Editor’s Note: The author of this letter, Ishmael Bishop, is also a columnist for The Daily Tar Heel.
TO THE EDITOR:
In response to David Wynne’s letter, let it be clear that discussing the First Amendment and demanding what The Daily Tar Heel should do is a distraction.
Conflating these examples with how Vietnam dissenters were censored, silenced or imprisoned is not only an inappropriate, misinformed parallel, but also a distraction.
White people who defend the actions of these boys in a roundabout way of defending the first amendment are unapologetically reiterating that this country can be racist and supportive of white supremacy and not be held responsible.
It must be strange to hold white people responsible for their actions. Let’s not forget about the many instances of Black folk, men, women and children who have been killed, imprisoned or brutalized without receiving their due process or retribution.
To make this more relevant, let’s not forget about how a young man with a valid ID was brutalized by Alcohol and Beverage Control agents on the University of Virginia’s campus.
Letters, like Wynne’s comments made by the Carolina Review, and the chant by the now disbanded chapter of Sigma Alpha Epsilon are indicative of a much larger and endemic type of racism in this country, one that disregards and invalidates the feelings of people of color and “legally” upholds racist acts.
It’s not enough to simply condemn what happened or what was said; you must also take action. It’s less a matter of how can we justify their whiteness and more a matter of how can we can inform whiteness.
