Column: The Others

The recent stereotyping by Sigma Chi fraternity undeniably indicates that the racial debate on campus has for too long been restricted to the white-black dichotomy. While the onus of marginalization has in years past largely fallen on the shoulders of African Americans (and increasingly so on Latinos), cries from the Asian community to revoke its "model minority" status have not gone unheard.

However, the myth of the model minority is not entirely false; East and South Asians form an increasingly privileged elite in this country, with disproportionate numbers in institutions of higher learning. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, there is some truth to the notion that Asian Americans are better educated and more successful than other Americans. For instance, over 26 percent of Asian Americans have at least a bachelor's degree, compared with 17 percent of Americans as a whole. They receive nearly 80 percent of government minority set-aside contracts.

To argue that Asian Americans face the same socioeconomic hurdles that blacks face in America amounts to sheer lunacy, particularly when one takes into consideration the recent work by the Harvard Civil Rights Project. The CRP's study notes that Asians are not only the most highly educated minority group, but they also attend the most integrated schools and live in the most integrated neighborhoods. For Asian Americans, then, the conflict between maintaining cultural identity and appealing to the ethics and tastes of the majority white population does not seem to run as deep as the internal struggle in the lives of black Americans.

The Sigma Chi fiasco has further reminded Duke about the complexity of race in this country. Latinos form the largest minority group in the United States today and have the potential to become the majority in the not-too-distant future. Just like in the black community, there are serious equality issues to tackle, many of which are more acute for Latinos. Among minority groups, Latino students attend the least integrated schools and have the highest high school dropout rate. While the proportion of black students in intensely segregated schools (90 to 100 percent minority) had been decreasing before the inception of white flight in the 1980s, Latino students have never experienced any decrease in segregation at all.

Yet the situation of blacks seems to be unique. Sixty-seven percent of all hate crimes in America are committed against African Americans each year. One in every three New York City black youths is either in custody or on parole. At the end of 1996, nearly 1,600 out of every 100,000 African Americans were serving at least a year in federal or state prisons; for Latinos, this figure was cut by more than half. Richard Rodriguez, the prominent Latino writer who is speaking at Duke Oct. 9, remembers in his new book, Brown: The Last Discovery of America, how his ethnicity shielded him from the wrath of his friend's mother, who "let some niggers know they weren't welcome."

I am not debating the relative suffering of American minority groups, but these figures can only suggest how African Americans bear the brunt of the racist legacy in this country, and how race should still play a prominent role in our public policymaking. While the abject poverty of many Asians, Latinos and Caucasians is troubling, there is something distinctive about African Americans simply because they are black. Conservatives attempt to argue that the black community is disposed to lack of education and criminal activity, and that blacks should aspire to the values set by rags-to-riches Asians who have achieved the American dream.

But the more plausible reason for the current situation is slavery's enduring grip on the black psyche, one in which assimilating into the majority culture often amounts to self-destruction. Asians, and to a lesser extent Latinos, can escape this reality because their migration to the United States was one of choice and not of forced removal. Even if they come to this country poor (which many Asian families indeed do not), they come with the empowering knowledge that they have left their roots behind for a reason. Besides Native Americans, who are still exoticized as foreigners, blacks are then the only minority group that has effectively lost their immigrant status, and their situation is accordingly met as if they were on an equal playing field with other true-blooded Americans.

The big question on students' minds now is how the campus should proceed after "Viva Mexico." As a native South Carolinian privy to many a Ku Klux Klan rally, I believe in each individual's right to free speech, even when that individual or group may be spouting racist propaganda. An apology has been issued by Sigma Chi's leadership, but Mi Gente and other cultural and minority groups on campus desire more action to be taken. It is not clear to me that punishing Sigma Chi for its racism is the proper next step; nor is it clear to me that Sigma Chi's overt stupidity should warrant a wave of Latino faculty hires or a renewed interest in Latino studies.