Archive - Dec 5, 2007 - Story

The noose was first discovered at 4:15 p.m.

That means that in the middle of the day on Sept. 7, in front of the often bustling Nyumburu Cultural Center, someone managed to hang the three-foot length of rope without ever being seen. The center is the hub for minority activity at the University of Maryland, and the noose is a symbol for historic oppression of African-Americans.

And yet, after dozens of interviews were conducted and hours of videotape were examined, no suspects were identified.

“I couldn’t believe it. It was like someone was spitting in our face,” says James Crabbe, a senior at Maryland. “We haven’t really come that far, I guess, if people out there still want control over minorities.”

The rest of the University of Maryland community was equally appalled. Shawna Murray, a vice president of the black student union, called the act one of “terrorism.” The chair of the Women’s Studies Department, Dr. Bonnie Dill, told NPR she was “very disturbed, very upset,” adding that “there’s been fear, there’s been tension.” The weeks following the noose’s appearance were marked by displays of solidarity and unity, demonstration and strength.

For all the fear and activism wrought by the hate crime, however, no one to blame has yet materialized. Not even a suspect. The same is true at Columbia, where a noose was hung on the doorknob of Professor Madonna Constantine’s office a month after the Maryland incident. The hateful acts are indicative of what is becoming a national trend. DiversityInc keeps a “Noose Watch.” During an average year, there are 12-15 noose incidents. This year, the number is up to 61. Of those, 22 have occurred in school settings, including a horrific scene at Reed College in Oregon this October in which six stuffed scarecrows were found hanging from a grove of cherry blossom trees.

Fourteen of these cases have yet to be solved. Some of the nooses, such as those at Maryland and Columbia, were flaunted in open areas where any number of people could have witnessed the rope as its knot was tied. As is the case for the issue of racism itself, resolution has proven elusive. Now, two generations removed from the height of the civil rights’ struggle, racism still shows its face with regularity. The reasons why, however, do not.

When 13 parents led by Oliver Brown first challenged the racial segregation of the Topeka, Kansas school system in 1951, they looked to overturn 90 years of the “separate, but equal” statute in the United States. By 1954, when the case appeared before the Supreme Court, Martin Luther King had begun preaching equality in Alabama, and the Civil Rights Movement was fully underway.

The decision in Brown v. The Board of Education was meant to cure the racial ills of all of America’s education systems, from elementary to university. It was intended to serve as the temporal partition separating “now” from “then.”

But if 1954 was supposed to be a turning point, it has been a wide bend.

Andrew Grant-Thomas is the deputy director of the Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity at Ohio State University. He says that an analysis of the developing racial climate on campuses is a matter of perspective.

“In absolute terms, we’ve come very far. The statistics for people of color, in attendance and graduation, have gone way up. That’s good news,” he says. “The discrepancy, on the other hand, between white and minority is still enormous. So, in relative terms, we have a long way to go.”

Considering that we live in a time that outlaws segregation and overt racism, those words are distressing. But it is the belief in a linear progression of racial inclusion that Sean Eversley-Bradwell, an assistant professor at Ithaca College, believes lies at the root of our misunderstanding of racism.

“We think that, by default, as time goes on ‘race relations’ get better,” he says. “I’ll hear people say things like, ‘Can you believe that would take place in 2007?’ As though, somehow, because it’s 2007, we would not experience what we experienced 50 years ago. There’s the belief that because time passes, things automatically get better without doing any of the work.”

The proof is in the press. In 2004, celebrations, symposiums and conventions took place all around the country to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Brown decision. Just this year, Americans celebrated the same anniversary of the forced inclusion of the “Little Rock Nine” in 1957. However, as Eversley-Bradwell points out, we didn’t talk about what happened in 1958 when Central High had to close its doors because of the mounting racial tensions.

“The fact that we celebrate these ideas clouds people’s judgments about what actually takes place,” Eversley-Bradwell says. “We haven’t really made that much progress. We think we have, because we celebrate it. But in the grand scheme of things, not much has really changed.”

But clearly, some things have changed, right? Socially-accepted beliefs have changed. The brazen racial bias of many societal structures, especially schools, is gone. Jim Crow is gone. Segregation is illegal. We’ve undergone something relatively unknown in the Western world—a civil rights movement.

As in the past, on the other hand, we still experience disparate outcomes based on race. According to the Kirwan Institute, nearly all schools that have a strong majority of minority students are also high poverty schools. For average white children, student poverty at public schools falls around 25 percent. For black students, school poverty ranges from 61 to 78 percent. Highly proficient, low-income (often minority) students have only a 50 percent chance of being placed in AP and Honors classes because of the low quality of their schools. De facto racial segregation of cities and schools has been on the rise since the mid-1990s, and it strongly correlates to economic segregation, resulting in the poor minority among the poor minority, the rich white among the rich white.

Perceptible racial inequalities regarding health care, employment, transportation, childcare and the criminal justice system all affect education. The effects accumulate over time, and the interplay of these factors is enough to doom many minority children early and often.

But it is the housing system to which education is most bound. It is a subject that gets a palpable rise out of the normally composed Grant-Thomas.

“Certainly, we have all kind of data that there is discrimination in all levels of the housing markets, from real estate steering to stiffer loans for blacks by banks. There is more than detectable discrimination at all stages, which makes the overall difference immense.”

Grant-Thomas then thinks back to some research that suggested that people, both white and of color, often choose to live in predominantly segregated communities. He takes a short breath, seemingly filters through a long-realized frustration, and responds.

“The argument that others want to live with ‘their own’ is nonsense. Many minorities find their selves poor and in low opportunity neighborhoods—and they know it. Studies show that if you ask them what they would change, they say crime and security. The notion that they would rather live in places that have schools with worse infrastructures, metal detectors, overcrowded classes…”

He pauses. “It is not a matter of choice. That’s ludicrous.”

Grant-Thomas has a simple point: where you live determines where you go to school, and quality of education determines subsequent life opportunities. Poorer neighborhoods have poorer schools with worse teachers, less funding and a diluted, less engaging curriculum. Minorities disproportionately constitute these poorer communities because racially prejudiced housing policies pushed them that way. Today, the average white student goes to a school that is 79 percent white. On top of that, research shows that low-income students attending middle-class schools perform higher than middle-class students attending high-poverty schools.

These facts paint a picture of systematic inequality and disparity that is little different from decades before. But, culturally, it is no longer tolerable or rational to carry— much less act upon— racist ideology. So, what does all this have to do with the increase in campuses incidents this year?

To help us understand, we need simply to look at the average GPA of UCLA’s admitted students in 1997. It was 4.125 on a 4.0 scale, with the extra points indicative of curves given for taking AP and honor classes. At the same time, 15 percent of high schools in California didn’t offer any AP or honors classes. Another 17 percent offered only a limited selection. Most of these schools were from high-poverty, mostly minority districts.

“Hardly any of those kids, no matter how brilliant, could achieve that high a GPA,” Grant-Thomas says.

And the numbers haven’t changed much. In 2006, the average weighted GPA at the largest school in the UC system was 4.26. That year, only 210 black students were admitted, making up 2 percent of all admitted students. Ten years earlier, UCLA admitted 488 black students, or about 5.1 percent.

The other factor is that, as Dill states, “Students come to this very diverse campus from a very un-diverse high school experience.”

This creates a new, heightened sense of race for many young people. Mix that with an atmosphere that is conducive to academic freedom— in other words, free thinking and speaking— and you have a potentially combustible package.

“When people have the freedom to open up and say whatever they want, they’re more willing to test the boundaries. I’m not sure that folks always believe what they say, but they’re willing to take that risk to see how far they can push the conventions of societal speech,” Eversley-Bradwell says.

“That means exploring both the positive aspects of identity as well as the not so positive; the much more contentious, the much more racialized, sexualized, classist. Those reasons are why, I think, we find more of this kind of behavior on college campuses.”

This insight shines light on a curious paradox: racist sentiment is counter to society’s norms, yet it persists in alarming numbers in university settings, and indeed, in society.

Eversley-Bradwell’s point is illustrated improbably well by Jerome Stafford. While at Howard University, a historically black school in Washington D.C., the tall, soft-spoken Stafford discovered something about himself and society.

“Even when I meet other black people, the first thing I think is, ‘Okay, they’re black.’ But on campus, they’re just people because we’re all black. You can find out more about the individual,” he said.

“You know, there can’t be the table of black kids,” he added with a chuckle.

Racial inequality and racist activity still exists because race is as pervasive and unavoidable a concept in our society as any other, yet we struggle to discuss it as we still mend from a fractured past. In an environment that encourages personal exploration and expression, well-brewed misunderstandings of race find a place to emerge. At the University of Maryland and at Columbia, they emerged in the form of a very old instrument of fear—the noose.

Sitting in his office adorned by the images of black leaders of years past like Sojourner Truth and Malcolm X, Eversley-Bradwell asks a challenging question.

“If we were taking severe steps backward in terms of race relations, what would it look like? Would it look like Hurricane Katrina? Would it look like the rapid increase of noose hangings all over the country? What would it look like if there was a culture shift that wasn’t for the positive?”

He looks aside for a moment, then struggles to find his own answer.

“I don’t know what the cultural shift is, but I’m saying that we should probably pay closer attention to the signs.”

On October 5, 2006, members of two fraternities and sororities at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign threw a party with a “fiesta” theme. The party was dubbed the “Tacos and Tequila” party and portrayed Latinos using derogatory stereotypes, with students dressing up as janitors and wearing gardening gear. Soon, however, pictures of the party ended up on Facebook and sparked a firestorm of criticism on campus. It also brought a controversial issue to the forefront of the public eye: racism against minorities other than African-Americans.

Racism has often been presented as a black and white topic, a problem between Caucasians and African-Americans. Discrimination against other minorities is still prevalent on college campuses, however. It’s a different mindset, says Harrison Hsueh, president of the Asian American Association at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

“I think it’s more or less the same, but people kind of look at it through different lenses. Certain minorities have been portrayed more in terms of their stereotypes, and it’s a little more brash when people are insensitive to certain minorities. When you’re being racist to an Asian-American, it doesn’t seem as harsh because there’s that whole ‘modern minority thing.’”

Some experiences on college campuses are the same for minorities, whether they’re black, Latino, Asian or Muslim.

“As a minority on a predominately white campus, you see things. You have to. You have to know where you are, who you’re surrounded by, what you say, because it all comes back, if you don’t know what’s going on,” says Liz Rodriguez, a member of the African-Latino Society at Ithaca College.

One of the major differences between racism against African-Americans and racism against other minorities is perception. Rodriguez feels that the long history of discrimination against African-Americans in the United States causes a different awareness of it.

“I think sometimes it’s seen as worse if it’s African-Americans because of what they’ve been through and how it keeps coming back with incidents like the nooses. And it’s so much in our society. We know so much about the civil rights movement, we barely hear about anything having to do with anyone else, like, other minorities. I think it’s a problem that people would just watch what they say around African-Americans, and not a Hispanic person. Because the thinking is that they haven’t been through much, what is their problem, why do they feel this way. When you look at Hispanic people, you think immigrants, and not anything else of it.”

Although Ramie Shalabi, president of the Muslim Students Association at the University of South Carolina, has not been a direct victim of blatant racism while at college, he acknowledges its existence.

“There’s still discrimination going on, unfortunately. Slurs have been made, mostly towards Muslim females who wear their scarves, because it’s clear that they’re different from everybody else. And our organization has received various hate mail over the past year or two years. I don’t think there’s any clear differences that you could really point out, I mean discrimination is discrimination one way or another.”

A form of subtle discrimination prevalent on college campuses is the practice of self-segregation, which can be viewed in both positive and negative light.

“There’s a pretty noticeable self-segregation in terms of the different ethnic communities in addition to Caucasians. I guess at one level it’s more of an unspoken sort of racism. It’s definitely more subtle. Since it’s so subtle it’s hard to make people change it because it’s hard to make people see it.”

Other types of racist parties similar to the Tacos and Tequila party at the University of Illinois have occurred on college campuses, including South of the Border parties at the University of Santa Clara and University of Delaware. The backlash from the University of Illinois party had very visible results, but it’s rare for these common parties to cause such controversy. “There were a lot of minorities who were upset, and there were a lot of groups that were specifically organized in reaction to the Tacos and Tequilas Party,” says Hsueh.

Recent world events can also make discrimination more pronounced for certain groups. After the Virginia Tech shooting, when South Korean Cho Seung-Hui killed 32 people, minorities held their breath to find out the ethnicity of the suspect, in hopes that it would not be a person of their race.

“I think any kind of minority hopes that someone from their own ethnic background doesn’t do something really overt like at Virginia Tech, because when that does happen you’re subject to being targeted,” says Hsueh.

There was also a visible change in the campus atmosphere after the incident, says Hseuh.

“For Asians—and specifically Koreans— at Illinois, there was a sort of heightened sense of insecurity, in the sense that they might be targeted for racism, or just targeted in the sense that people would be afraid of them inherently just because they’re Korean.”

Rodriguez, however, feels racism doesn’t spike after these incidents, it’s just that more light is shed on the subject.

“I don’t think there’s a heightened degree, I just think we actually see it. It’s always there, we just choose not to see it, but when things such as Virginia Tech and 9/11 happen, it becomes more known. Then people start to see ‘Wow, this does actually happen on a daily basis.’ But it’s blown out of proportion and shown as if it doesn’t happen every day.”

People are rallying for change, however. There are countless ethnic and cultural student organizations on college campuses across the country whose goal is to spread awareness of their culture to the general campus and debunk common stereotypes about their ethnic background.

The Muslim Students Association at the University of South Carolina hosts an Islamic Awareness Week, where they bring in speakers to talk about different aspects of Islam. On the fifth day, which is the Islamic day of Sabbath, their mosque is opened to the public, and students and professors are invited to see what it’s like to worship in a mosque.

“We always try and reach out within the community, both the Muslim community and non-Muslim community. We’re trying to raise awareness, to show people that not all Muslims are terrorists,” says Shalabi.

Hsueh also stresses the importance of creating ties within the community. “We have specific committees devoted to trying to spread diversity and help promote the cultural background of Asian ethnicities. We have a cultural committee and they help to educate the campus and also the other Asians on campus about Asian culture. We also have another committee called the outreach committee and the purpose of the outreach committee is to connect the Asian American association to different communities outside the Asian-American community to show that we’re not just isolated.”

Another effective way to combat discrimination is through diversity retreats and conference such as the Cross-Cultural Leadership Retreat, held through Ithaca College.

“They make it a point to bring a bunch of different people together, and they speak about topic like racism and discrimination against all people,” says Rodriguez. “You make friends with people you’ve seen but wouldn’t normally talk to, and you become really, really good friends, and then you get into their friends, and start going outward into something you’re not used to.”

Even through all of these outreach methods, it doesn’t appear as if racism will go away from college campuses, or society in general anytime soon. It’s too ingrained in society to fade any time in the near future.

“In an ideal world, I’d like to say that that might be achievable, but whenever people look different, and they have different backgrounds, different upbringings, and different experiences, there’s always going to be a certain level of bias or prejudice just based on physical perception,” says Hsueh.

“We’re just stuck,” adds Rodriguez. “We did progress, but right now we’re not continuing to do it, we’re just stuck where we were left. Until we have someone like Malcolm X or Martin Luther King, or a group of people that come together, we’re going to stay stuck where we are now.”

In 1965, Rosa Parks, a 42-year-old African-American woman, sat in the front of a bus and refused to give up her seat. In her autobiography, My Story, Parks recalled that she was simply “tired of giving in.” A police officer arrested her for her actions, but Parks’ peaceful protest helped spark a civil rights movement. The rest is history.

Since Parks’ protest, equal rights and opportunity have been indoctrinated into America society through legislation, affirmative action, and desegregation. History may be repeating itself, however.

In August 2006, at Jena High School in Jena, La., three nooses were hung on a “whites-only” tree. This occurred after a black student asked the school’s vice principal if he and his friends could sit under the tree. Three white students were suspended, but were not criminally charged.

After a number of racially driven incidents, a group of six black teenagers, now known as the Jena Six, were charged with beating their white schoolmate Justin Barker on December 4, 2006. Barker was reportedly knocked unconscious, and his face was bloodied and swollen. Barker still attended a school function the same night of the beating.

Seventeen-year-old Mychal Bell was the first to be tried. Bell was a successful and talented student athlete. He had already received offers to play Division I football for schools like Louisiana State University and Mississippi State.

He was originally charged with attempted murder, but that charge was reduced to aggravated battery and conspiracy. After much debate, it was decided that Bell should have been tried as a juvenile. He was imprisoned for almost 10 months, and was finally released on September 27, 2007 after providing bail. Despite his release, the case is not over for Bell, whose retrial will begin on December 6, 2007.

For the past few months, college campuses across the country have actively protested against the treatment of the Jena Six.

The Internet has been extremely popular and resourceful to college students, as most students have little money and financial resources. Using Facebook, students have created and organized events on campus such as open discussions, petition signings, and protests on the Jena Six incident. Students have even used the site to coordinate days to wear certain color shirts that represent a certain opinion or idea, or simply supportive shirts with “Free the Jena Six” written on them.

“Many people actually check their Facebook to know what’s going on in the world,” Ithaca College sophomore Zaneta Clarke says. “It’s somewhat unfortunate, but it’s true… Many people found out about the Jena Six incident just from Facebook. I know I did.”

Yet some people still felt the need to expand their activism beyond Facebook and the Internet. The case sparked tremendous protests by those who felt that the arrests and charges were racially discriminatory and unfair.

On September 20, more than 15,000 demonstrators swarmed Jena to rally against the unjustified treatment of the Jena Six in Jena. During the demonstration, the Rev. Jesse Jackson, the demonstration’s organizer, told people outside of a nearby courthouse “we will not stop marching until justice runs down like waters.”

The demonstration, one of the largest civil rights demonstrations in years, was certainly not limited to protesters from the South. During that same day, similar protests were held in other cities such as New York., Los Angeles and Cleveland.

Many of the college students protesting the incident became involved because they could personally relate to them, due to the age closeness. Students of color were especially reactant towards the incident.

At the University of Virginia, students held a vigil and walk out in response to the Jena Six incident. Students wore black or green shirts, both signifying protests supporting the Jena Six. Families of the Jena Six informed the media that protestors should wear black to signify their support. Green was also worn to represent new beginnings.

Five University of Virginia students and three Virginia Commonwealth University students traveled to Jena to participate in the primary protest.

UVA freshman Nureya Angelique, who helped plan the trip to Jena, says that she first heard about the protest from her local hometown NAACP chapter. She originally thought that her college would plan some type of event where students could travel together with faculty to protest the Jena Six incident. When that didn’t happen, Angelique decided to pursue a trip herself, but says it was difficult to plan because she wasn’t familiar with trip planning at UVA.

Administrators were not encouraging, claiming it would be impossible to plan such a trip in four weeks. Angelique didn’t have enough money, people showing interest, or student clubs or organizations formally supporting her by showing their strong interest in going on the trip.

“I was personally determined to go and would not have minded going by myself,” Angelique says. “I set up a Facebook group as soon as I could, and I had a lot of feedback from people who were interested.”

Eventually, UVA’s Office of African American Affairs encouraged her to make the trip happen. The office told her that she did not need the school’s approval to go and could simply rent a form of transportation. Many people dropped out and only a few were still interested in going on the trip, however.

CNN and the New York Times claimed this is the first time since the 1960s that a significant percentage of college students have rallied around a cause. Anita L. Allen, Henry R. Silverman Professor of Law and Philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania School of Law, felt there are far more important things students should be protesting about. Allen is an expert on privacy law and contemporary ethics, and has spoken on various media networks such as BBC. Allen explained that she did not think it was extremely important for students to be participating in rallies and protests against the outcomes surrounding the Jena Six.

“I believe the case has gotten a lot of attention and the attention it deserves, but I believe there are other matters extremely important that would benefit from student energies,” said Allen. “This would include problems like the war in Iraq, which has taken the lives of a disproportionate number of men and women of color, and the fact that police are shooting mentally ill teenagers rather than subduing them and getting them medical care.”

Allen says she wishes young people would become engaged in other issues of social injustice, such as the prisons systems, sentencing disparities, and the death penalty.

Angelique feels that all these different issues are extremely important. However, she felt that these issues naturally don’t receive enough media attention to make people want to stand up. The Jena Six have provoked students to create change, but only recently did most learn about the problem.

“So we have an issue, we work hard to unify, and now we should have protested something else?” Angelique says. “We attacked the Jena Six issue before it became bigger. If that’s not worth fighting for, I don’t know what is.”

Angelique believes that protesting is extremely important for college students to do. She feels that although the Jena Six is a specific case displaying racism, if students do not participate in rallies and demonstrations, the government and other citizens will harm minorities and take advantage of this.

“It reminded us that as college students we could join a common cause and make a huge impact,” says Angelique. “It also reminded minorities that we are still in a struggle. This was not only my chance, but a chance for other students, other people of every race, to stand up for what we believe in.”

“I don't want black people to be disappointed in me for putting that [message] out there... It's a complete moral dilemma." – Dave Chappelle, The Oprah Winfrey Show

Music and comedy distort our sense of reality. It’s easily arguable that this is exactly what entertainment is supposed to do, but the age-old question remains: At the root of art is truth, so what is its effect on actual life? In particular, how does art’s depiction of race affect its target demographic – us, the college community?

In comparison with America’s early history, this generation was born into a relatively equal playing field. It’s not completely even, but we’ve come a long way; views of equal value are encouraged, and equal opportunity is possible. Unfortunately, as our generation grew up – like those before us – we were informed of the facts of our past. But why do we continue to carry the burden of our ignorant history?

Simultaneously, we are confronted with conflicting images and influences from the arts and the media. For whatever reason, we start to compare ourselves and doubt our self-worth. We search for what we’re supposed to be, and unite with others who seem to be just like us on the surface.

The Music Machine

Hip-hop artists like Curtis Jackson (a.k.a. 50 Cent) provide what may be the relatable image some people are looking for. They understand the hardships some people are going through, and have managed to make a successful, appealing lifestyle – with money, women, and undefeated spirit.

For those not living with hardships, they still create a fantasy that can easily be adapted to other situations- every time they play the artists' music while getting ready to go out for the night, to a place where the music will then follow you.

In May of this year, in an interview with EURweb, Jackson explains:

“Music is a mirror, and hip hop is a reflection of the environment that we grew up in. It’s the harsh realities that end up in the music. If I ask you to paint a picture of the American flag and not use the color red, you’re gonna have a difficult time. To capture what we try to capture in the art form, I’m sure some conservative Americans can’t [identify] with it because of their lifestyle and the way they’ve actually been brought up, and they haven’t been exposed to those realities.”

But what is his goal; why wouldn’t he want social improvement?

The continuous misrepresentation of an entire race is at stake. Those at a young age searching for what they should be will think this is it. This is the way to make a life. Other options are not cool. Other options are not widely accepted for me.

And what about socially conscious rappers, like Common and Mos Def? Is their view of life really less appealing? In a letter to Curtis Jackson, hip-hop mogul Master P. admitted that he was once part of the problem, but that he saw it was time for a change.

Originally, racial-oriented music was used as an uplifting tool. Think of the great works of the early jazz and blues artists. They were telling of their hardships, but were also trying to inspire and rise above. “A man…He wants a chance to give his kids a better life, Well hello brother, hello,” sung Louis Armstrong. The rappers of today are purely exploiting the situation.

Rutgers student Vince Bruno notes, “The businessmen are savvy…It's revolting how they could be so selfish as to prevent their own race's advancement in the wake of their greed.”

Bruno has also created a Facebook group “Students Against Racist Groups.”

“Thankfully, there are people who are intelligent enough to say, ‘Listen, this isn't what my race values’,” he says.

Towards the end of 50 Cent’s interview, he was asked if he would make a decision to turn around and set a positive example, as Master P. has done. He responded, “Well, Master P. doesn’t sell CDs anymore. You can tell him I said that.”

The Comedy Train

Comedy throws in an entirely different issue. It’s not so much about misrepresentation or stereotyping, but what the intent of this stereotyping is. As with the Jewish culture, jokes are not really intended to prolong stereotypes, but to counteract them. Point them out in such an obvious way, and people realize how ridiculous they are.

So, can this be applied to race?

During the third season of the Chappelle Show, Dave Chappelle had to question this. It was in the middle of a skit that he looked over and felt that a white man was not laughing with him, but at him. At that moment he had to question whether he was “dancing, or just shuffling.” He didn’t want the message he was sending out to be misinterpreted.

Widely respected comedian and actress Whoopi Goldberg sat down with CNN correspondent Anderson Cooper in April of this year to discuss a topic of racial concern: Radio talk show host Don Imus had recently blamed the African-American community for inventing a slur, which he was criticized for using in a joke aimed at a college basketball team. While speaking about the team, he referred to the female players as “nappy-headed hos.” Regardless of where the slur originated, it clearly should not have been used. Unfortunately, Imus did not explain the intent of his joke. But since he is white, it would not be widely accepted as an attempt to overcome a racial stereotype.

“If you're a comic, then you know that there is a line that you walk. And, every now and then, you go, whoop, and you're over the line, and consequences happen…there's always that price,” Goldberg says.

“The best advice I can give to him, get over to that campus…talk about whatever was happening, what you thought you were doing, and be honest.”

I guess in the end, it’s all about what you want art to do – reflect your life, or inspire a new one. Then it’s up to the individual – what reality do you want to subscribe to? As for the jokes, the audience needs to be mature enough to realize the intent, and the entertainer should be wise enough to know when his audience just can’t handle it.

But even beyond that, why does there need to be a division between races? By uniting as a group, it only excludes others, thereby perpetuating the race issue. Haven’t we come anywhere since the ignorance of our past? Let us remove the burden. Maybe we can’t forget the past, but I believe forgiveness is realizing your adversary’s limitations, and this is possible.

iMPrint Multimedia Editor Aaron Arm takes a look at how affirmative action is affecting the college admissions process in an iMPrint video.

To watch the video, click here.