Asking the Question
How equal do minorities actually want to be treated?

by Jack Boyer

The police chief in Palo Alto, California, Lynne Johnson, recently admitted to ordering officers to stop and question African-Americans around town. Her reason for doing so was that many suspects of a recent outbreak in robberies are African-Americans. She claims that this is a typical situation in which the police are investigating leads, but many believe it’s unconstitutional and are saying it is a textbook case of racial profiling.

When it comes to incidents like this, African-Americans want to be given the same opportunities as everyone else and want to be treated just like everyone else. But who doesn’t?

Maybe some of the African-Americans attending Ohio State, the University of Minnesota, and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign don’t.

In recent years, a large number of black students at Ohio State and Minnesota have planned their own homecoming activities. This year, students at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign held their own homecoming festivities. Many of them have said they don’t feel welcome in their school’s social scene.

But are these students helping the situation by completely taking themselves out of that social scene?

If the situation was reversed, would white students be criticized for having their own homecoming festivities? The answer is yes.

FUBU is a clothing company founded in 1992. The name is an acronym meaning "For Us By Us" referring to the company being produced by African-Americans for African Americans. White consumers aren’t being kept from buying FUBU’s products by any means, but it makes me question how Americans would react to a company that makes products specifically for white people.

Another example of this is Black Entertainment Television. BET was founded in 1980 and targets a black audience. The American people would be in an uproar if White Entertainment Television was a station.

My last example is what are referred to as black colleges. Most of these colleges are historically black colleges, meaning that they were founded for African-Americans during times of segregation. However, these universities still advertise themselves as being black colleges to this day. White people are still allowed enrollment in these colleges but in my opinion, advertising as a black college is equivalent to discouraging white people from attending. I think it would create a problem if a typical university discouraged blacks from attending by presenting itself as a white college.

I have no doubt in my mind that there are racially oppressive things going on in America against African-Americans, as well as any minority race. However, instead of completely blaming these things for preventing complete unity between races, another question needs to be asked.

How equal do minorities actually want to be treated?

The answer in my opinion: Enough to have the same opportunities as anybody else without losing the status of a separate entity. But can they have both?