On Saturday, March 7th, a bus full of University of Oklahoma SAE fraternity members chanted disgusting racism. Someone filmed a 20-second clip of it on their phone. The following day, the video appeared on the Internet, and quickly became viral, worldwide. On Monday, the school severed all ties to the frat.
On Tuesday, two of the students from the video were expelled. Even though the school’s administration acted swiftly and harshly, there were multiple protests & marches. The school’s football and basketball teams and coaches gave the actions even more attention. None of the outrage displayed could stop a highly-recruited football player from decommitting from Oklahoma. Many are saying this requires a “national dialogue,” so we certainly haven’t heard the end of this story.
Nearly a month earlier — and halfway across the country — a UCLA student was applying for a position on the student council’s judicial board when she was asked this question:
“Given that you are a Jewish student and very active in the Jewish community, how do you see yourself being able to maintain an unbiased view?”
On February 19th, The College Fix covered the story. While not MSM-level attention, it was good that the story was being reported.
On March 5th, a full 23 days later, The New York Times got around to covering this story.
Imagine: “Given that you are a black student…” or “Given that you are a gay student…” or “Give that you are a Muslim student…”
The backlash would be as immediate and severe as what happened at the University of Oklahoma, possibly even harsher. This was not leaked hidden video of drunken frat boys chanting racist slogans on a bus somewhere. This was the UCLA student council, conducting an official meeting on-campus.
Thankfully, sanity prevailed, the student was unanimously approved, people were criticized, and apologies were made. But there were no protests on the quad. Dozens of UCLA students didn’t march with duct tape over their mouths. No Bruin player on any sport held hands with a coach to express displeasure.
Originally posted at Ricochet.com