The past couple of months have been pretttttyyy heated at my school, with acts of insensitivity, bias, bigotry, hatred, etc. etc. etc. etc. ETC.
Is that really the case though?
I personally don't think so. At least, not to the extent of which its been advertised by the various school Diversity groups. Simple and stupid acts committed by individuals that either crave attention or were belligerently intoxicated have made school difficult for everybody in the wake of their actions. These acts, while stupid, were perpetrated by individuals, and not the "Stonehill Community", which received the brunt of punishment and anger from offended students.
The incident which started off this fervor at school pretty much started when it was made aware to students that some F***ing moron decided to etch a Swastika into a doorway.
Let's take a step back for a second here. I certainly don't condone the action, but we need to ask ourselves some serious questions as to the nature of the 'bias'. Personally, as the event occurred on a weekend, I'd assume the individual in question was drunk. Does that excuse the action? No, of course not. However, is it safe to assume that the individual was a neo-nazi member of the underground KKK organization on campus, and thus sober and in a rational state of mind when he (or she) committed such an action?
In all probability no. We've all dealt with that kid in middle school who drew swastikas on desks to get a rise out of people...and that's exactly what this was. Some punk thinking he was the shit. Those kids in middle school were treated exactly as they should have been: ignored, laughed at, and generally seen as major toolbags.
Nope. Even bigger than this. (Source)
The situation was not scoffed at however. It was blown over the top with an activist response. Which is what I'm sure that person wanted: Attention.
First of all. I'm just going to get this out here in the open before you get any further. I do not like bigots, nor the political/social/cultural standards that they admire. I find them ignorant, stupid, counter-intuitive and backwards. That being said, I don't appreciate over the top Politically Correct Nuts. No one likes having a doctrine rammed down their throat, especially if there was not a perceived problem in the first place. You could attribute this to anybody: The Jesus-Freak who says you should read the Bible more or the Hipster who tells you that you're working for "The Man". The drawing of a swastika on a public campus door was immature. But that doesn't mean there's a "hate" issue on campus that required a (and I quote the school newspaper) "mobilization" of a "Bias Response Task Force". Idiots aren't combated with pity anymore; they're attacked (and by "they" I mean everyone who isn't an activist) by an Orwellian Big Brother with an undeniable voice on campus...made out of condescending, cheesy and ultimately misguided students.
The aftermath is what I address as "Misguided Activism". The initial message was good, and there should have been a response on campus, but as soon as I started getting emails from the "Activist" student body addressing the entire community for our apparent bigotry problem..I was immediately irritated.
To use some of the words of my fellow students:
"I suggest that the student body, other than the 100 or so folks who already do [we have a campus of 2000+], wake up and start to care a little bit more about the environment we create. If one person is feeling unsafe or insecure on campus, then we have failed them as Stonehill peers. It isn't right, and I know we can do better."
But honestly, are we going to be a school that tolerates this shit?
We are way better than this.
"I will not be a bystander. I am Stonehill."
We are way better than this.
"I will not be a bystander. I am Stonehill."
"We are a community. We are a family-- the Stonehill family. Homophobia, racism, and bullying in general are unacceptable and, quite frankly, are beneath us. We are better than this. Ignorant hate speech has no place on our campus. Seriously, SPEAK OUT. Just passively ignoring "jokes" just enables them to continue. Choose what is right, not what is easy."
"To be silent witnesses is as bad as committing crime.
We need to wake up. We need to know that everyone has a right to life, and a life with dignity at that. Something that might look like a joke to you could shatter someone's belief in life. Lets not forget our humanity."
We need to wake up. We need to know that everyone has a right to life, and a life with dignity at that. Something that might look like a joke to you could shatter someone's belief in life. Lets not forget our humanity."
"If you come from a place where homophobic slurs are commonplace... If you've been, unknowingly, growing in an environment which harbors hatred, racism, and discrimination...If the phrase, "That's so gay," (or any other discriminatory slur, for that matter) is or has ever been part of your vernacular, then I challenge you to admit it to yourself, and I believe that you can change. I believe in you [Because "I" am not responsible for you being an idiot]. I encourage you to take control...it is not too late. To quote Professor Ruth Henderson, "be the hero of your own life"; be "determined to save/ the only life you could save." These recent bias incidents can become a part of your past, a part of Stonehill's past, and the future is so bright for you, for all of us. If we are here at Stonehill, then we are damn lucky. You have the power to change now, and for the better. You can do this, I truly believe in you."
Alright. "We" are not the problem. My roommates and I aren't Nazis. The girls down the hall don't go to cross-burning meets on the weekends. The majority of the campus has no feelings of actual, physical malice and hatred towards a particular ethnicity or sexual orientation. I get the basis of the message..I really do. The only issue is, that by blaming the entire community for the actions of one idiot, and making it seem like everyone on campus is a bigot, people get rightfully pissed off. This was the same deal in High-School as well. People turn away from a perfectly good message because they perceive that they themselves are getting blamed, while the activists that are raising awareness are better than the "community". The basic message is reasonable, but the tone is condescending....and that's the main issue. The "I'm superior and you need my help to spell out your life for you" attitude of many activists makes people irritated, unwilling to comply, and causes them to scoff at any additional measures taken to quell "the community's problems."
Let me try to make an example for you. Since this is The Grog, we'll make it random so the majority of you can get what I'm saying here. Have you ever seen Full Metal Jacket? There's that one fuck up (Pvt. Pyle) out of the whole company. He's an idiot who does everything (except maintaining and firing his weapon...as we find out later) half-ass. There's a particularly famous scene where a Jelly Donut, contraband, is found in his barracks foot locker. If you haven't seen it, here's a link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XUSDg7NSODw
Now imagine that instead of a jelly donut, you have the verbal charge of bigotry or racism, instead of Pvt. Pyle=an anonymous individual, instead of the Marine Corps company=A campus of 2000+ students.
Point Being: Everyone who is squared away doesn't want to be doing push ups because of one idiot's actions.
Unless it was to Techno...I could put up with this (uploaded by DigitalParadise101)
So what spurred this post? The "Swastika-incident" was a long time ago. No...I got the idea for this post because once again, controversy surrounded the campus after some emails were sent out by the activist portion of the student body concerning appropriate Halloween costume wear.
Agh. I guess the main reason why over the top Political Correctness annoys me is for all the hollering and patronizing going on, the "activist" is just as equally bias as everybody else. Let's get real. Everyone is bias. Everyone. It is human nature. Now whether or not you include malice behind your bias is another thing, that's where we'd get into hate crimes and what not. No-one likes being told what to do, or what's acceptable and what's not. Anyone can be offended by anything. Here's where the second Pet Peeve comes into play. There is a 100% double standard in terms of what constitutes as "bias" and what doesn't.
The following images spread out below are the images first introduced in the emails.
There's a double standard here.
If I came up to the school's Diversity club and said: "I think students shouldn't be allowed to dress up in something that would come off as ethnically insensitive to people of Irish, Italian, Scottish/English, German, or Dutch descent" I would be laughed out of the room and told that costumes directed towards those ethnicities are not bias.
You can't come to the Halloween "Mixer" (Dance), if you're wearing a sombrero. Yes. That is an actual rule. What if you're dressing up as a bank robber from the Wild West? What if you're being Steve Martin from Three Amigos? Doesn't matter; that's seen as "insensitive" and "bigoted" towards Hispanics.
But the various drinking oriented costumes that emphasize the historically stereotypical image of the Scots, Irish and Germans as drunks isn't offensive. Not according to the Diversity Club anyway. Ethnicities of "Whites" (which as explained in one of my classes, the concept of race is a made up concept) are in the perceived majority...and thus not offended by anything. If you dress up as a Guido, or heck, dress up as Jesus Christ Himself---That's not viewed as an act of 'bias'.
Personally, I don't care as to if someone wants to dress up as an Irishman or a German (the two main components of my heritage). The emails got wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy off topic in the school list-serves. Some students, at this point, had kind of had enough with the patronizing attitude conveyed by other students upon the community, and they argued against the emails. In response, somehow "so you think it's acceptable to dress up in black-face" came up.
This is stupid. Obviously, costumes attacking a "race" are not acceptable. I don't view myself as a sensitive person, but typing into Google "Chop Suey Glasses" or "Fee Ling Yu Asian Man Halloween Mask" (two costumes dervied from a 10 Halloween Costumes That Blew Our Minds as seen here) made me cringe. Obviously, dressing up in something like that or Black-Face is ridiculous, and yes...offensive to people who aren't even part of that ethnic group. However, pulling the race-card on someone and putting words in their mouth in order to win an argument is childish and lends to the belief that you're the sort of person who yells over the opposition rather than rationally argue with them in an intelligent manner.
I agree that some of the costumes above are in poor taste. I think the only one I have trouble finding offensive is the suicide bomber. By tagging that "We're a culture, not a costume", and then applying the image of a suicide bomber, your inadvertently creating a bias incident. It seems counter-intuitive to attach the concept of dressing up as a suicide bomber as offensive to the Arabic/Muslim culture.** If you dressed up as a generic "Arab" with exaggerated physical features or cultural garb, or as Muhammad, sure, that's offensive. But now we can't make fun of terrorists? What? Does this mean I can't dress up as the late Bin Laden? Would that be offensive to the Arabic student body? It isn't bigotry to wear a suicide vest parodying an Islamic fundamentalist. Unless the poster is suggesting that the kid in the photograph is in fact a fundamentalist, and thus offended.
**Let me try to clarify what I'm saying: Nobody complains if someone dresses up as the IRA for Halloween. Myself, being a dual citizen, I think I can speak on the subject instead of having some obscure ethnically ancestral tie to the motherland like a lot of my activist counterparts.
I wouldn't put myself on a poster saying that being in the IRA is a part of my culture and thus the costume offends me. That's counter-intuitive. If you don't want to be associated with a group of people...don't say "We're a culture, not a costume". We already know that "This is NOT who I am, and this is NOT okay". Not everyone equates an Irishman with the IRA, nor every person of an Arabic heritage with suicide bombers. That's like dressing up as The Black Hand and expecting someone of generic Serbian descent to say "Whoa, whoa, whoa....Franz Ferdinand references are too soon." RELAX. Take deep breaths. It's a free country, and seriously............worrying about the types of costumes you'll see on Halloween is nothing compared to actual, real, tangible bigotry that you may encounter after school in the big bad world.
Sometimes I wonder if people in Student Government, Diversity Club and other related organizations honestly believe that their petitions and calls for awareness make an impact on the flow of the world. But that's another post for another day.
Hope this argument made sense to some of you...
Until next time,
--Fin--
