When I arrived at UW-Madison, I thought I would find the liberal utopia so many people claimed it to be. I really didn't consider the sources of these claims. I just took them as truth. However, this concept is a myth for students of color.
By the time I got to UW-Madison, I was tired of being white people's \educator,"" being asked stupid questions like ""Can I touch your hair?"" and ""Do you tan?"" Going to primarily white schools all my life, I was often their first contact with a person of color.
Knowing that, I convinced myself that it was my duty to paint a good picture of minorities, especially black women. I made sure I was their class president, their student council president and their forensics president. I was the keynote speaker at graduation and high school open houses.
I was in a position of authority when I knew many of them didn't want me to be and I made sure they knew that all their student benefits were the result of a black girl's work and leadership. But I know now that it wasn't my duty. My duty was just to go to school and be a good student.
So when I got to UW-Madison, I was tired. I had done my part as ""educator"" and I thought that being on a campus of intellectuals, that need would be nonexistent. But racial and ethnic education here, at least socially, is a lie. Liberalism is a fa??ade, a clich??d cover-up many UW-Madison students use to hide their ignorance.
Having one minority in a class of 300 does not make this campus liberal. Seeing an interracial couple walk down State Street without getting hassled doesn't either. Even having the token black, Latino or Asian friend does not make students any more liberal.
How can anyone think UW-Madison is liberal or inclusive when constant attacks (in the form of supposed free speech and policy opposition) have ingrained fight-or-flight reflexes in its minority students?
Students should be students. However, it seems the role of the minority student is not to be a student at all but to teach multicultural social skills. We have to plan meetings to address inadequate minority recruitment. We have to organize rallies to combat racist propaganda that has somehow found its way into the campus newspaper that, believe it or not, we read as well. We have to look out for ourselves because, on a campus as ""liberal"" as this one, no one else will.
The need to infuse multiculturalism into our campus climate is real. And, although unfair and exhausting, we do it because it needs to be done. We do it because liberals aren't as liberal as they think. However, promoting multicultural awareness is not the job of minority students. It is the job of administrators and instructors.
It saddens me to think that I came here to get prepared for the ""real world,"" but still I feel like I am preparing everybody else. But what angers me is that every single student of color on this campus is plagued with the same chore because our ""liberal"" school is failing us.
