Patronize

By Crispin Sartwell

The problem with affirmative action is not that it is discriminatory against white people; the problem is that it's condescending to black people.

Indeed, it is kind of sweet that some white people are aware enough of the historical crimes of our own race and contemporary structural racism to want to do something about it. And cultural diversity on campus and in the workplace is a worthwhile goal. For example, I teach at an art school, and in my view much that is most vital in contemporary art - hip hop and graffiti, for instance - emerges from African America. It helps everybody's education to have black kids at an art college.

But allowing folks into a prestigious institution based largely on their race is patronizing. And it is also quite possibly a tool of cultural annihilation, as these institutions largely present a catechism in white American culture. Indeed the lack of awareness of white folks that we are a particular culture and that our institutions are dedicated to reproducing this culture in a thousand ways is symptomatic of the current forms white racism takes.

Black kids who are thinking about how best to get educated ought to consider attending and hence bolstering the institutions of their own community. They should consider not only what institution has the most prestige, but what institution is most nurturing to the soul. That might turn out to be Howard, not Harvard.

Look, in other words, for a place that has something to sell you besides a bottle of bleach.

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Crispin Sartwell writes from Railroad, PA. His email address is c.sartwell@verizon.net