'Whiteout' a washout

Bastard Hat
    By David Auerbach

When I heard about "Whiteout," a demonstration protesting the demise of affirmative action, my first reaction was, "What were they thinking?" I oppose Proposition 209 and its unpassed federal twin, HR3330, and I don't think that "Whiteout" was racist--but the tactics of the Student Coalition for Diversity (SCD) were rather provocative. Shilpi Mehta, MC '99, and Lee Wang, BK '00, two of the event's organizers, were gracious enough to discuss the purposes and messages behind "Whiteout." Both said, "Our main point was to raise awareness." Let's see how well they did.

Both Mehta and Wang insisted that the meaning was not an anti-white statement. Among other things, it was supposed to mean (1) "students of color are being whited-out at universities," according to Wang, and (2) "diversity is being whited-out," according to Mehta. Despite press to the contrary, SCD was fully cognizant of the name's racial implications, and its potential effects on people. "We did predict that some people would perceive it as being some kind of anti-white thing. I'm surprised by the number of people who have reacted that way," Wang said. "There are a lot of people on this campus that feel threatened by the inclusion of historically excluded groups. Lots of people are incredibly insecure about their position at this University."

Wang was not surprised by the accusations of "reverse racism," and in a letter to the Yale Daily News (YDN) explained that "Whiteout" "attempts to confront that form of whiteness that is posited as a universalism dependent on the exclusion of difference." Wang explained the elliptical term of "whiteness" as follows: "Whiteness is symbolic of many systems of domination. I think that we're all sort of perpetrators of whiteness.... The point of using that term was to catch people's attention."

That much they did, and their expectations were, unsurprisingly, well met. Greg Gilbert, BR '99, writing to the YDN, said that the face-value of the term "Whiteout" was "Get the white out of Yale," and gave another version of the tired and slightly flawed argument that "any group demonstrating against affirmative action would never even consider calling their movement `blackout.'" Most intriguingly, YDN columnist Nick Madden, PC '98, attacked a "racial double standard" without knowing the main purpose of the rally. Madden thought that supporting affirmative action outside California was a "moot point," whereas House bill HR3330 is attempting to do for all public universities what Proposition 209 did for California.

You can fault Madden for not doing his research, but his attention to the symbols rather than the message was not atypical. SCD advertised its rally with a "very complex symbol" that it knew was potentially misleading and at the very least ambiguous. They knew it would provoke, and it did, but the reactions tended more towards outrage than support, and the press has been almost universally negative. Wang doesn't altogether mind this. "It would have been far, far worse if nothing had happened at all," she said. Wang also spoke of "the danger in silence and complacency."

The ignorance shown by Madden and others regarding the actual issues indicates that the chief raison d'être of "White-out"--HR3330--shriveled under the glare of SCD's shock tactics and obfuscatory slogans. I'd say the face painting and event title did not bring anyone to the rally who would not have gone without them; it also actively put off many people, who may still support affirmative action and may still do something about it, but will dismiss SCD and related events as anti-white extremism. And they won't listen to SCD, which hurts both awareness and dialogue, two explicit goals of SCD. If SCD knew that these reactions would occur, why did it provoke them? Wang hopes "that people will ask themselves why they feel so defensive about ["Whiteout"].... People aren't rising to that challenge."

Fair enough. If people are made uncomfortable by something, they should question it. But those offended by "Whiteout" did not feel defensive; they felt insulted. They did not feel that they were being confronted with their "whiteness," they felt they were being confronted for being white. Regardless of intent, SCD knew that this would happen. Mehta and Wang object to the complacency and superficial commitments of Yalies, and they're probably justified in doing so, but it's bad faith to argue that students aren't considering your issues respectfully after knowingly antagonizing them. Calling your opponents insecure and defensive is at least off-putting, and at most condescending. SCD picked a fight for greater effect, but expected its opponents to respond with Socratic self-examination. They didn't; rather, they entrenched themselves more deeply in what they already believed and shut out SCD. As a result, students do not know more about anti-affirmative action bills, but only about belligerent guerilla tactics. People are talking, but not about HR3330, and not about whiteness.

There is an arrogance at work here. SCD believed that outright provocation was necessary to catch most people's attention. Again, they're probably right, but you can't let people know that you think so little of them. There is no room for discussion once you tell your opponents that you think they're threatened by you. And if for these reasons, students did not challenge themselves to consider the questions SCD was trying to ask and become more aware, that is the fault of SCD's campaign and not of the students, because that was the campaign's stated goal. But Wang was certainly right on the apathy part. When asked for her reaction to "Whiteout," one person said, "Am I supposed to have one?"

Recent Herald Columns by this Columnist:
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• The legacy of Julian Jaynes, 3/27/97
• Cassavetes' legacy--or lack thereof, 2/27/98
• Today's publishers prefer pulp over prose, 2/13/97

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