Since Ford Hall 2015, there have been whisperings in dark corners and behind closed doors that the movement had no point – that the administration wasn’t really fighting them on the issues and that Brandeis is an open, inclusive community. People have argued that there is no such thing as structuralized racism, especially at Brandeis – that’s something for the Midwest and the South. Structuralized racism, however, is not a unicorn and it’s easy to see if you’re looking. As a white girl from an affluent northern suburb of Chicago, I have a great deal of privilege and I’m sure I’ll miss some things or misrepresent others. I’m writing this not to call anyone or any groups out, but instead to offer a list of very real ways structuralized racism continues, both on and off campus, and suggest a few areas in which we can do better.

1. Structuralized racism is that poster in every elementary school classroom – the one with people of all colors of the rainbow holding hands in a circle. Diversity doesn’t work like that. Diversity is a struggle – pushes and pulls between oppression, acceptance, appropriation, and “tolerance.” That poster makes us think that we can all get along if we just try hard enough – if we just hold hands in a circle. But the poster ignores the basic fact that in this society, some people are denied rights, not necessarily out of malice, but because the system was developed to exclude certain people. Some will argue that movements like Black Lives Matter are "reverse racist." "All Lives Matter" denies that people of color are denied rights. Yes, all lives do matter. But some lives are not subject to daily systematic oppression. Some systems are relics of a time when explicit racial segregation was the norm, and nice posters of green and purple and blue people will not fix these systematic injustices.
2. Structuralized racism isn’t the argument, “There just aren’t enough black professors, or “We’d have to lower Brandeis’s standards to admit more black students.” Brandeis is a school founded in 1948 to combat quotas at the Ivy League schools primarily for Jews. As a result, it naturally does attract more Jews because more Jews have heard of Brandeis. But we can do better. There are more opportunities for outreach outside of Jewish communities or communities with a high population of Jews. Everyone has heard of University of Massachusetts Amherst. Not everyone has heard of Brandeis.
3. Structuralized racism is the tracking system used in high schools. Some kids certainly should not be in BC Calculus – like me. I should not ever be in BC Calculus. But, practically, the system of tracking segregates schools along racial lines. And this happens for a number of reasons, but it’s not because people of color just can’t handle the rigor of honors and AP classes. That’s not a viable argument. Period. Acceptance to selective schools like Brandeis depends on a number of factors including taking challenging courses. Students that do not test into AP or honors courses in eighth grade for their freshman year of high school are less likely to be admitted to higher level universities because they were never given the opportunity to take more challenging courses.
4. Structuralized racism is the prison population. According to the Department of Justice, in 2013 people of color made up about 59 percent of the male prison population.
5. Structuralized racism is that most felons, made up of about 59 percent people of color, will not be able to vote. Let’s be clear – I’m not in favor of extending the vote to every person convicted of a crime. But in places like Florida, felons must wait either five or seven years after completion of their prison terms before applying to become re-enfranchised, depending on the seriousness of the crime. These applications are reviewed by a board on an individual basis, which certainly leaves room for subjectivity.
6. Structuralized racism is having to take a Non-Western class but not a class in the AAAS department. If we are required to learn about our neighbors, shouldn’t we also be required to learn about ourselves?
7. Structuralized racism is standardized tests. Tests measure aptitude based on certain experience, skewing towards people that can afford test preparation, tutors, and that speak the way the tests are written.
8. Structuralized racism is bussing. Voluntary bussing programs, like METCO in Boston, take students from the Boston Public Schools to suburban schools so that suburban schools can call themselves diverse and those few students lucky enough to be admitted receive access to better education. But, to name one disadvantage, these students have to get up hours earlier, say, at 6 a.m., to compete with kids who didn’t have to get up until 8 a.m. Built-in disadvantage, even to programs meant to aid failing schools, perpetuates systems of oppression. Well-meaning Band-Aid solutions simply are not enough to fix systematic failure.
9. Structuralized racism is being able to write this article without feeling directly disadvantaged by structuralized racism.
10. Structuralized racism is being able to claim my ethnicity when I want to and pass for white when it’s more convenient or safe – the ability, therefore, to have more of a say in how people see me.
11. Structural racism is only learning about black history and culture when I choose to, or for one month of the year. Or for one week or for one day of that one month, depending on how much the teacher cares.
12. Structuralized racism is being told, “Well, there just aren’t black authors for us to read.” Maya Angelou. James Baldwin. Chinua Achebe, Octavia Butler, Ralph Ellison, Toni Morrison, Richard Wright. To name a few. Actually, you know what, if you have questions about numbers four and five, read “The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness” by Michelle Alexander.
13. Structuralized racism is being told, “You’re just being a college idealist,” for talking about what’s wrong with our education system and the way things should be – being trivialized because of your race for pointing out real problems.
14. Structuralized racism is the right to say you support the Ford Hall 2015 movement but not the methods – for calling the methods inconvenient, uncomfortable, ineffective, “not the right way to go about it.”
15. Structuralized racism is the fact that, according to a study by the Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity of the Ohio State University, a white family making $30,000 a year is more likely to live in a more affluent neighborhood than a black family making $60,000. Let’s not forget that most kids go to their neighborhood schools. Most kids have a racially homogenous education.
16. Bonus: Symbolic ethnicity is saying, “I’m a Jew, I’ve been discriminated against, I feel solidarity towards Ford Hall 2015,” but choosing to stay home instead of standing in solidarity with the protests.

No one is perfect. We’re all guilty of imperfection, especially in handling uncomfortable topics and in confrontation. And that’s called being human. But to turn a blind eye to the struggles of our neighbors is an easy path towards ignorance. And to stand without thought is also an easy way towards ignorance. Tough questions involve tough conversations. I would like to just suggest that in addressing each other’s concerns, we can all choose to show more respect and more empathy towards struggle, even if we’re not aware of exactly what that struggle is. We’re college students. It’s okay to ask questions when we don’t know the answer and it’s OK to be curious and to learn and to grapple with our individual place in that struggle.