Panelist James Fowler, director of the Ethics Center, wondered if D'Souza was hoping to serve a purpose similar to that of the fabled unicorn, who inflicts a stab wound, but it is a wound that heals. "I finally decided that he was no unicorn," Fowler told an audience of about 60 faculty, staff and students, "because his words really wounded and caused a lot of pain for many members of this community."
D'Souza does not take seriously enough the shame resulting from forced minority status, Fowler said. "People are made to feel a subtle sense of shame about any differences they have," he said. "That cuts very deeply, and it's part of wound that doesn't really heal. Mr. D'Souza cannot relate to what it's like being the descendants of an enslaved people."
Fowler also noted what could have been unconscious racism in D'Souza's address. In describing the initial process of African American families working their way into the American middle class,
D'Souza used the word "metastasized" to describe that process. Because the word is normally used to described the process by which a malignant cancer attaches itself to the body and thereby begins to spread, Fowler said he could not help but wonder if D'Souza's use of the word revealed a racist attitude.
Panelist Jonathan Butler of the Black Student Alliance criticized D'Souza's failure to acknowledge the role of economics and capitalism in the perpetuation of racism. Citing an extreme disparity between the wealthy and the American under class, Butler said that, "Capitalism inherently leads to racism." He said that while overt racism on the order of Adolf Hitler's Germany is no longer common, "institutional and covert racism still exist." Butler disagreed with D'Souza's assertion that government should play little if any part in addressing racial issues, because "race plays too big a role in society."
Panelist Pat Marsteller, a biology faculty member who chairs the President's Commission on the Status of Minorities, said that while she believes D'Souza was honestly trying to examine difficult problems in American society, she also believes that "his arguments are full of holes. He says that racism is an opinion that recognizes differences and attributes those differences to biology. But I believe that racism is a hell of a lot more than that. It is discriminatory acts. The playing field looks more like a mine field to me. It's not equal out there [for members of minority groups], from the very beginning of life."
Marsteller also characterized D'Souza's definition of academic merit purely on the grounds of test scores and grade point average as being far too narrow. "I think merit means a lot more," she said. "It means giving back to your community, helping a system to change, helping others to achieve. Test scores don't measure any of that." She said standardized test scores have only a 16 percent success rate in predicting first-year college success.
Paul Courtright, chair of the religion department, said that race is very difficult to talk about and evokes feelings of humiliation, distrust, rage and the pain of alienation. "This is a wound that every American shares with every other American," he said. "It is a wound borne by all of us. It is important to carry that sensitivity into any examination of Mr. D'Souza's arguments. Growing up in India gives him a different perspective than if he had grown up here. But it seems to me that if he were going to write a book about race, he would have gone and lived among the people who have been negatively impacted by the problems he explores. If he had done that, he might have written a very different book."
Courtright also wondered why D'Souza's latest book, The End of Racism: Principles for a Multiracial Society, did not do much in the way of celebrating the elimination of the visible barriers to racial equality, the barriers that were eliminated by changes in the law. "Instead he focuses on what he sees as the irony of the liberal vision of ending racism actually perpetuating discrimination," Courtright said. "He blames liberals, minorities, the government and universities. The only people he doesn't blame are white conservatives, who are largely funding his work."
Student panelist Jeff Fredericks, president of the College Republicans, who co-sponsored D'Souza's appearance, was more sympathetic to D'Souza's views. Using an analogy from the card game poker, Fredericks explained that everyone is dealt a different hand in life, and "some hands are better than others." The true test of excellence, Fredericks said, is the degree to which one strives to overcome the deficiencies of the hand he or she is dealt.
Following the panelists' five-minute addresses, a number of audience members took turns expressing strenuous disagreement and frustration, not only with D'Souza's address, but also with Fredericks poker analogy. Overcoming the deficiencies of the hand one is dealt in life, they said, is an erroneous method of measurement, because the color of one's skin predetermines the majority of the content of one's hand.
Despite the strong disagreement the majority of the audience and panelists had with D'Souza's philosophy, at least one audience member called for understanding. "We should recognize Mr. D'Souza as a victim," said College student Kofi Johnson. "He has traded in his identity as a person of color to be a spokesperson for the dominant power structure."
--Dan Treadaway