Conservative Club's anti-affirmative action bake sale, The Fed's incendiary cartoon, and the Columbia University Marching Band's Orgo Night posters--led students to organize a week of protests and to draft a list of nine demands for the administration to address institutional racism at Columbia.
They opposed the affirmative action bake sale? Did they recognize it as racist by chance? I guess the bake sale served it's purpose then. It highlighted exactly what "affirmative" action is and people didn't like it.
What the Columbia College Conservative Club did next, however, was a mistake. They apologized. "It has come to our attention that members of the Columbia community have felt threatened and hurt by comments questioning the qualifications of minority students, made at our Affirmative Action Bake Sale..." "We are sorry that some of the comments expressed that day have caused fellow students to feel hurt and threatened."
I'll question the qualifications of minority students who have benefited from "affirmative" action. If it's anything like the University of Michigan's 20 admission points for black skin, I think some questioning is in order.
The demand that most recently affected change was for the creation of a University-wide committee on diversity.
Ahhh yes. Diversity. Where we ignore true diversity - which comes largely from diversities of thought and experience, and instead focus on the useless concern of diversity of skin color.
The committee will work closely with the new Office of Multicultural Affairs, operational since the beginning of this school year, which was created in response to other student demands and to pressure from the protestors. Like the new committee, the OMA serves as a resource to address students' concerns regarding issues of race, ethnicity, gender, and sexual orientation on campus.
In other words: The committee on "diversity" will work closely with the new Office of Cultural-Marxism Affairs. Like the new committee, the OCMA serves as a resource to group each student into classes differentiated by race, ethnicity, gender and sexual orientation. The old economic classes aren't enough. We need new victim classes to help redistribute blame onto the oppressing class.
Two student advisory boards meet once a month to provide input regarding the OMA's internal affairs and various issues of administrative policy. One board focuses on diversity education and training and student advocacy, while the other deals with community programming and cultural organizations.
I think this one largely speaks for itself.
The demands from last year called for "the creation of a Multicultural Affairs Office that would provide designated safe space for students of color and other marginalized students."
"students of color and other marginalized students" The permanent victim class. If you're not in one of these special groups, then by definition you belong to the oppressor class. Cultural Marxism at work.
The administration instead appointed a Vice Provost for Diversity, Jean Howard, who is responsible for faculty diversity and has no relation to student affairs.
Pssst....hey Jean Howard, can you work in more conservative and libertarian minded professors in your quest for "diversity"? There needs to be something to balance out the current "diversity" at Columbia University.
This week, the administration will address another one of last year's demands. The negotiators, made up of leaders from students-of-color groups, only two of which participated in negotiations last year, are scheduled to meet with administrators to discuss changing the Core Curriculum to more adequately address issues of race and oppression. Though the original demands called for a new class about "issues of power and oppression in the United States," negotiators are open to possibilities less drastic than changing the curriculum, such as implementing different teaching approaches.
You don't even have to read between the lines or look hard into these people. They tell you exactly what they want and what they're doing! The victim classes are always looking for areas of oppression. It's central to their Marxist worldview. These two "students-of-color" people want more classes on race and oppression. Isn't there enough already? (just type in "race" and read the course listings)
Update:
University of Alabama free speech issues. (hat tip to Glenn Reynolds)