Yes, I’m 18 years old; yes, I am a millennial; and yes, I am obsessed with Frank Sinatra. There, I said it: I am a 60 -year-old woman in a teenager’s body. Not only am I infatuated with, “Old Blue Eyes” as they used to call him, but I yearn to live in the sixties. The teenage culture, music, and movies seem like the idealistic dream—sans the incredible racism and sexism that was occurring during this time period. Well, during one of my daily calls with my best friend, my mom, I told her that I am finally living my dream: I stepped back into the sixties!
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Yes, I know what you’re thinking, and the flyers were immediately torn down. Shortly after this incident, a surge of #BlackLivesMatter fliers and chalk writings flooded campus. A sit in protest in the Fishbowl, one of the largest computer labs in the very building where the white supremacist posters were plastered, was organized and executed in a timely manner after the first sighting of the racist leaflets. This was the point in time when I was first made aware of the race war on campus.
No, I never expected this to happen at college, let alone at the #1 Ranked Public University known for its liberal, progressive, and inclusive environment. I stepped on campus only to realize I had taken a time machine back to the days where people’s way of thinking are the same as those of the past who executed lynching of African Americans, deliberately kept African Americans below the poverty line because of discrimination in the work force, isolated black children from white children in schools—teaching racism at an alarmingly young age. But then I think further and realize even more that history is indeed repeating itself.
Barring an entirely separate conversation on the proliferation of brutal and unjust police shooting of black men and retaliation on the six officers in Dallas, white supremacy is alive and trying to re-divide a country that had taken some steps forward in the quest for equality. This extremist Euro-American conviction that America is ruled by the whites and everyone is socially, economically, politically, morally, and educationally subservient is what is scariest to everyone in the country and on this campus. The people, whomever they were, had the agenda to make it known to society that whites are feeling oppressed in this Black Lives Matter movement and that they are still the superior species on American soil.
The opposing argument to this one would be that white people are being shamed for being white and privileged and they don’t deserve to feel this way because they’ve done nothing wrong. There is some truth to this. If a white person has not been racist in speech or action, then yes, they have done nothing wrong; I mean, we can’t choose into which body we are born. But, where their logic flaws is in the assertion that black people are inherently more violent and stupid than whites and that whites are those who founded this land (fact check: unless there are traces of Native American in the blood, you are not the indigenous person of this land).
Here’s where a little bit of good news lies: these extreme white supremacists are the minority. However, they are picking up steam (think: Trump). University of Michigan, headed by President Mark Schlissel, is taking intense and passionate steps toward creating a unified campus respecting people of all ethnicities, races, genders, sexual orientations, etc. To learn more about the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion strategic plan at Michigan click here.
Take a step back and think: what good is history if we don’t learn from our mistakes? America: land of the free, home of the brave, and the melting pot of the world. Let’s respect our values and our brothers and sisters.
