BLOG: Racially charged incidents continue



Black History Month proved controversial this year.

After students from the University of California, San Diego allegedly encouraged others to mock blacks at an off-campus party, someone discovered a noose dangling from a light fixture at the campus library. Days later, Santa Cruz officials found an image of a noose on the inside of a bathroom door with the words “San Diego” and “lynch” written on either side of the picture. Then, someone discovered a KKK-style hood placed on a statue outside the UCSD library.

But these racially and ethnically charged incidents did not only occur on university campuses. Instead, the events spread to a South Los Angeles elementary school.

Three white male teachers from Wadsworth Avenue Elementary School decided to “honor” Black History Month by allegedly encouraging students to celebrate an accused murderer, a notorious drag queen and an NBA bad boy. First-, second- and fourth-grade students supposedly carried pictures of OJ Simpson, RuPaul and Dennis Rodman at a parade on the school’s playground. But children from other classes at the school displayed pictures of Nelson Mandela, Harriet Tubman and President Barack Obama, AP reported.

The teachers responsible for the incident have since been suspended. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa stepped up and expressed his “shock and outrage.” He said the teachers “undermined the school’s well-intentioned celebration at the expense of elementary school students,” Los Angeles Times reported. Los Angeles Times also noted the principal’s apology “for these errors in judgment.”

What do you think?

Do the teachers’ choices make a mockery of black history and reinforce racial stereotypes? Or is this a reminder to children that even once successful football players, singer-songwriters and basketball players are not perfect? Can the three teachers argue that, despite what some think or feel, those individuals still made history?