August 2005, when Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, neo-diversity anxiety led to a social tragedy.  I am not talking about what happened at the New Orleans Superdome.  I am talking about what happened to a New Orleans family of longstanding; the Zeitoun family.

    I fell in love with that family reading Dave Eggers nonfiction book, Zeitoun.  If I could find a woman like Kathy, the wife of Abdulrahman Zeitoun (Zay-toon), I would find some way to sweep her off her feet and make her mine.  If I could have as a friend a man of integrity and moral strength like Abdulrahman, husband of Kathy, I would work very hard to keep that friendship strong. If I could spend time with this family, I would do so every chance I got.

    The Zeitoun family’s story is part of the tragedy of our nation’s gross mishandling of Katrina.  But the brilliant move by the writer is to not rail in anger against the obvious; about the stupidity of what we allowed to happen.  Instead, with a stroke of writing genius, Dave Eggers gives us the story of the relationship between Abdulrahman and Kathy and how our mishandling of Katrina entered and almost destroyed their life together.

    That should explain how I fell in love with this family. Learning about their backgrounds, their struggles, their finding each other; she a native of Baton Rouge, a white Southern Christian convert to Islam, he born to Islam in his native Syria. In New Orleans they together have a well-respected, thriving building and construction business.  Hurricane Katrina is coming.  Kathy takes the children to Baton Rouge; Zeitoun stays in New Orleans to watch over their house and the other homes and buildings they own.

    After the storm passed and the levees broke, using his second-hand canoe, Zeitoun spends time going around to check on their various properties; he also helps rescue people and brings food to dogs trapped in houses.  Zeitoun sees and hears that much is out of sync in the city, so he is careful.  Kathy, now in Arizona with friends, is very worried and keeps trying to convince him to leave the city.  He tells her he is safe and feels like he has a purpose for being in the city at this time. Then one day, standing in one of his properties with three male acquaintances, he and those acquaintances are arrested by men who cannot be identified as belonging to any particular policing agency.

    Arrested, not read his rights, not allowed to make one phone call, forced to live for a time in a make-shift prison in the bus station, eventually moved to a real prison. Two weeks Zeitoun is unable to speak with his now frantic family. Given all the bad news and rumors coming out of New Orleans, Kathy begins to believe he is dead. Meanwhile, Zeitoun is being called a terrorist.  “You’re Taliban,” a guard sneers at him.

    That was the neo-diversity anxiety driving all that happened, from the arrest onward. Being Muslim had now become wrapped up with the military takeover of New Orleans after Katrina.  After going through what no American would ever expect to go through, Zeitoun and Kathy learned some things about the psychology of the arresting officer and the officer who took Zeitoun to the bus station prison.  Both said the same thing.  Despite the evidence that Zeitoun showed them of his identity and business, they ignored that evidence and to themselves said, “…these guys are up to no good…” “…they’re up to something.”  Where was this feeling coming from?  To the reader it becomes obvious that it came from the fact that Zeitoun and one of his companions was Muslim.  That was it… in the midst of the chaos, with the policing force scared and filled with anxiety, these Muslim guys… they had to be up to something.

    Zeitoun got out and is back to work, but it’s still not all straightened out.  Much was loss; buildings, homes, Kathy’s health and trust in government.  In her thoughts, she said:

    “…knowing that Zeitoun’s ordeal was caused… by systemic ignorance and malfunction—and perhaps long-festering paranoia on the part of the National Guard and whatever other agencies were involved—was unsettling.  It said, quite clearly, that this wasn’t a case of a bad apple or two in the barrel.  The barrel itself was rotten.”

     Yet in the face of his own ordeal, Zeitoun himself has faith.  His thoughts reflect that faith:

    “It was a test, Zeitoun thinks.  Who among us could deny that we were tested?  But now look at us, he says. Every person is stronger now. Every person who was forgotten by God or country is now louder, more defiant, and more determined. They existed before, and they exist again in the city of New Orleans and the United States of America.  And Abdulrahman Zeitoun existed before, and existed again, in the city of New Orleans and the United States of America.  He can only have faith that [he] will never again be forgotten, denied, called by a name other than his own.  He must trust, and he must have faith.  And so he builds…”

    The Zeitoun family’s story is the story of an American failure and tragedy.  But it is also more than that.  It is the story of a real relationship and a real family that we all should know about and will (if you read the book) admire, and acknowledge as real Americans.

    I love this family.

    Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

     Free-expression and freedom-of-speech are not the same thing.  In America, no one has a right to total free-expression.  What the constitution says is that,

     Congress shall make no law… abridging the freedom of speech…

     No accident that this is in the Bill of Rights; the 1^st Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.  In America, freedom of speech is a right, privilege and a responsibility.

     Freedom-of-Speech protects citizens from government trying to silence a citizen’s expression of ideas and claims.  Freedom of speech, however, protects no citizen from rebuttal from other citizens.  So Freedom-of-Speech does not protect “free-expression” because free-expression does not require you to identify yourself.  Free-expression does not even require that you stand by and represent your ideas.  That’s why free-expression is almost always done unseen, in the shadows.  

     The KKK wore hoods to hide their faces, and they only rode out at night. That shows you that free-expression is immature, and is the dark tunnel that immature citizens live in and prefer.

     Free-expression, you see, allows people to hide and not have their claims challenged.  Freedom-of-Speech is a right guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution.  As with all other constitutional rights, then, Freedom-of-Speech is an American privilege and responsibility.  So citizen, identify yourself and then speak so that other citizens may hear your claims, make judgments about your reasoning and the validity of what you say.  In doing so, your fellow citizens may choose to use their Freedom-of-Speech to challenge your ideas.

     The mistake that Americans have been making lately is this one. For some reason we have been saying that since Americans have freedom of expression, there is nothing to be done.  That is what some have said.  So that’s why we sometimes end up with the odd situation that when someone makes ugly racial, anti-gay and lesbian, anti-some-group statements,  people act as if there is nothing to be done. 

    Not so because, we Americans have the right to Freedom-of-Speech.  Lately, we have been acting as if we think that that freedom means that we have to shut up in the face of someone else’s ugly use of Freedom-of-Speech.  No we don’t…

     No we don’t because no one has a right to free expression, we all have a right to freedom-of-speech.  

   Starting at 8pm, Tuesday, August 16, 2011, on the campus of NCSU we had an event called “Respect the Pack.”

 

     That event was put on to protest and challenge all the offensive, negative group-hate graffiti that shows up in the Free-Expression Tunnel. Our protest that night was significant.

     We were expressing our Freedom of Speech to say that we value each and every student on our campus.

      We were expressing our Freedom of Speech to say that when someone writes racial graffiti, that does not reflect the opinion of the whole campus. 

     We recognize, you see, that the hate of a group expressed in graffiti is really an attack on students of all racial and religious stripes because it shows that there is intolerance and hate on our campus.  Who wants to live in a place like that?  How can a person go home and proclaim their pride in being a student at a place that is so hateful?

     When we recognize and understand that one person’s freedom-of-speech does not negate other Americans’ freedom-of-speech that means there is something to be done.  That means we can raise our voices in opposition to group-hate.

    Wait… wait… but white students at North Carolina State University were upset too!

    Yes indeed they were.

    You have to understand, we no longer live in a society of racial hierarchy.  Even people who wrongly believe in the superiority of one race over another… even those people have to interact with people of other groups who have equal-status with them, or authority over them.

    As importantly, white students at NCSU are not all of one mind about race.  So yeah, some simpleton writes racial graffiti, but that does not reflect the opinion of the whole campus.  Among all of the students there are different racial, moral codes, and interpersonal relationships.   No surprise then that racial graffiti is taken as an attack on students of all racial and religious stripes because it shows that there is intolerance and hate on the campus.  Who wants to live in a place like that?  How can a person go home and proclaim their pride in being a student at a place that is so hateful? It was all that that in this case of racial graffiti, had awakened a sleeping giant.

    These are college students with classes to go too, reading and projects to do, papers to write, exams to take. In the midst of that life, these young people wanted to speak out against intolerance. Yet, they refused to use their busy lives as an excuse for not working for change on their campus.  And as students from a number of racial and ethnic backgrounds developing a coalition, Wake Up! is part of a great American tradition of protest to improve the nation.

    Intergroup coalitions have always been part of the social change movements that mattered.  One example from the civil rights movement SCOPE (Summer Community Organizing and Political Education) a project sponsored by the SCLC (Southern Christian Leadership Conference) in the summer of 1964.  More recently is the example in NYC when people from many different groups showed up with colorful umbrellas so that gay and lesbian couples would not have to face anti-gay and lesbian protests.

    At the end of last semester (Spring 2011), I won a faculty award for my work on diversity on our campus.  Nothing pleased me more than to be in the company of a racial, ethnic and gender mix of people who also won awards for their diversity work on our campus.

    So yes, when offensive racial and anti-gay graffiti was found in our “Free-Expression” tunnel, white students were upset too.  Not only that, but with black, Arab, Hindu and Puerto Rican students as equal partners, white students started organizing themselves to stop the foolishness. That is how the interracial, interethnic student advocacy group “Wake Up! It’s Serious: A Campaign for Change” was born.

   Since Americans have freedom of expression, there is nothing to be done.  That is what some have said.  So that’s why we sometimes end up with the odd situation that when someone makes ugly racial, anti-gay and lesbian, anti-some-group statements,  people act as if there is nothing to be done.  We Americans have the right to freedom of expression.  We seem to think that that freedom means that we have to shut up in the face of someone else’s ugly use of freedom of expression.  No we don’t because we don’t have a right to free expression, we have a right to freedom-of-speech.  All of us have that right.

    I am happy to report that Americans are beginning to realize that. 

   There’s a group of Americans who turn out to yell and scream at the funerals of soldiers.  Members of the Westboro Baptist Church say that the death of a soldier is god’s punishment for the sins of America.  So they come out to a funeral to make that point in front of a family burying a loved one who served our country. And they have the freedom-of-speech right to do so.  Indeed the Supreme Court ruled that they cannot be stopped from doing so, based on freedom-of-speech. That was the right reading of our Constitution.  But that does not mean other Americans cannot use their freedom-of-speech to shout down this mean spirited behavior at the funeral of soldiers. 

    That’s what happened when the Westboro Baptist Church members showed up at the funeral of Elizabeth Edwards (former wife of presidential candidate John Edwards).  Since Ms. Edwards had been in support of marriage rights for gays and lesbians, members of the church came to her funeral to shout out that she was damned. But members of that church found themselves peacefully blocked by a “…line of love.”

At the funeral of Ms. Edwards, when that church group assembled where permitted, other Americans were there to block their position.  This has started to happen at the funerals of soldiers; people line up early early to stand in front of the assigned position of the Westboro Baptist Church, to block their signs from the sight of those attending the funeral.

    That is also legitimate freedom-of-speech. 

    So too was what people did in New York city on the first day that gays and lesbians could be legally married in that state. Knowing anti-gay and lesbian protestors would be there, people, some strangers to each other, some straight, showed up with colorful umbrellas.  With those umbrellas open they took positions that blocked the view of the protesters from those couples who, in love, had showed up and lined up to get married.

    That was also legitimate freedom-of-speech.

    One person’s freedom-of-speech does not negate other Americans’ freedom-of-speech.  Let’s not forget that because when we do, we allow ugly speech to rule the day.

    Why object?  “What’s the big deal,” some students asked.  Even some professors wondered about the level of risks some African American students had been willing to take.  Speaking with a degree of accuracy, some said “I’ve seen worse graffiti on the stalls in men’s bathrooms on campus; so why this big reaction to this particular racial graffiti?”

     Yes we have seen worse things in bathroom stalls.  So I asked myself, what are we not teaching these African American students who are so outraged as to be ready to break the law?  Here the law was not unjust or immoral.  The law in question had to do with physically blocking other students’ access to a tunnel to their legitimate destinations on campus.  Why were students willing to risk being arrested for that?

    Then it occurred to me that for these African American students, like for all the other students, this is college.  This is college and university life that was supposed to be the “…best time in their lives.” For all of our students, and college students everywhere, this time is supposed to be that time between being a child, a minor, and being a real adult (full-time-job, paying rent and all that).  So this is supposed to be football and basketball games, parties, frivolity, while taking classes to get that degree.  But now, with public, offensive, racial graffiti aimed at your group, it’s not that.  Damn, the real world is already here and so the dream is deferred; sadly, probably forever.

     That is why African America students were demanding something even they knew was ridiculous; a guarantee that this will never happen again; or at least while they are still a student here.  Those students are angry at the loss of the college dream; at the loss of their innocence.  So that’s why they say “…oh it’s on…” as a threat, but an empty threat. 

     What happens to a dream deferred is what Langston Hughes asked:

     “Does it stink like rotten meat

     Or fester over like a syrupy sweet.

     Maybe it just sags like a heavy load…

     Or does it explode.”

    A dream deferred in the name of “…free expression.”  But it is a dream deferred only for students who are members of certain American groups.  Is that really the point of “…free expression,” or the result of completely confusing the idea of “…free expression” with the constitutional right of Freedom-of-Speech?

    So once again, racial graffiti had appeared in NCSU’s Free Expression Tunnel.

    At North Carolina State University, we have a Free Expression Tunnel. 

    Turns out that a train track runs through our campus, and so to get from one side of campus to the other, tunnels were built under that train track. In the 1960s, by university administration, one tunnel was designated the Free Expression Tunnel making it the place where students could paint in any graffiti they would like.  In that tunnel, no surprise, there have been all manner of ugly racial, anti-gay, anti-female graffiti.  But with the election of Senator Barack Obama to the presidency, the racial graffiti has caught the attention of university students and administration because President Obama has been featured in that graffiti.

  

    Our neo-diverse student body has been outraged.  Not only outraged, but oriented toward finding ways to object and reduce the occurrence of this kind of racial graffiti.  The quandary is that the tunnel is a place for “free expression.”  Not only is it designated so by the university, many students see it as part of the tradition of the campus.  At the same time, many students at NCSU are not only offended by the graffiti but want others to know that this is not who they are. 

    So now there is a tension between the tradition of the Free Expression Tunnel and the neo-diverse identities of the student-citizens of the campus. Although a predominantly white campus of students, North Carolina State University is close to 20% non-white.  As importantly, no one can reasonably assume that all white students are the same with the same racial or other values.  White students are among those objecting to these racial-hate and anti-gay messages. 

    But can objecting matter?  After all, it’s called the Free-Expression-Tunnel.  How should we citizens of America think about these matters?  We need to think about these matters because eventually, in some form, these matters will show up in our particular communities.

    From June 1 until July 29 (today) I have been on my summer break.  As a professor with a (standard) nine-month contract, I have the opportunity and privilege to use my summer as I chose. In recent years, I have used my summers to work on my writing… not technical writing but fiction writing.  Summer 2010, for example, I spent a week at the writer’s conference at Santa Fe College, under the tutelage mystery writer Michael McGarrity.  I learned a lot.

    This summer I have spent revising my book manuscript which I have now titled “Briefing for Life on the Neo-Diversity Frontier.”  That book takes on in longer form some of the ideas I have been writing about on this blog.  I’ll let you know when I find a publisher.

    Otherwise this summer, I have been reading for fun.  In fact, one of the last things I did as the Spring semester was ending was make a list of books I intended to read this summer.  I don’t usually do it that systematically, but I got a request from our library to let them know what I planned to read.  Marian Fragola, the librarian making the request was doing so to put together a webpage that would highlight what selected faculty members planned to read over the summer.  Ms. Fragola did a great job with that webpage idea.  To see my reading list go to:

http://news.lib.ncsu.edu/wolfpacksummerreads/

    If you haven’t yet read them, I highly recommend the novels of Mary Doria Russell. At the beginning of the summer I read her newest, “Doc”; historical fiction about the true Doc Holliday; wow! I also read her science fiction novels “The Sparrow” and the follow-up “Children of God.” Religious science fiction of the highest caliber; not orthodox and preachy, but a good story filled with theological quandaries; also, wow!  

    I am telling you this to explain why I have been away from this blog. I needed a break to refresh myself, to give my brain a different focus.  So now I will again be posting regularly.  There’s a lot going on to comment on.  But first, my posts will be mostly about the evolution of “Wake Up! It’s Serious: A Campaign for Change.”

    My summer interlude is over.