Separate and Certainly Not Equal

At the collegefix.com site, one learns that at New York University, students demanded that "an entire floor of the mixed use building in the Southern Superblock plan be entirely dedicated to Students of Color, and another for Queer Students on campus." At "Oberlin University, students have demanded 'safe spaces' for black students." In 2016 at San Francisco State University, an "Afro-themed dorm floor" was created. Leo Hohmann documents how "an Illinois college has defended its restriction of portions of a mandatory course to black students even though part of the stated goal of the class is to teach students 'an appreciation for diversity.'" In an effort to achieve better graduation rates among black students, the University of Connecticut is "implementing a 'bold' new strategy to help boost its abysmal graduation rates for black males. The plan involves the clustering of 40 black male students in a portion of one dorm, no whites or Asians allowed, in what the university calls a 'learning community.'" On the other hand, the University of Vermont "provides a safe space for white students to explore their 'white privilege.'"

Walter Williams explains that since so many black college students are not prepared for college work, "for college administrators and leftist faculty, the actual fate of black students is not nearly so important as the good feelings they receive from a black presence on campus." Williams asserts that it is a "gross dereliction of duty for college administrators to cave to these demands." Nevertheless, WeDemand.org has a "list of hundreds of 'demands' by black student movements at universities across the country. Many of the demands include calls for major reductions in white faculty and separate 'safe spaces' for black students." At the University of Missouri, there was a demand for a "blacks only healing zone." Whites were told to leave the room and meet somewhere else. In 2015, the Motley Coffeehouse at Scripps College maintained that it would be open "from 6-10 only for people of color and allies that they invite ... to decompress, discuss, grieve, plan, support each other[.]" Oberlin College demanded that "space throughout the campus be designated as a Safe Space for Africana-identifying [sic] students." At Harvard University, "[b]lack members of the class of 2017 decided to form an individual [graduation] ceremony." According to the students, "[t]he separate graduation is an effort to highlight the aforementioned struggles and resilience it takes to get through[.]" One is reminded of Michelle LaVaughn Robinson's thesis, titled "Princeton-Educated Blacks and the Black Community," wherein the first lady-to-be "wondered whether or not [her] education at Princeton would affect [her] identification with the Black community." Thus, Ms. Robinson argued "that the relative sense of comfort [respondents] may feel when interacting with Blacks in comparison to Whites (and vice versa) in various activities reflects the relative ease and familiarity the respondents feel with Blacks in comparison to Whites which, in turn, indicates the extent to which the respondents are personally attached to Blacks as individuals in comparison to Whites as individuals." That such drivel was used in a Princeton thesis some 31 years ago explains why the race-obsessed presidency of Barack Obama is not a surprise. As a lineal descendant of this line of thinking, it follows that "Courtney Woods, who is finishing a master's degree in education policy and management from the Graduate School of Education, asserts that 'Harvard's institutional foundation is in direct conflict with the needs of black students. There is a legacy of slavery, epistemic racism and colonization at Harvard, which was an institution founded to train rising imperialist leaders. This is a history that we are reclaiming.'" Michael Huggins, who is graduating with a master's in public policy from the Harvard Kennedy School, asserts that "[t]his is an opportunity to celebrate Harvard's black excellence and black brilliance." So much for that school spirit that used to animate a university. Imagine the outrage if students registering for classes were confronted with sections designated "whites only." As Frank Furedi explains, it is clear that the "new black living-learning" community's aim "is not to enhance a common campus experience and culture." But according to Huggins, "[t]his is not about segregation. It's about fellowship and building a community. This is a chance to reaffirm for each other that we enter the work world with a network of supporters standing with us. We are all partners." Horace Cooper of Project 21 questions how such policies differ from the Jim Crow laws of the Deep South, "where blacks were blocked by whites from using the same public water fountains and were sent to a blacks-only public school. There is no difference ... between a Jim Crow segregationist and a 'progressive' professor claiming that black-only segregation is good." Brandon Morse notes that at the University of Chicago, UChicago United, a student group, has "posted a list of 50 demands that focus on the addition and strengthening of racial-based policies within the university." These demands include "segregated housing, six racially centered programs, and a sociology class focusing on Islamic history." Across the pond, in "April 2015, University College London's students' union posted a statement on its website supporting Goldsmiths Students' Union decision to exclude men and white people from meetings about anti-racist campaigns because 'self-defining spaces are so important because the reality is it is not possible to have discussions that need to be had with your oppressors in the room – even if they are saying nothing. BME [black and minority ethnic] students are used to going through life facing microaggressions – sometimes to the point where they don't even notice it anymore until someone like them tells them horror stories of their experiences.'" Lest one think such segregation is limited only to melanin levels, in an editorial in the British Guardian newspaper, one learns "that Universities UKK (UUK) ... representing more than 130 organisations involved in the business of knowledge and learning, defended 'voluntary' gender segregation at non-religious meetings in publicly funded institutions ... in the name of the lawful promotion of freedom of speech." In other words, if a speaker is not comfortable in a mixed-gender environment, women will have to sit at the back of a hall. Contorted logic is plentiful, and "endless propaganda, dedicated to shifting the boundaries of what is acceptable," is becoming the norm. Thus, at a public debate at the Islamic Education and Research Academy, those who objected to the segregated audience were ordered to leave. In effect, "Islam is conflicting with a modern civil liberties agenda." Furedi explains that in the "bizarre world of students' union politics, any group can face a call to be excluded from another's space." Consequently, the National Union of Students' LGBT campaign group asserted that white gay men are almost as privileged as white heterosexual men. In fact, "[t]he campaign also suggested that gay men have become accomplices in the oppression of others, stating that 'misogyny, transphobia, racism and biphobia are often present in LGBT+ societies', and that such acts of oppression are 'more likely to occur when the society is dominated by white, cis gay men.'" Hence, this segregation on campuses includes racial and sexual segregation and encompasses the idea that "in order to create a Safe Space, only those equality officers who were gay, disabled or from an ethnic minority could attend an equality conference." It is not a coincidence that left-wing blacks and sharia-compliant Muslims appear to be joining forces to make absolute demands on society that contravene Western principles. No matter how much progress black Americans have made and no matter how much accommodation is given to Muslim students, it is vital to understand that the demands will never cease, since the ultimate aim is to diminish and eventually destroy Western values. Consequently, "their focus is clearly on creating a racial division on campus." In fact, "students push to exclude many from their part of campus but force Islam studies." In fact, this meshing of Muslim and black separation portends something sinister. Melanie Phillips has written about "the red-black-green-Islamic axis." Phillips asserts: On its face, the love affair between sections of the left and the Islamists is a most unlikely pairing. Much of the left stands for militant secularism and the social agenda that follows: sexual libertinism and gay rights, as well as the bedrock issue of equality for women. Yet behind the banners of 'Free Palestine' and 'No Blood for Oil,' they have marched shoulder to shoulder with Islamists who believe in the subservience of women, stoning adulterers and executing homosexuals and apostates. As David Horowitz has chronicled, the roots of the left's alliance with Islamism lie in a logical progression of its core animus against America and the West. After communism imploded, those on the left did not conclude they had been mistaken – indeed, they could never think such a thing – but instead simply reshaped their belief system to perpetuate their revolutionary illusions by encompassing new nihilistic and anti-Western agendas, of which Islamism was one, alongside environmentalism, feminism and gay rights. In fact, many of these black students have absorbed the ideas of people like Angela Davis, who in 1989 helped found the first Black Student Union, which "eventually developed into a movement demanding Black studies on the campus and an entire college devoted to the needs of Black students [.]" An avowed communist, "Davis teaches at the University of California's Santa Cruz campus; is a recipient of the Lenin 'Peace Prize' from the police state of East Germany in 1979; and was instrumental in providing an arsenal of weapons to Black Panthers who used them to kill a Marin County judge in a failed attempt to free Davis' imprisoned lover, Black Panther murderer George Jackson." Davis maintains that "the only path of liberation for black people is that which leads toward complete and radical overthrow of the capitalist class." At the Center for Security Policy, it becomes clear that "the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement, MoveOn.org, and Bernie Sanders supporters joined in solidarity with Muslim Brotherhood loyalists and other jihadis, Marxists, leftists, progressives, and even the convicted domestic terrorist Bill Ayers, a former leader of the Weather Underground." The sole aim of this "Red-Green Axis" of groups that include the Muslim Brotherhood in America; the Black Lives Matter movement; and a collection of communists, leftists, progressives, and socialists is to bring down the U.S. government. As Alex Newman, co-author of Crimes of the Educators, explains, "Americans need to understand that this otherwise fringe ideology and extremism is now thoroughly embedded throughout the education system, from pre-K through university. Schools are no longer really doing what normal people understand as education or academics." The balkanization of students into packaged racial groups and the abdication of school officials in stopping such segregated classes are resulting in a dangerous affliction running through American schools. Demanding exclusionary space and describing it as "social justice" is clearly euphemistic language to camouflage malignant and prejudicial activity. Orwellian overtones abound. Eileen can be reached at middlemarch18@gmail.com.