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I 2B The Michigan Daily - Wednesday, October 4, 2006
Wednesday, October 2006 Dail)
-The Michigan
able demand: righteous racial pay-
ment for indelible racial guilt. But
every applicant who is admitted to
the University in part because of
his color displaces another appli-
cant who was denied admission in
part because of her color. You do
see this inescapable consequence
of preference, do you not? When
we give by race it follows neces-
sarily that in so doing we also take
by race. That displaced applicant
disadvantaged only by her color,
whose name we cannot know, is
real; she and all those similarly
rejected are the persons who must
pay for the guilt we feel and seek
to expiate. Do you think that fair?
The chief justice of the United
States Supreme Court put it very
aptly a few weeks ago. He wrote:
"It is a sordid business, this divvy-
ing us up by race."
But, you say (echoing our
president), here at the Univer-
sity we consider race as, only
one factor among many. Of
course! Race has always been
only one factor among many.
The skin color of those blacks
cruelly discriminated against
for generations was then only
one of many factors weighed.
In truth, there is no degree of
racial discrimination that is
benign. Honorably motivated,
our current admission practices
are one form, not very subtle, of
outright racial discrimination.
With our talk about the "holis-
tic" evaluation of applicants we
do our best to hide that reality.
Our conduct, well meant, is
shameful. We would not behave
in this shameful way were we
not driven by guilt.
Our president has exhibited,
to her great credit, a continuing
concern for the happiness and
satisfaction of student life in our
residence halls. My office is in
one of those residence halls; I am
there night and day, year in and
year out. I invited her to come
and stay with us for a while. Dur-
ing any prolonged period in one
of our residence halls one will
experience directly the humiliat-
ing truth of what Shelby Steele
has written. Equality of status
and treatment, confidence that
all races and nationalities would
be treated evenhandedly, none
favored or disfavored because of
grandparents' birthplace or color
of skin - these were the seri-
ous promises of the civil rights
era. The logo we wore proudly
in those years was a large white
equal sign emblazoned on a
solid black background - on
an armband, a pin, wherever
we could present the image. It
is also the logo of the Michigan
Civil Rights Initiative. The lead-
ers of the civil rights movement
(and also we in the ACLU) said
equal means equal. We meant
what we said. Today, on our
campus, that spirit has been
forsaken. The symbolic equal
sign will not be worn. On the
one great issue, racial equal-
ity, which bound whites and
blacks together as comrades,
blacks and whites together have
vitiated the promises of the
civil rights era. Shelby Steele
writes:
"When I visit university
campuses today, black students
often tell me that racism is
everywhere around them, that
the university is a racist insti-
tution ... These students feel
aggrieved by racism even as
they live on campuses notorious
for almost totalitarian regimes
of political correctness ... This
is because their feeling of racial
aggrievement is calibrated to the
degree of white guilt on univer-
sity campuses and not to actual
racism ... Even announcements
of a new commitment to "diver-
sity" within an institution will
very likely increase feelings of
racial aggrievement in minori-
ties. We blacks always experi-
ence white guilt as an incentive,
almost a command, to somehow
exhibit racial woundedness and
animus ... .
"Threatened with a stigma-
tization that can gravely injure
businesses and ruin careers,
whites can be pressured into
treating the merest accusation of
racism as virtual proof ... Tex-
aco, Coca-Cola, and Toyota are
only a few of the corporations
that have paid hundreds of mil-
lions of dollars to the diversity
industry to avoid stigmatization
as 'racist.' "
The race card always works in
our country because, where the
atmosphere is one of pervasive
racial guilt, the accusation of rac-
In fact, there is no degree
of racial discrimination
that is benign.
ism leveled at a person or an insti-
tution sticks like glue, and needs
no proof to do its damage. Uni-
versities, like corporations, do not
pay to the measure of any actual
racism; they pay to the measure of
racism's bloated reputation in the
age of white guilt.
"White Guilt" is the name of the
book, published by HarperCollins
this year. As your University col-
league, I urge that you read it.
Respectfully yours,
Carl Cohen
RC professor
This is a version of a letter Cohen
send to University President Mary
Sue Coleman, which will be published
in the winter 2007 issue of Academic
Questions at Princeton University.
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3B THE JUNK DRAWER 8B DESERVING EDUCATION
A look at all of the things Why meritocracy without
you should and shouldn't affirmative action
be talking about on is a myth.
campus this week.
12B POETRY
4B SHORT FICTION Two poems from
A short story by student writers.
Karl Stampfl, the Daily's
managing news editor.
5B ESSAY
An essay on the
Tigers' playoff run and
baseball's decline.!
6B WHITE GUILT AND
RACIAL PREFERENCES
An open letter from RC
Prof. Carl Cohen with a ,
unique perspective on
affirmative action.-
~d
Magazine Editor: James V. Dowd
Associate Magazine Editor:
Chris Gaerig
Cover Art: Shubra Ohri =
Photo Editor: Shubra Ohri s
Designers: Bridget O'Donnell and
the Morgan McKay ?
Editor in Chief: Donn M. Fresard ,
stat m ent Managing Editor: Jeffrey Bloomer
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