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Column: Tolerance isn't enough
Published: Friday, February 15, 2008 - 1:32am
Gargoyle staff reporter
Posted Friday, Feb. 15, 2008
TO ADVERTISE FOR the first of the two Black History Month movie nights, I put up a few signs around the school.
The signs feature a painting of the four little girls who were killed in the bombing of a church in Birmingham (the focus of the movie “4 Little Girls”) and some text. The signs said:
- Tolerant?
Diverse?
Accepting?
Prove It.
In honor of Black History Month Uni’s very own movie night:
Completely free unfiltered
Knowledge.
It continued on in detail about the place and time. On my way back from English I noticed a note drawn on in pencil that said, “Why does it have to be a challenge?”
I took the question as a legitimate one, and one that needed to be answered in a way that was more formal than simply writing a note back on the paper. My answer would be this:
I wrote the advertisement in the form of a challenge because that's exactly what it is. There are a lot of students at Uni who talk about how we need to be more diverse and how we need a more tolerant environment (tolerant of things ranging from homosexuality to race to religion).
I personally agree, but those same students need to be willing to create that environment.
When there isn't the promise of free food or missing a class, how many students are actually willing to go to something for the purpose of learning about a culture that isn't necessarily theirs?
Of course for all of those students who think that we need to create a more tolerant environment there are those who think that our environment is perfectly tolerant and that nothing really needs to be done.
To these students I say that if our environment is so tolerant and inviting to minorities, then people should care about the issues and history that surround these different people.
Actually, if you think about it, we should be striving for more than just tolerance. Tolerance is simply not objecting to the Black History Month signs in the second-floor hallway, tolerance is not making a fuss about the Black History luncheon scheduled for later this month, tolerance is what many of us have been practicing for far too long.
Tolerance is unacceptable. In order for us to encourage a cohesive society, regardless of race or other things, we need to gain knowledge and rise above tolerance.
So here's your opportunity to practice more than tolerance. Here is your opportunity to learn something. Here is your opportunity to step out of your comfort zone.
- Movie Night 1: Today, Feb. 15, after school at 1:30 p.m. Go out to eat, come back, watch a great movie! (“4 Little Girls,” Uni Gym)
- Movie Night 2: Thursday, Feb. 21, at 7 p.m.-ish (time still flexible; more details to come)
- Luncheon: Wednesday, Feb. 27, at lunch — free food for all, great performances (more details later)
Note: An earlier version of this column was published as an entry in the Gargoyle staff blog.
Comments
So, is there a reason that
So, is there a reason that the vast majority of your columns have something to do with race? Do you not have opinions about anything else?
As a matter of fact there is
As a matter of fact there is a reason that alot of my columns and other work has something to do with race and amazingly I do have opinions about other things. I'm not going to try and justify my interests to you, but I will say that I write about what I am passionate about, and I write about things that I feel need to be addressed. Furthermore, so many aspects of my life have been influenced by my race it would be nonsense for me to ignore it's importance. I'm not going to avoid a topic that I find interesting and think is important so I can write about spring fashions, Hannah Montana (no offense Laura), or something else that I honestly don't care about. Race and racial issues are things that are important within my life, and I think in general, and that's reflected through my written work. I don't feel that the Gargoyle is overwhelmingly filled with articles about race or racial issues, so it's not as if I'm writing about an issue that is covered constantly. As far as having opinions about other things, I don't feel it useful for me to express my opinion on college applications or whatever when everyone else already has. Also, if you haven't noticed I take a different approach every time, when I sit down to write a column or blog entry I think about something that I know I can write about and will enjoy writing about it. I'm not attempting to come off as a one-dimensional person, but I will address that which I feel is worthy of addressing. If you have a problem with it, Anonymous, you always have the simple option of clicking the little box with the x in it and reading something else.
Most of us on the Gargoyle
Most of us on the Gargoyle staff have particular interests (e.g. environmental issues, sports, chess, vidoegames, art/photography) which we often write about. The fact that Rachel often writes about race simply reflects her interest.
Why do you single that out?
The purpose of a newspaper is to inform its readers. And Rachel's articles do just that. We gain an insight into many racial issues that most of us would have otherwise overlooked.
Why black history month
Every year at about this time, we all hear about black history month, and even as a child i wondered why other cultures aren't educated about in the same respect. i still have this same question as people generally don't seem to ask the question or push the issue.
But in a recent book i am reading, although fiction, it talks about how global warming is basically a product of the media and some politicians looking to strike it big with the public.
I don't particularly agree with this opinion, i wonder whether black history month is just some media persons idea or not? and if not why aren't there such months as Indian history month(as i am Indian) or Jewish history month , or Christian history month, and such? and i don't mean to offend any Africans but why is black history month so much more heard of that other months of this kind if there are any.
In response to Arnav
I'd say that we in the US focus so much on black history as opposed to the history of any other ethnic group because our history is fraught with tensions specifically between blacks and whites. Even the many conflicts between white Americans and American Indians, and the atrocities that they engendered, don't match the the length and breadth of the history of African-Americans. The entire history of this country is defined by slavery, war over slavery, struggles for equal rights for all races, and opposition to equality. By the time the majority of Americans decided that they'd rather see equality than oppression, whites had been mistreating blacks in this country for hundreds of years. There's even a sort of racial guilt that some whites feel about all this terrible history, as if we need to make up now for the horrors of the past. I don't necessarily agree with this viewpoint, but you can't deny it's there. In the end, you just can't say that Indians, Jews, or Christians have a history in this country as long or as marred as blacks do, and that's why I feel it's reasonable to have a Black History month and not a history month for other ethnic groups.
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