I have two Clown Awards this week. Originally I was sure I had The One, but I did come across a worthy contender. Not quite up to the championship standards presented by my original choice, but still deserving of a mention.So, a Clown Award Honorable Mention goes to the administration of the Minneapolis Community and Technical College, a two-year community college that prides itself on having one of the most diverse student populations in Minnesota.
A black female professor named Shannon Gibney at the school teaches a course called Introduction to Mass Communication in which she has a lesson on structural racism, which would certainly seem to be relevant to anyone who wants to understand and analyze the impact of modern mass communication.
Well, three of her white male students didn't like that. "Why do we have to talk about this?” demanded one, prompting another to chime in with "I don’t get this either. It’s like people are trying to say that white men are always the villains, the bad guys. Why do we have to say this?"
The three continued to argue and disrupt the class until she told them that if they were that troubled, they could file an official complaint with the school’s legal affairs department. They did and the school formally reprimanded her for, officialdom - or official dum-dum - said, creating a "hostile learning environment."
That's right - they reprimanded her for creating a "hostile learning environment" on the basis that three white male twits barely old enough to be out of short pants and with even less maturity whined about having to hear that, yeah, racism exists. That was just too brutal, too "hostile" for their delicate psyches.
Maybe they should rename the place to the Minneapolis Community and Technical Preschool and have the students - or at least some of them - take afternoon naps so they don't get all cranky. And they wouldn't even have to hire clowns for the kiddie parties, since the administration is already full of them.
Sources:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minneapolis_Community_and_Technical_College
http://www.salon.com/2013/12/02/three_white_college_students_file_racial_discrimination_complaint_against_professor_over_lesson_on_structural_racism/
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