WOE TO YOU IF YOU ARE OF THE WRONG RACE

Are Some Races More Equal Than Others?

By Abigail Thernstrom and Tim Fay, The American, March 12, 2010

How will the Obama administration respond to a formal complaint in the wake of serious black-on-Asian violence at South Philadelphia High School?

Secretary of Education Arne Duncan has just announced a new push to enforce civil rights laws to combat discrimination in our schools. In the last decade, he said, his department’s Office for Civil Rights “has not been as vigilant as it should have been . . . But that is about to change.” His remarks were made March 8 in a speech at the Edmund Pettus Bridge commemorating the 45th anniversary of the civil rights march on Selma, Alabama, that came to be known as “Bloody Sunday.”

The Department of Justice (DOJ) is also eager to break with the allegedly lax civil rights policies of the Bush administration. Tom Perez, assistant attorney general for civil rights, has appointed a new education section chief, Anurima Bhargava, who comes to the department directly from the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund (LDF), where she had been director of education practice since 2006. "I am excited she will be joining us as we continue our efforts to restore and transform the civil rights division," Perez declared.

Duncan wants to eliminate racial disparities in education in general, including in student discipline in particular. Undoubtedly, Perez does as well. But what will they do in response to a formal complaint filed by the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund (AALDEF) in the wake of serious black-on-Asian violence at South Philadelphia High School (SPHS)? AALDEF has charged that the district acted with "deliberate indifference" to the harassment of Asian students and with "intentional disregard" of their welfare.

Interethnic tension is generally ignored in the media, as is the level of violence and disorder in an appalling number of urban schools.

Will the Obama administration act aggressively to ensure Asian rights to a public education free of intimidation and actual violence—surely a basic civil right? Or will such action be taken only when blacks are the victims rather than the perpetrators? If the administration acts in the interest of the Asians, black students will be singled out as racially hostile troublemakers—a conclusion that neither the Department of Education nor the DOJ will welcome, if Duncan’s announcement means what it says. ...

Evidently, it is beyond imagination that disparities in school discipline reflect disparities in the conduct that merits discipline. Why is it that Asian-American students are only half as likely as whites to be suspended or expelled from school? Does this reveal the powerful anti-white biases of our largely white teaching force today? And does it reveal anti-black hostility on the part of black administrators and teachers when they discipline disproportionately high numbers of black students?

As far as we can tell at present, the Obama’s administration’s perspective is that of the LDF. That is, the big problem with school discipline is not the failure to impose it. Rather, it is the racial disparities that appear when data on disciplined students are collected. It is very hard to make schools like SPHS safe for all those who attend it—especially when those in charge seem unprepared to stop problems before they start by insisting on a culture of civility, which the best schools do. But the difficulty of creating a school in which students feel safe and are actually learning is certainly made much harder if administrators must worry about getting the numbers right—making sure blacks are not overrepresented and Asians underrepresented when disciplined students are counted for federal reporting purposes. Obama administration officials may have their hearts in the right place—worrying about the number of blacks who are floundering in school—but their heads are badly askew. 

Abigail Thernstrom is an adjunct scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and the vice chair of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. Her most recent book is Voting Rights—and Wrongs: The Elusive Quest for Racially Fair Elections. Tim Fay is the special assistant to the vice chair of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights.

Read the full article: http://www.american.com/archive/2010/march/are-some-races-more-equal-than-others/