The group posted its plans for the "Increase Diversity Bake Sale" on Facebook.
The Republicans' posting describes five price levels for their bake sale, with pastries described as "White/Caucasian" going for $2, "Asian/American American" for $1.50, "Latino/Hispanic" for $1, "Black/African American" for 75 cents, and "Native American" for a quarter. A 25-cent discount is offered for women.That the College Republicans intended their posting and the sale itself as satire is indisputable: they've said as much. The bake sale is slated to take place at the same time as a call-in to support a California state bill, SB 185, that would allow the state's two public university systems "to consider race, ethnicity and gender in student admissions". (At present, the university systems are prohibited from considering these factors.) The bill awaits Governor Jerry Brown's signature or veto.
"If you don't come, you're a racist," the post declares.
The prices for the bake sale clearly are intended to poke fun at the idea of unequal treatment of different groups. I think they muddied the waters by using price as the distinguishing characteristic, though. Making the items for sale equivalent to ethnic or racial groups, and attaching prices to those items, evokes not only the unsettling image of selling human beings, but also raises in that already distasteful context the question of whether the prices are supposed to indicate the human beings' relative worth -- as assessed, of course, by the Berkeley College Republicans.
I'm not saying that was the BCR's intended meaning. I'm saying that it's a possible interpretation because BCR casually attached prices to common ethnic and racial designations without understanding -- likely without even considering -- the unsavory connotations of doing so.
I doubt any of the organizers thought the metaphor through, and that, perhaps, is what's most troubling about the whole exercise. BCR comes off not only as humor-impaired, but tone-deaf. It might not care: frequently those who are certain they're correct revel in broaching taboo subjects and otherwise outraging the mainstream (Chris Rock, for instance). But if you want people to keep listening to you, it helps to understand how to insinuate your point of view into the cultural conversation without driving everyone else off.
It would have been a better-fitting analogy to have announced that BCR would take race, ethnicity and gender into account when considering to whom to sell the baked goods. That's pretty much what BCR is saying the new bill would allow.
On the other hand, my suggestion wouldn't have garnered BCR anywhere near as much publicity. That, I'm sure, was a major consideration.
A BCR spokesman on KTVU's 10 O'Clock News broadcast tonight said that, contrary to the Facebook posting, all customers would be charged the same price -- but the listed prices would be as in the post, so as to preserve the group's point. (Regrettably, I couldn't find the video on KTVU's web site.)
The Associated Students of the University of California (ASUC) Senate weighed in on Sunday.
The bill that emerged from the student senators did not punish the group, or even name it, but referred to the power of a separate Judiciary Council to defund any campus group found to be discriminatory.Yeah ... you know, it's hard to condemn any tactic that is employed under the rubric of "satire". Satire, after all, isn't meant to be taken seriously.
"The ASUC," the bill reads, "condemns the use of discrimination whether it is in satire or in seriousness by any student group."
And by the way, did ASUC make a cogent response to BCR's facially valid point that SB 185 would restore unequal treatment of applicants on the basis of race, ethnicity and gender? (I can't tell because the admins of ASUC's Web site introduced a scripting error that botches a database query when searching for recent student senate bills.)
What is the compelling interest in distinguishing candidates on a basis, or bases, other than their academic performance and potential? I'm not saying there isn't a compelling interest, but nobody seems interested in explaining what it might be.
This is the main problem with all the criticism of BCR's posting and the pricing scheme at its heart. The critics are outraged and offended, but they don't tend to say why with any clarity: they simply cry "racism!" and apparently assume their reasoning is so obvious, it need not be verbalized. BCR and its supporters can easily dismiss the huffing and puffing as irreflective, knee-jerk, hypocritical liberal political correctness run amok.
And they may be right. Honestly, I look at the heart of this tempest in a teapot and think, "The pricing scheme's not funny, it smells of privileged youth that knows nothing of genuine racism -- but it's not worth wasting a whole lot of energy fighting." Like a lot of conservative-leaning humor, it falls flat with a loud thud. (I started off this post undecided as to whether BCR's price list was good satire. I guess I've decided it's not.)
The compelling interest in distinguishing between candidates on the basis of race, ethnicity, and gender, by the way, is creating "a multifactored, diverse student body", to quote SB 185. That's a worthy goal in my book, because outside college, we're balkanizing ourselves into like-minded enclaves, both physical and virtual. It's not a bad idea to bring young adults of different backgrounds together so their core unexamined beliefs can be tested against others' beliefs, and against the reality of a diverse world.
BCR's critics could learn something here, too. Instead of reflexively shouting "Hurtful!" when they see what comes off as unfunny attempts at satire, they might take a second look and ask, "Do these guys, in spite of their lame humor, have a point?" Again I say that BCR made a point that has gone unchallenged, its critics having limited themselves to branding BCR racist without explaining why. These critics should look deep inside themselves, figure out why exactly BCR's dopey publicity stunt pissed them off, and either explain their anger in some detail or recognize that their anger might have roots outside BCR's immediate action. Come to think of it, they should explain those external factors too, so we can all understand a little better why they reacted as vehemently as they did -- and maybe discover that our own unconsidered words and actions contributed to the problem.
All this thinking is a lot of work, yet without it, we get useless shouting matches like the one BCR incited.
To me, the "tell" in this silliness (which, of course has provoked exactly the response they were looking for) is that the BCR assume that white men should pay the highest prices, the implication being that other genders and ethnicities are less competitive and are only being admitted due to affirmative action.
ReplyDeleteOf course, admission numbers at most top univerisities are skewed toward Asians of both genders, who routinely outperform white students. That the BCR misses this tells me this is more about racism and less about their concern for a level playing field.
The sad thing is, I doubt a lot of BCR's members even realize racism was at the heart of this exercise in stupidity. I have the distinct feeling they haven't thought through the rationale for their stunt.
ReplyDeleteBut I find I still haven't mustered up the energy to give a damn.