Quote:
Originally Posted by MikeWaters
I read the NYT article about this controversy. So there was 2 incidents of a verbal slur (so could have been just 2 people total involved in slurring). And then the fecal swastika.
I expected a little bit more meat on that bone. Not saying that it shouldn't be systematically addressed.
But could you imagine the average high school, how many have had 2 racial slurs uttered?
I guess this gets to how one can tell if a culture is broken.
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Missouri racial culture is totally broken. You have to look at this in the context of where this is taking place. I think Missouri is even worse than most states in the deep south are when it comes to racism and racial relations. My brother's wife grew up in the St. Louis area pretty close to Ferguson, Missouri. According to them, it's really bad there. The recent racist incidents the students are angry about are unfortunately pretty commonplace in that state. People in cars driving by and screaming racial epithets to random black citizens just walking down the street in a mostly white part of town happen a lot there. My brother has even seen it. Remember the former St. Louis Cardinals player who got beat up at a gas station a few months ago by a white supremacist for doing nothing except happening to be in a certain part of town? Also, the St. Louis suburbs are notorious for the phenomenon once called "white flight." You could have a middle class neighborhood that is mostly white. Then a few black families move in and suddenly within a very short time all the white families choose to move out. That's exactly what happened in Ferguson. That's the context the black students at the U. of Missouri are coming from. While some of their actions may appear to be overreacting, at the same time, I don't know that I can just easily dismiss it like your garden variety cougarboard poster who grew up in Utah and who has never lived among people of other races might.
In other words, I don't think this is just a reaction to a few recent incidents on campus.