My letter to the president of Virginia Tech

The Honorable Timothy Sands
Office of the President
Virginia Tech

Dear Dr. Sands:

According to Campus Reform, an instructor in the Department of Human Development and Family Science apologized to students of color for her whiteness.

Prof. Crystal Duncan Lane said that although she did not ask for the many privileges she has enjoyed from being born white, she has nevertheless benefitted from them and “will continue to benefit from them whether I like it or not. This is injustice.”

Lane vowed to work on a “daily basis to be antiracist,” and to confront the “innate racism” within herself, citing the “reality and history” of white people in America.

“I want to be better: Every day,” she wrote. “I will transform: Every day. This work terrifies me: Every day. I invite my white students to join me on this journey. And to my students of color: I apologize for the inexcusable horrors within our shared history.”

Maybe I’m wrong, President Sands, but Prof. Lane appears to be suffering from the privilege of being a well-paid university instructor, but not enough to resign and demand that her position be given to a person of color.

As Stokely Carmichael observed, what white liberals want is to bring about change that in no way endangers their own position.

Respectfully,

John Eidson
BSEE 1968, Georgia Tech

In the interest of academic balance, the Department of Human Development and Family Science is free to incorporate my article below in its instruction.

©John Edison. All rights reserved.

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