Chavis' words may have closed minds

I am writing in reference to the speech Benjamin Chavis delivered March 22, in which he asserted that "Duke is a plantation, a very elaborate plantation." While such words may have been intended to attract attention to his cause and shock the University community out of its apathy in so far as campus race relations are concerned, the fact of the matter is that the slightest reflection reveals this characterization to be absurd.

As a former undergraduate and now a graduate student at the University, I am especially sensitive to the reality that there exist significant racial problems here that need to be continually addressed. I find it very troubling that so many of the lower wage workers and so few of the professors are black. It has always bothered me that blacks and whites very rarely eat lunch together on campus. I am disgusted by the fact that predominantly black employees have to clean up after spoiled, predominantly white students who think nothing about continuously trashing campus grounds without ever cleaning up after themselves.

I think it is extremely problematic that we hear repeated claims of racial discrimination and mistreatment of black employees at the Medical Center. Finally, I find it absolutely heartbreaking that my Durham little brother used to think that only whites could make it to and at a university like Duke.

Nevertheless, characterizing the University as an "elaborate plantation" because of the problems that exist is wholly excessive and downright insulting to all of the members of the campus community who are not racist and who work daily at making the University a racially more equitable and harmonious place. Additionally, referring to administrators as "plantation owners" and thus de facto slave holders is categorically disgusting.

The fact of the matter is that the University provides employment experiences to Durham residents that are superior to other opportunities available to them. After all, to my knowledge, University employees are not chained to the campus and involuntarily subject to the administration's whip. Also, despite the very real problems that exist, candles have been lit to help dispel the darkness.

Recall for example that when the student body displayed a clear preference for Wendy's to replace the Burger King in the Bryan Center, concern about the deleterious impact of such a change on University employees prevented the move. Racial problems at the University are a reflection of the deeper racial problems in American society--America has made significant progress on the road to racial justice, and so has the University. While certainly not a utopia, the University is not even close to being a plantation. Indeed the very comparison trivializes the tremendous suffering endured by countless blacks on the plantations of the Old South.

If the University is a plantation, then the South, and the rest of the country for that matter, are utterly beyond hope. And if you think America is bad, take a trip to Eastern Europe and check out race relations there.

My point is not to excuse the problems that exist here by highlighting the existence of worse problems elsewhere--my purpose is to put the problems in their proper perspective in the belief that an accurate understanding of their nature and extent will be most conducive to successfully resolving them.

Department of Economics