I’m not racist. Really, I’m not.
But seriously, at the end of last semester the Breezeway really did look like a Mexican flea market. I then got to thinking about the hate mail I received from various organizations when I called the Breezeway a Mexican flea market last time, and realized, “Hey, there’s no American student organization!” How come? We have organizations for just about every minority: Cubans, Asians, Blacks, Mexicans, Puerto Ricans, Japanese, Assyrian, Babylonians, Gays, Squirrels, etc. If this is the case, why has an American student association or white student organization not been created?
I know a lot of you are going to raise your arms in bloody fury and say, “Who does he think he is?” I’ll accept that, but at the same time I understand that the second someone talks about race, everyone stops thinking. Let’s run through this thought process.
Would it not be a double standard to allow every “minority” to have their own association or club, yet not allow the “majority” to have one as well? I put that in quotes because purely American students just may very well be a minority on this campus. I then ask: What about making such a club is racist? I’d understand if the club were created with the purpose to propagate some form of racist beliefs of superiority, which by all means should never be tolerated. (And the administration would never allow that.) Just like every organization, it would be an amalgamation of students from around the country with similar interests, hobbies and backgrounds.
Whenever I’ve hypothetically asked this question, people immediately think it’s a racist idea. Yet, I am disappointed they really are not sure why that is the case. Perhaps social conditioning, or the media or even history itself has made us believe that a group of white or American people equals racist behavior.
A group like this would be beneficial, sparking unity in this melting pot that we call the “U,” because like many of the other organizations, they would have mixers and events where several clubs work together. What a great thing that would be to expose everyone to the different cultures and traditions of the other clubs through that club. The result would be a greater understanding of the people we sit with in class.
So, before you go and send your mob with pitch forks and tomatoes at me for proposing such an organization, consider the benefits. In the end, it would inspire unity and help squelch racism on campus, which could trickle down through our community and, when all is said and done, the world.
Jovanni Bello is a senior majoring in computer information systems and creative writing. He can be contacted at j.bello2@umiami.edu.