On enhancing race relations - criticism of programs at University of Michigan and Stanford University

National Review, Feb 19, 1990 by William F. Buckley, Jr.

On Enhancing Race Relations

NEW YORK, JANUARY 15

The New York Times on Martin Luther King Day reports on activities undertaken by the University of Michigan to combat racism. Among these are new offerings in the curriculum, including a course called "Ancient Greece and the Black Experience." The Nuclear Engineering Department will have course called "Your Success Can Be Enhanced by Positive Race Relations." And the School of Natural Resources will address "Environmental Issues and Concerns: The Impact on People of Color." It takes one's breath away. Or should.

The current issue of Chronicles reports on an incident in Stanford, California, that, in the opinion of author Jared Taylor, highlights what he calls the encouragement of "ethnic aggressivity." The story is gruesomely interesting.

One day last year, some undergraduates were discussing musical origins in the Ujamaa House, which is Stanford's "African-theme" dormitory. A black student, who is identified in the long report since issued by the Stanford administration only as "QC," announced that all music played in America had African origins. A white student ("Fred") said, Whaddayamean! Beethoven, for instance, wasn't black. To which QC replied, Oh yes, he was.

Fred was amused and annoyed, and thought he would satirize the statement. He did this by filching a huge poster of Beethoven from the Stanford Symphony Orchestra. He went to work on it, giving Beethoven an Afro and black features, and then hung the picture, in the dead of night, outside QC's room.

The following day, someone scrawled the word "niggers" across a poster advertising a dance at a black fraternity. I say "someone" because although it was generally assumed that the person who did so was a white bigot, the suspicion is there that it was the work of a black agent provocateur.

What then happened was that Fred went to the "TA," a teaching assistant, and said to him that he wondered if QC was really upset about the Beethoven poster, to which the TA replied, Don't worry about it, it will blow over--obviously it was not meant maliciously.

But that was not to be, and in due course Fred identified himself as the Beethoven plastic surgeon and invited everyone at Ujamaa House to a meeting so he could explain his non-racist motivation. But no sooner had he begun than a black student interrupted: "You arrogant bastard. How dare you come here and not even apologize?" I quote from the author of the story: "Fred made a perfunctory apology, which the blacks did not accept, and there followed a hostile clamor that Fred be expelled from his dormitory ... James W. Lyons [the Dean of Student Affairs] came to Fred's defense and argued that the Beethoven poster was not a big deal, that Fred should stay. The black students then turned on the dean, and attacked him repeatedly ... QC stood up and said he could not tolerate having Fred live next door ... After a few minutes of this, QC started crying, became hysterical, and moved toward Fred. He shouted something to the effect that back in Chicago, where he was from, he could kill Fred for a thing like that. He then lunged at Fred and collapsed." He was taken out of the room "crying and screaming and having a fit." The dean finally agreed to expel Fred from his dorm. (He clearly aspires to be a dean at Dartmouth College, whose specialty is yielding to minority pressures). Two days later, two of the white residents at Ujamaa found notices pushed under their doors: "Non-blacks leave our home/ you are not welcome at Ujamaa." And, on the bulletin board, a sign, "Smash the honkie oppressors!"

The net effect of the incident, and a few others, was a 244-page report on race relations which called for thirty new minority faculty, twice as many minority graduates students, twice as many courses on race relations, an obligatory undergraduate course in ethnic studies, and an assortment of workshops, review boards, executive committees, and task forces.

A secon news story on Martin Luther King Day in the New York Times is headed, "Mid-and Low-Income Minorities in Decline on College Rolls."

One is entitled to ask the question: What if every college and university exactly duplicated the action Stanford? Where would they find the students, the graduate students, and the teachers?

Well, if you're going to give courses on "Ancient Greece and the Black Experience" you don't really need a teacher, do you? Why don't people remind themselves, on Martin Luther King Day, that Mr. King's dream was of a society in which the color of the skin was unnoticeable. The whole race-relations drag in places like Stanford has only the effect of accentuating the color of a student's skin, which ought to be irrelevant, but certainly isn't at Ujamaa House.