This Week’s Campus Question:
Why are student groups so segregated between each other? What
can we do to combine our groups and better interact with each
other?
Ronnie Aguilar Third-year Mathematics
This Week’s Response:
By Justin Kahrl
The standard explanation for on-campus segregation is laziness
or apathy. Potential reformers hope that by lecturing on diversity
or by creating a standard diversity GE requirement, lazy or
apathetic students will be encouraged to overcome their own latent
segregation. I do not wish to question the logic of this tact or
argument.
However, as a white male who has made an effort to join several
on-campus clubs which represent minority groups, I would also like
to say that the ethnic clubs, while talking a great deal about
diversity, actually do very little to reach out to non-ethnic
students. Both in the way they recruit as well as the events they
choose to sponsor. Ethnic clubs do almost nothing to encourage
actual diversity of participation.
Last year, I attempted to join the Vietnamese Student Union, the
Indian Student Union, the Latin American Student Association and
the United Arab Society. I visited their tables on Bruin Walk; I
talked with those running them and then signed up to receive
e-mails. Of those groups, only the UAS ever contacted me. I cannot
say whether the other groups could not read my handwriting or if
they crossed my name off the list.
The bottom line is, only one of four groups actually wanted me
to participate in their club. Why? Perhaps because I’m not of
their ethnicity. In the recruiting phase, ethnic clubs specifically
target their own ethnicity. In so doing, they segregate themselves,
which is arguably OK. But then they create additional barriers
against their supposed goal, informing the broader campus about a
specific culture, by not only failing to pursue members of other
ethnicities but also specifically excluding them.
During last year’s elections, Student Empowerment
supporters never handed me a flyer. I eventually walked up to a
woman to ask for one and she seemed very reluctant. I then asked
when the African Student Union met and if I could come. She allowed
that it was possible but she never told me where or when I should
arrive. Perhaps I should have pushed but the point is that normally
a club should be dying for additional members, anyone enthusiastic
to join. I have not found this to be the case.
Next comes the phase in which clubs put on events to inform the
campus about their culture. Again, the ethnic clubs fail miserably
in attracting students who are not of their ethnicity. In this
case, I was invited through a class to an ASU meeting regarding
Black Nationalism.
This was the only contact I have had with that organization, as
I have never seen them advertise on campus specifically for ASU
events. But why would I want to go to such an event? I was in an
African-American Politics class at the time. I know what Black
Nationalism is and, quite frankly, I don’t agree with it.
Consider the opposite: suppose a white person were to invite a
black person to a white separatist meeting. Why on earth would that
black person wish to attend an event that is geared toward one
ethnicity and specifically sneers at another?
I’ve gone to a few Jewish events as well. I’ll be
having a nice conversation when my new acquaintance discovers
I’m not Jewish. They then ask me, “What are you doing
here then?” and then tell me, “It was nice to meet
you.” My experience with the Jewish community has varied. At
times, Hillel leaders seem very happy to have me join in their
events. At other times, they ignore me because I’m not
Jewish. The pattern seems to be that individuals that I know in
other contexts make me feel welcome, but the group as a whole is
very reluctant to have me participate.
I am not saying that the clubs are to blame. No doubt their
skepticism is based on years of student apathy. But that
doesn’t make it right. They should be overjoyed to find
someone interested in exploring their culture.
The system should be open to the individuals that make an
effort, to the best of us. Unfortunately, it is not. I have friends
of every race I can conceive of, but it is not because of the
efforts of on-campus clubs. It is in spite of them. I have these
friendships at a personal level outside of the racial context.
Perhaps that’s how it should be. But I still feel UCLA can do
more for students who don’t make the effort.
In this context, we should consider a plan that places
incentives for clubs to expand their activities to members outside
of one ethnicity. Funding for student groups should be prorated
based on how diverse the membership is. In this way, we can
encourage on-campus student groups to reach out to those outside of
their own ethnicity.
We want a commitment to diversity, not just as individuals like
myself but as a university. That can only occur if we stop staging
rallies on behalf of the concept of diversity and start holding
events targeted at the practice of diversity.
By J. Daniel Williams
How can we combine groups? How can we exhibit some solidarity?
How can we de-fragment a little bit?
Complex question with a simple answer. I asked myself: first of
all, what is the common thread that keeps all these specialized
organizations separated? What is it about the people in these
groups that stimulates this Balkanization, for lack of a better
word?
I will tell you what it is.
A lack of common purpose and a dearth of solidarity. Almost all
of these groups exist for their own good ““ most of them have
no purpose but to perpetuate their own existence. This child-like
lack of larger purpose is the expected result of the insipid
subjectivist liberal culture that characterizes most college
campuses on the West Coast.
It has become vogue to become the victim of a repressive
America. I call it the liberal fantasy. Every single person who
makes a claim of oppression or victimhood is to be assured that,
yes, their angst is real and it is not their fault.
The newest, most stylish claim to victimhood is heterosexism.
Bet your life that a whole slew of new little organizations will
pop up to combat the onslaught of oppressive heterosexist
presumption. But there is no heterosexism. Some people out there
just want to be approved by everyone.
The alternative to victimhood organizations are organizations
that recognize the potential dignity of a person and his ability to
take responsibility for his own actions.
Liberalist causes perpetuate the exact opposite; to them, even
something as petty as a value judgment is construed as a threat to
liberty. If I don’t like the things you do and speak out
about how wrong you are and how destructive your lifestyle is, I am
considered an enemy of liberty ““ even if I am completely and
absolutely right.
In the same way, UCLA’s many different groups get high on
their own sense of entitlement and form groups that, instead of
engendering “diversity,” actually accentuate the lines
that divide us.
Perhaps if America comes to the realization that every
individual has the god-given right of personal choice, they would
recognize the superfluity of many organizations that exist just for
their own good. The United States Constitution maintains the
assumption that we all have the right to do as we please. Just not
at the expense of others. And not at the expense of the whole.
So what is the answer to UCLA’s Balkanization?
Rejecting the liberal fantasy in the recognition of each
person’s power to steer his own life. Then, the need to
organize into a thousand self-concerned groups that try to justify
anything and everything will fizzle.
Williams is a first-year civil engineering student.
Next Week’s Campus Question:
How does the UCLA community feel about the design of the current
UCLA bus schedule? Is it adequate and on time, or are buses
overcrowded and uncomfortable?
Sherman Dorsey UCLA bus operator
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