Solely Because of Their Race

The Civil Rights movement may have taken place four decades ago, but apparently some of us still have catching up to do.

CNN: Students Attend First Integrated Prom

Yes, you read that correctly. The students of Ashburn, Georgia were still holding segregated proms right up through 2006.

But don't worry, it's not as bad as it sounds! Mindy Bryan, a student who attended a segregated prom back in 2001, had this to say:

"There was not anybody that I can remember that was black," she said. "The white people have theirs, and the black people have theirs. It's nothing racial at all."

Nothing racial at all. Yes. The segregation of black people from white people was nothing racial at all. That's the dumbest goddamned thing I've ever heard in my life.

Apparently, though, Mindy isn't the only Rhodes Scholar in the bunch. Nichole Royal, who attended a white prom and commented that black students could have attended too but didn't, said: "I guess they feel like they're not welcome."

Now there's a startling sociological inference: black people might not feel welcome attending a prom for white people!

I think it's appropriate to end this heated post with a dispassionate analysis from Earl Warren's opinion in Brown v. Board of Education in 1954. Note that this was written 53 years ago. We should be past this.

To separate [black children] from others of similar age and qualifications solely because of their race generates a feeling of inferiority as to their status in the community that may affect their hearts and minds in a way unlikely ever to be undone.