Wednesday, April 30, 2008

Coming Soon to an Ivory Tower Near You!

It seems that Mr. Jefferson's alma mater is not the only elite university with a vacant leadership post. In response to their presidential search (no doubt less acrimonious than ours), Dartmouth freshman Jordan Osserman had this to say: "Straight white men need not apply." If you want to torture yourself with the full identity-politics manifesto, here it is.
http://thedartmouth.com/2008/04/30/opinion/osserman/

A few observations. First, I believe it goes without saying that if anyone had written "Lesbian Chicano transgendered need not apply" the writer would be marksteyned (see post from 4/29). That is, he would be, if he were allowed to keep his life. It seems that all sexual orientations, races, and gender identies are equal, but some are more equal than others. Second, this is coming to William and Mary. All is quiet on the presidential selection front now, but as the deadline on Reveley's caretaker period approaches, surely we will see "enlightened" calls for certain people to take over at the Brafferton. The oddsmakers (me) have it at 5/1 that similar sentiments to Mr. Osserman's will be published by someone, perhaps in the DOG Street Journal (does anybody actually read that?).
Third and most importantly, let me call Mr. Osserman's sentiments what they are: absolutely fucking racist. It is patently shocking that so-called liberals, in the name of "progress," insist on clinging (if I may coin a phrase) to the same racial caste system used by Bull Connor and Jefferson Davis. If we are ever to move beyond "race" into true "multiculturalism" (for lack of a better word) it's about damn time we realize that culture doesn't fit into neat racial or ethnic categories. Why is it that two first-generation Americans, one Czech and one French, one whose parents fled Communism or Nazism and one whose parents freely emigrated, are classified as "Caucasian" with your humble correspondent, an at-least-fifth generation American whose ties to the "old country" are purely artificial? Why is it that a first-generation American whose parents immigrated from China classified as "Asian" with a third-generation American whose ancestors came from Japan before 1941? I could do this calculus for every "racial" group, but that would be excessive; the absurdity is demonstrated. Likewise, it is absurd to assume that only an "oppressed minority" can end "oppression." I cannot speak for Dartmouth. Perhaps they burn crosses and huddle in white sheets in the Ivy League. But from what I've seen at W&M, the "races" get along much better than anybody gives them credit for. Don't be the fool who cries "opression" every day of the week. You might look absurd, to say nothing of the fact that no one will listen when you're really being opressed.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=dOOTKA0aGI0

No comments: