Requirement vital for just society

As Academic Affairs commissioner, I made a promise to the
undergraduate student body to implement a diversity requirement at
UCLA. Though the diversity requirement was first proposed in the
mid-1980s, the reasons put forth then still stand. In fact, they
are even more relevant today.

The historic assemblage of students who have contributed to this
17-year struggle have not acted in a vacuum, but with an awareness
of the increasing conservatism that has defined the national, state
and campus stances on diversity in education. This continuing
paradigm shift has moved the political point of reference so far to
the right that ideas and policies once seen as just-left-of-center
are now being viewed as overly progressive and even radical.

The so-called objectivity and neutrality of the educational
system, which is embedded in this type of political environment,
must be called into question because education is never a
politically neutral practice.

The university’s commitment to diversity in all areas is
being challenged. This longstanding principle and priority is in
jeopardy. Instead of taking a defensive position against
conservative attacks, we need to know our history, understand how
it affects our campus today, and stand by our own principles.
Proactive steps are necessary to move us forward toward a more
socially just and equitable society.

Even if we don’t understand how oppression has been
increasingly institutionalized, we need to be aware that overt
racism, sexism, homophobia and religious persecution are not things
of the past.

We need to know that in 2002, Eddie Araujo, a transgender youth
living in Newark was found in a shallow grave. One man has since
pled guilty to voluntary manslaughter in the case, and three more
face murder charges.

We need to know that the Ku Klux Klan and other white
supremacist groups came out to protest the Immigrant Workers
Freedom Ride at several of their stops throughout the country this
past year.

We need to know that, according to San Francisco Chronicle
reports, a series of incidents have taken place at the Claremont
Colleges within the last six months including anti-gay graffiti, a
cross burning, and the writing of racist, sexist and anti-Semitic
epithets.

We need to know that just a year ago at the UCLA Medical Center
hospital, the contents of a container labeled as pork blood were
poured on prayer mats.

We need to know that this year, MEChA de UCLA, one of
UCLA’s most prominent and respected student advocacy
organizations, is being compared to the Nazis by the Bruin
Republicans. We need to know that a picture on the office door of
Undergraduate Students Association Council Facilities Commissioner
Tutram Nguyen was vandalized during winter quarter; three swastikas
were drawn and the F-word was written before the word
“Vietnamese.”

These are events that have taken place in the very recent past.
We need to ask ourselves, why are these types of hate crimes and
incidents still occurring on our campus and in our society?

If we are truly working toward a society that is
color/gender/religion/sexual orientation blind, we need to achieve
a socially just society first. We need to recognize that people are
treated differently based on who they are on an interpersonal and
institutional level.

For the past few decades, the term “diversity” has
been watered down. It has come to refer to the interpersonal
differences between people in a melting pot society, where everyone
is afforded the same rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of
happiness. Diversity education, in this light, works to develop a
minimal level of awareness and “tolerance” of these
differences, without challenging students to understand how and why
people are treated better or worse because of their
differences.

Education is never a politically neutral practice. Both students
and faculty need to decide for themselves whether they are going to
advocate an educational system that supports the current structure,
or one that deconstructs and provides more equitable and just
alternatives.

The type of diversity education that can truly deconstruct the
incidence of hate crimes cannot be divorced from the institutions
we live, learn and work in ““ the institutions that work to
maintain and reproduce a system that privileges some and oppresses
others on the basis of race, ethnicity, gender, religion, sexual
orientation, class, etc.

Teaching diversity must be considered an essential part of any
education. The diversity requirement exemplifies the kind of
proactive steps we can take to ensure we are doing our part in
creating an excellent and equitable educational system. We cannot
stand back and watch any longer.

USAC supports the Academic Senate’s effort to implement a
diversity requirement and urges them to act swiftly in approving
the piece of legislation for a diversity requirement that is
currently on the table by the last Legislative Assembly meeting in
June 2004. This would lead to the implementation of a campus-wide
diversity requirement as early as next school year.

We also urge the faculty to support the implementation of a
diversity requirement that is meaningful in both form and content.
The courses that are chosen to fulfill the requirement need to be
rigorous and comprehensive. Not only does diversity need to be the
central focus of the course, but diversity needs to be understood
in terms of the inter-group relations and institutional dynamics
between dominant and non-dominant groups in our society.

Finally, I personally encourage all of us, as students, to
deconstruct the forms and content of knowledge we learn. The
measure of academic success for any student should be whether or
not we have learned to think critically ““ not only about the
books we are given, but about from where those books come, who
writes them, from which perspective, and to what ends.

Kozak is the Academic Affairs commissioner.