Emory Students Apologize for Racially Insensitive Television Broadcast
Filed in Campus Racial Incidents on January 3, 2013
Students at Emory University apologized for a segment of a parody television broadcast called the “Dooley Show.” The segment focused on the current Supreme Court case concerning the race-sensitive affirmative action admissions program at the University of Texas. In the satirical segment, viewers were asked to help identify students who “shouldn’t be here and are only at the school because of affirmative action.” The segment went on to make references to lynching, tarring and feathering, and cross burnings.
In a statement, the producers of the program wrote, “We would like to apologize for the segment that recently caused so much hurt, pain, and anger in the Emory community. The segment was poorly written and in poor taste. We were not aware of the pain the segment would cause, the wounds existing on our campus it would open, or the dialogue it would recall. We, too are members of the Emory community, and are deeply ashamed and sincerely sorry for all the pain and hurt our words have caused within it.”
Privilege — regardless of its sources — never has had to police itself. There is no evidence to suggest that it ever will. In today’s environment the dominant class operates under the beliefs that: 1) so long as one does not use the N-word publicly, then no one should take offense; 2) if I wasn’t around during slavery/Jim Crow, why do I get criticized?; and 3) if YOU were offended by X, then YOU need to get over being so sensitive.
Forget history; this isn’t about yesteryear. Do not be misled by the contemporary plaudits bestowed on a select few. Emory’s systemic practices of race-, class-, and Christian-based denigrations are alive and well.
P.S. I have not overlooked queers and other ‘others’. They just aren’t the focus of this latest outrage.