Hey everyone-
Firstly, I want to thank Susy and Jane for their great work on open house this weekend. From what I could see and what my guest told me, we really impressed the prospective students. The diversity of presentations on Saturday made me proud to be an MUP student at DURP. Great job, everyone.
I want to use this forum to address something of which I’ve become acutely conscious after my presentation on “a day in my life in C-U.” In my presentation, I explained my frustration with the Wright St. bicycle lane by relating an episode in which I nearly ran over two students walking in the middle of the lane. The two students subsequently made fun of my large, red bicycle helmet of which I remain unashamed! Those of you present heard me refer to the two students as “bros.”
As this term crossed my mouth, I immediately wondered if I should clarify exactly what I meant by “bros”. I did not, and for this I am sorry. At that moment, I used the term as self-deprecating humor: I was in a social fraternity as an undergraduate, and I have since resorted to using the term “bros” to refer to “fraternity brothers” who take the label too seriously. My intention was to mock this stereotype. Stereotypes aside, I call my best friend of 20 years “bro.” It is a term I use loosely, but apparently in ignorance of its more delicate social connotations. After the presentation, a classmate approached me and informed me that some in the audience may have interpreted the comment as a reference to men of color. Please know that this was not my intention. Now, and in the future, perhaps a more appropriate term is “dudes.”
It is unfortunate that a legacy of racism in this country has resulted in the need for self-censorship. It is unfortunate that “bros” must be treated like a four-letter word. While I am a life-long proponent of candid public discourse, I am discovering more and more that public discussion requires preparation and sensitivity, even in a five minute presentation about my daily life. I will remain conscious of this in the future. If you want to discuss the matter with me personally, please let me know. You can e-mail me at rhboyer@gmail.com.
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2 comments:
It hadn't occurred to me at the time that your comment could be taken this way, but I'm happy to be in a social sphere where the person who approached you could do so candidly and that you felt you could respond in an equally candid way. It's good to be able to discuss these things.
I was the one who approached Robby about the comment. I'm sure Robby will be the second person (after me) to tell you that I approached him as a friend and with an open mind, with nothing but the best intentions, and with both his and my best interests at heart.
The fact that I know Robby as well as I do allowed me to refrain from jumping to any false conclusions about him based on his comment which, unfortunately, is too often the case in situations like these. I know he has a good and big heart. So I was conflicted when debating the decision of whether or not to talk to him about it, because I felt fairly certain he did not mean anything by it; but I wanted to be sure. I didn't want anything left unsaid or unquestioned.
Therefore, we had an open, honest, and brief conversation. Before very long at all, we understood where the other one was coming from. Then we actually hugged! WTF! :-)
It's amazing what can happen when the first step toward conflict resolution is to have reasonable people sit down and talk calmly, openly, and honestly instead of yelling and screaming and crying foul, or some form of [insert demographic here]"-ism." Not that the various "-isms" don't exist in our world, but in this case, they don't apply.
There are several lessons to be learned here. The one I'd like to highlight, however, is this: we all come from different backgrounds, frames of reference, and have different sensitivities and sensibilities. We shouldn't be judged or criticized for our misperceptions or misstatements. We should only come under fire if we dismiss the fact that these differences exist and/or if we allow them to continue shape our thoughts and actions, even after they've been brought to our attention.
In order for us to truly accept one another, we can't just co-exist, waiting for the next scandal to spring up that has to be managed. We need to eliminate our own personal barriers that keep us from accepting others, among them being our unwillingness to look within ourselves and acknowledge and address our own shortcomings; and to find the sometimes inconvenient truths that lie behind convenient and comfortable assumptions.
John
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