Students looking to draw attention to a diversity training session they were leading at Binghamton University got a more attention than they ever expected after naming their program #StopWhitePeople2K16.
The title — based off a popular spoof Twitter hashtag and meme showing white people doing crazy or silly things — was meant to be ironic, but social media took it seriously and responded with a barrage of criticism about reverse racism and liberal campuses run amok
The students organizing the one-time training worked as resident advisers and were hoping to prod discussions of diversity issues their peers might encounter in their job.
The online outcry forced the university to release a statement.
“We verified that the actual program content was not ‘anti-white.’ The inclusion of the program in the educational session was not driven by any University administration initiative to advocate any specific viewpoint on diversity. About 40 to 50 RAs chose to attend the session, which ran concurrently with other sessions. Topically, the discussion in the program was far-ranging, student-driven and explored reverse racism, the relationship of communities of color with police, whiteness, crime and segregation in an open conversation format,” said Brian Rose, Binghamton’s vice president for student affairs.
To read more, go to AJC Get Schooled blog.
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