The Color 'White': 'White' is a color, too. Yet, one would never know it by reading the free magazine 'Colors' that litters the Seattle junk newspaper boxes, streets, and recycle bins. Why do so many people of all colors and races flee the Seattle government schools?? It is a PRIVILEDGE to know many of them!!

White is not a color and priviledge is not limited to White people: I have the priviledge of choosing my form of transportation on any given day. I can ride my bicycle, walk, take the bus or drive. Priviledge is choice.

Before there were White people in America, there were Irish, Italian, Norse, Danes, Dutch, German, etc. But being White provides far more priviledge than just being say, Irish. Remember, the Irish were discriminated against when they first came to the US as economic immigrants. Upon becoming White, however, all that discrimination ended.

We might all do better to determine our own points of priviledge.

social engineering out of control: I am used to the "blame whitey" mentallity, but sending students to Colorado to be indoctrinated? I think it's time everybody stops tip-toeing around the big elephant in the middle of the room and start speaking frankly. instead of blaming whites for black failure, why don't we examine blacks as the source ?
Black IQ ranges from 80-85 in the US, 60-70 in Africa, in 100 years of testing, it has not deviated. Blacks in Africa can only be described as total failures in any time frame you compare. A recent genetic study found the there is AT LEAST a 10% genetic difference between Blk and white races. It is obvious that Blacks and whites are not equal, but Caucasians are not responsible for the inequality, and no amount of "white guilt" will alter a million years of evolution. Does the Seattle school board want to erase evolution? If they don't come to some understanding of reality, how far will they go to make blacks and whites "equal"? And I'll tell you something, as a white, I feel cheated, because I was never issued this mythical "knapsack", I think it is just a tool to make me feel guilty.

Stuck record...stuck record...stuck record...stuck record...: Is this trip necessary???

Here we go again watching so-called educators in Seattle blame somebody else for their own incompetence.

Let's lump people into groups and classes and refuse to look at them as individuals with varying degrees of ability, motivation, and background. It's silly to say that all whites can be lumped together just like it's silly to say that all blacks, Latinos, Asians, or whtever can be lumped together. How gross is that? And how un-American and racist? Taking this thinking to its logical extreme, then the NBA and NFL are racist against whites, Latinos, and Asians since their players are overwhelmingly black.

The state of public education in Seattle is such that the only reason black kids remain is that their parents don't have charter schools or tuition vouchers or some other means by which they, too, can flee the Titanic wannabe of the Seattle School district.

Parents want excellence in education so that their kids can have a better life. I know...I have five kids, and I scrimped and went without so that their private school tuition could be paid. Now, they're on their own and doing well, though not as I planned. They were educated to think for themselves and to be individuals, not members of a group, and they're taking that seriously while confounding me with the choices they make.

One response to the FAQ's in Mossback's article speaks of the "obliviousness of white advantage," a phrase that immediately brought to mind the Wenatche's repressed memory syndrome witch hunts of a few years ago. Let's persecute and harrass anyone who dares to challange the orthodoxy of blame-oriented political correctness.

This junk will continue as long as Seattle taxpayers cower under their coverlets and allow their $$$ to send young minds full of mush to conferences like the one in Denver where they're indoctrinated with drivel that's inherently dangerous since it teaches kids that their lot in life is to be losers and failures and there's nothing they can do about it. Blame someone else of another race for the lousy state of your life, and while you're at it, build a few concentration camps so that the oppressors can be indoctrinated or subjected to a final solution. Or didn't the Denver conference include what other racists historically advocated? If not, it's only a matter of time.

This record is so stuck it's not funny.

Re: "white privilege": Oh, some of these comments are painful to read. I don't agree that "white" is a color; I think it's a racialized identity that was invented just to convey an artificial kind of specialness, with special rights and privileges. My ancestors came from Wessex, Wales, Ireland, France and Germany, but none of them was "white" by nature; "white" is something they became when the category of "whiteness" was created by designating other people as "lower races." Even so, the Irish, Jews and Italians had to wait longer to become "white" in this country than some others did.

It's ludicrous to deny that being seen as "white" sometimes brings special privileges in our society. Just ask anyone who's been stopped by police in an all-white town at night for "driving while Black." Or read the current issue of Colors magazine, which has an article about the history of housing discrimination in Seattle.

So I think "white privilege" is a very interesting topic. But Mossback and Danny Westneat in the Seattle Times raise some good questions about how to talk about it. Clearly, schools need to address racism. But some ways work better than others. I think it's a problem when anyone substitutes defensively pre-fabricated truisms for thought and communication. Whether it's "white" defensiveness or "politically correct" groupthink, people on all sides of this kind of issue can and sometimes do shut down the space where otherwise we could maybe learn from each other's experience.

Once more unto the breach, dear friends...: The essence of freedom and liberty is the right of an individual to think, speak, and act as he or she sees fit in light of what's seen as the individual's best interests. Somewhere along the way, we've lost sight of not only this notion, but also some necessary corollaries.

While I belong to several groups, they do not define me. Born into some (white, male, American citizen), with some chosen by me (evangelical Christian, conservative, Highland piper), they combine with many other factors to make me who I am; I define who I am.

I do not march lock step (some would claim goose step) to the beat of anyone's drummer save my own. Now, I do let the God I worship set the tempo and call the tune, but even then He and I get into it from time to time.

Scripture likens us to sheep, yet it calls us to individual decisions, accountability, and responsibility. Groupthink is antithetical to these values, and I'm here to both decry and reject it. The Denver conference about which Mossback writes is an example of groupthink.

Does racism exist in Seattle? Absolutely. Since we are all yet sinners and since racism is sin, by definition it does and it will. But what makes this tautology uncomfortable, is that racism exists all over the place; it's just as wrong from "them" as it is from "us."

Categorical accusations and assumptions directed at any one person or group of persons is specious and superficial. Yet, isn't that what the White Privilege Conference does? Reading the blurbs about it in Mossback's essay you get the sense that world peace is attainable only by the elimination of all things "white."

Really…how silly is that?

Try telling this to the Tutsis and Hutus of Rwanda.

I find that just as racist as the crap that used to come out of Hayden Lake, ID. The only difference is that it gets wrapped in politically correct academia speak and it's uttered by PhD's. No matter how you package it…baloney is baloney.

What, then, is a better approach? How about we remember some of those necessary corollaries I mentioned at the outset? Respect, courtesy, individual responsibility, accountability, self-reliance, honor…These character traits - these moral values - know no racial or group barriers; they're self-definitional choices each individual makes irrespective of external circumstances.

Sure, some people have it tougher than others, and not everyone starts off with the same advantage or finishes with the same results. But between the beginning and the end, don't you and I as individual human beings have a lot to say about the matter? Not all white kids are born privileged, rich, and elitist. And not all black kids are born oppressed, poor, and inferior. It's not that simple, yet we're told it must be by those whose view of the world refuses to acknowledge the real complexity of what it takes to individually self-define oneself in a free and open society rather than simplistically and vacuously group-define in order to explain away inconvenient truths or uncomfortable realities.

Since I wrote more than 4,000 characters...I have to call this Part I...Stay tuned for Part II...

Once more, etc.: Part II...

We all have realities in our lives that we wish were otherwise. If I could sing, I would; but I can't so I better not. Still, it's my choice, and I choose to exercise discretion by not showing up at American Idol auditions. Lucky for you, dear reader, that I do so choose.

And isn't choice a lot of what this is really all about? Mossback makes reference to a couple Danny Westneat columns in The Seattle Times where the subject of choice is both implicitly and explicitly illustrated. Represented in the almost "anywhere but here" statements from anonymous Seattle school employees and ex-employees as well as the yearnings of "a whole host of families of all races at Madrona (who) were voting with their feet," individual human beings and families were exercising choice and refusing to be bullied by racist rhetoric (some of the statements attributed to so-called educators ought to be grounds for their dismissal) or someone else's determination of what's good for them. All I can say to that is…Good for them!

As long as this continues, Seattle schools will resemble a cheap imitation of the Titanic with the exception that the Titanic was mercifully swift in sinking to the bottom. Regardless of race, color, creed, religion, or national origin, kids will be cheated, parents disrespected, taxpayers screwed, and educational excellence flushed into a sewer of stupidity all to appease know-nothing, think-nothing, demagogues.

School should be about kids, not groups. Individual children receiving instruction from committed professional educators who strive for one and one thing only: excellence. Whether the kid is black, white, brown, or whatever, and whether the kid is academically gifted or not, shouldn't school be what's best for the kid? And shouldn't that include preparing the kid to succeed rather than setting him or her up to fail?

I have an 18-month old grandson who lives in North Carolina. Before I would let my Lil' Latino grandchild's (His last name is Lopez) parents enroll him in a Seattle public school, I would sell my bagpipe and hock the farm in order to put him into a school that values truth, teaches individual responsibility, and prepares him with the tools necessary for him to be successful in the world.

That's what I think…

RE: social engineering out of control: Perhaps you weren't issued the mythical "knapsack" of "blame whitey." Instead you seem to have been issued the one that holds nothing but racial stereotypes. I had hoped that this forum wouldn't be reduced to this level; but I see I was quite wrong.

Your post might have more impact if you were to prove me wrong by citing where you found these statistics on IQ. Who did the "testing?" All people are equal in the eyes of God. Some are more educated than others and some have better social skills.

"A recent genetic study..."?: Can jeandeux cite the source of the "recent genetic study" that he/she refers to? Is Sound Politics the source?

Or is that the study by Lester Maddox? Or maybe the one by David Duke?

Comments by Piper Scott: Piper Scott wrote: "Categorical accusations and assumptions directed at any one person or group of persons is specious and superficial."

And Piper also considers the entire Seattle School District corrupt and unworthy of educating our kids? He'd even sell his bagpipe to keep his grandchild out of our schools. Wow.

I guess Piper has done an in depth study of every single school and teacher in the Seattle School District. Congratuations.

Bad things happen to everyone: I was listening to an NPR show called "Open Source" a couple months back in which racism was being discussed. Some New York academic (he sounded like a young black guy) argued that four black guys harassing a middle aged white guy on a subway because he was white could not be called racist because the white guy has all the power. The MC,a white guy, didn't challenge him on the assertion.

Some young black people cultivate a stereotype of violence, (black culture?) walking, talking, acting like thugs. (Don't believe me-ride the #7 bus in the CD.or the 358 up Aurora at night. Stand around the bus stops at 3rd and Pike and Pine.) They listen to music about HOs and the joys of killing people, especially cops. And then when white people react to them like they are a thug. It's because white people are racist? Or is it because when a person doesn't know you he reacts to what you present?

It's time black people are held responsible for their own behavior. It's the people, of all colors, who make excuses for unacceptable behavior by blacks, and who hold blacks to a lesser standard of behavior than other people who are racist. Couldn't the willingness of some black people to question the motives of virtually every white person they come in contact with be considered racism? Is every disagreement between a white and black person grounded in racism?

Racism certainly exists. But every bad thing that happens to black people isn't due to racism. Some of it is self-inflicted.

What you cannot defeat, you become...: Snesich writes, "I guess Piper has done an in depth study of every single school and teacher in the Seattle School District. Congratuations."

I will respond by saying that a fish rots from the head down...Are parents and kids fleeing toward Seattle schools...or from them?

My comments weren't an indictment of individual schools or teachers, but of systemic issues and the leadership that drives them. Certainly, there are dedicated, kid-focused teachers in Seattle, but are they succeeding because of District policies and directions...or in spite of them?

I suspect if you asked the families of the 40 or so students who bailed from Madrona, you would get some interesting responses. But then again, they were dissed on the way out the door by so-called educational professionals because they chose the welfare of their children over the Orwellian Das Kapital groupthink of the district. So much for tolerance...

The Piper

groupthink and rude kids on the bus: I agree that we're all sinners and we're all responsible for ourselves, though figuring out how to take responsibility for oneself can take a lifetime, and how many of us even thought about this kind of thing when we were adolescents? Kids test limits and flout authority, and when they do so they can be very unpleasant and sometimes scary for adults to deal with. I don't envy "Disgruntled"'s experiences, and of course it's not "racist" to object to rude and threatening behavior. To say that "white" people can be racist but African-American people can't sort of makes sense to me (because I think the terms aren't symmetrical, they have different histories etc.), but it's an abstract kind of sense, and it doesn't seem like a useful principal for conducting any kind of relationship. It seems a bit like saying that because U.S. women couldn't vote until 1920, it's always my husband's turn to do the dishes!

Judging by what I've seen of the "White Privilege" conference materials, I have to agree that it could represent an exercise in bullying and groupthink, which can happen around any touchy issue, after all. I do get the point about academic discussions sometimes getting pretty heady or Stalinist in spirit, trying to change the world with ultra-rationalistic, linear solutions which usually seem to amount to telling people what to think and feel.

But I think the conference organizers are probably hoping to inspire people to reject racism and to try harder to come up with something better, and even if I don't love their methods I can find some common ground there. One point that seems really clear to me is that racism hurts us all, even if the impact is more subtle on those of us who are seen as "white." I think "whiteness" is dehumanizing, in all kinds of ways.

To imagine that "white" people are uniquely bad (racist, privileged, etc.) ignores human history in favor of the racist idea that there is such a thing as a "white" race that is in some way unique and special in all of human history. This racist idea obscures the reality that all of us humans contend with: we all struggle with the tension between our survival needs and fears, and our ethical and loving impulses. We're all capable of oppression or the opposite, and I think being fully human means trying genuinely, in our own ways, to take a measure of responsibility for the history we participate in every day.

Who can be a racist: So it sort of makes sense to you that white people can be racist but black people can't? So for you four black guys hassling one white man BECAUSE he is white and vulnerable can not be racist? How about if they spit in his face?

Let me more or less quote myself here: people who make excuses for misbehavior by blacks, or hold them to lesser standards of behavior are racist because in their hearts they feel that blacks are indeed inferior to whites.

Black problems in this society are not so much racist as financial and educational and self-inflicted. I have a friend of over 35 years who is black. He has six kids. #1, a male, is an engineer in Alaska oil fields pulling down a six figure income. #2, and #3 each female, earn six figure incomes working for the state of California. #4, male, is a Public School superintendent in a California suburb. #5 & #6 are hip hop generation rap loving high school drop outs with a bunch of kids out of wedlock by more than one woman and both have been in jail repeatedly and are currently on parole or probation. Racism exists! But I would argue that this is evidence that personal choices and effort is more important.

FOX-Lite: I'd be real interested in knowing how hard CROSSCUT tried to offer a breadth of voices on their staff. Is everyone white? Mostly male? Mostly 50? Talking about civic engagement is another way NOT to change the power structure. What I see in Seattle is that the janitor is hispanic, the parking attendant is African American but the folks in power are white and make themselves feel better by having their civic engagement love fest or their diversity shindigs. The Madrona school article was more of the same. Most of the comments on ths blog belong on the FOX webpage. Is Crosscut Fox-Lite?

RE: Who can be a racist: I did say that I don't think it's racist to object to rude or threatening behavior from anyone. I'm not sure if you're accusing me of making excuses for "misbehavior by blacks;" I will very gladly admit I'm not interested in making any blanket judgments about African-Americans, I'm interested in trying to understand human beings.

I think the word "racist" gets used as a weapon, and flinging that weapon back and forth doesn't accomplish anything except re-enacting over and over how bad it feels to be silenced and excluded. ("You're a racist!" now means "Nothing you say has any validity at all.") So while I can see the logic in saying only "white" people can be "racist" in this society--it's intellectually debatable in some contexts, I think--I do really also think this argument can be misused in just the way you're talking about, to imply a license to bully. I do think it's important to be able to talk about the differences between people's experiences, based on history; I don't believe in excusing bullying by anyone. Picking on someone who can't fight back never reflects well on whoever's doing it.

As for your critique of your friend's family, I don't believe African-American people are any different from anyone else in this respect. Choose any family on Earth and you could find some members who seemed happier or more successful than others. But who's in a position to judge others' lives? Isn't it just the human condition that personal choices and effort are important for us all? And don't we all fail to be perfect in some way or other?

RE: FOX-Lite: Crosscut is fully aware that it is comprised mostly of middle-aged white guys sitting around talking, and we plan to address that shortcoming.

What's good for the goose...ought to be good for all geese...: Yarrow said:

"I think the word "racist" gets used as a weapon, and flinging that weapon back and forth doesn't accomplish anything except re-enacting over and over how bad it feels to be silenced and excluded. ("You're a racist!" now means "Nothing you say has any validity at all.") So while I can see the logic in saying only "white" people can be "racist" in this society--it's intellectually debatable in some contexts, I think--I do really also think this argument can be misused in just the way you're talking about, to imply a license to bully."

He (a sexist assumption, I know) is correct that the word racist is often used as a weapon. All too often, it's used as a rhetorical club to stifle opposing opinions and tag with an epithet any who hold a contrary opinion.

But there is absolutely no logic in saying that in this culture only white people can be racist. Racism is wrong, period! Whether it's from whites, blacks, Latinos, Asians or whatever.

I work with the homeless a lot. This past January while in Occidental Park distributing clothes and food, I witnessed a really gross example of black on Latino racism where a black homeless man cussed at a couple Latino homeless men and blamed them for his inability to find work. He hurled racial invectives and slurs and the "F" word like it was going out of style. It was bad enough that I asked the black man to tone down the rhetoric given that I was there with a couple dozen junior high and high school-aged youth. Pure, unadulterated racism…no two ways about it.

Bad behaviors and attitudes are bad irrespective of who engages in them. If it's bad for Don Imus to spew bigotry and insult women they way he recently did, then it's equally bad for some rapper to spew bigotry and insult women. Yet I hear extraordinarily selective condemnation. Ditto among too many in Seattle schools and local public venues and forums.

If we selectively apply standards of behavior or create different sets of rules for different people, then we become what George Orwell feared: "All animals are equal, but some are more equal than others…" Sadly, this seems to be where we're headed.

The Piper

RE: FOX-Lite: Ahhh Make that fox-lite (racist) ain't got a clue, it's all their fault that black people's lives are not perfect middle aged white guys. How are you going to address that problem, Mr. Taylor? Send 'em to a white privilege conference? Me, I don't have the time. I'm too busy subverting the hopes and efforts of black Americans. Why? Because I'm white, that's why. I was born to the task? as a white man it's my responsibility to make sure that black folks never get their piece of the pie. Check out this guest column by Matt Rosenberg in today's Seattle Times. Another cluelerss racist white guy-here's a bit of what he has to say:

"In encouraging academic success for all, rather than blaming the larger society for minority-student failures, let's take the parental role into greater account. In Washington state, according to the U.S. Census, the families with the highest percentage of single-parent households are black, Native American and Latino, the same groups that most often lag behind in our state's achievement tests.

As for family stability and well-being, a troubling indicator is that home ownership among African Americans in Seattle and the state – once above the national average – has dropped precipitously. And, for the first time in Washington state, the 2000 census found more black children living with single rather than married parents. Those are the dynamics that need to be addressed.

In the real world, success in school and as adults results from individual responsibility, hard work, family cohesion and a home culture that exalts student learning, planning and respect for authority.

By promoting the "white privilege" canard and by designing a student indoctrination plan, the Seattle School District is putting retrograde, leftist politics ahead of academics, while the perpetrators of "white privilege" are minimizing the capabilities of minorities.

That diminishes us all. "

RE: What's good for the goose...ought to be good for all geese...: I think there's a nuance that gets lost in all the emotional intensity of people literally beating each other up, as in the example you cite.

The nuance, as I understand it, is that individuals aren't "racist," institutions are. Individuals are often prejudiced, obnoxious, violent, etc., etc., but I think there's been some attempt to set aside the word "racism" to describe a larger, structural, institutionalized kind of oppression. "Racism" would be prejudice plus the power of the state. Prejudice plus the power only of one's own fists would be racially-motivated violence but not "racism."

So if you accept this argument, which I think has some really interesting angles to it, I think it's wrong to say that "white" people can be "racist" but no one else can. I think that when people say that they're assuming a situation like, say, L.A. in the 1950s (from what I've read), where you had a predominantly white police force actively using their official power to intimidate African-Americans who wanted to move out of "black" neighborhoods into "white" ones. Or a situation like existed in Seattle in the mid-20th century as well, where banks colluded to deny African-Americans mortgages and loans in most neighborhoods in the city.

Those are situations where powerful institutions which define "right" and "wrong" in a society are actively enforcing a racist agenda such as segregation. In this context, I guess even an individual such as an employer or landlord sometimes actively participate in racism by joining in the discrimination.

Examples like this can still be found, though circumstances are always changing. I don't think "Bull" Connor flinched when he was called a racist; he knew he was a racist and was proud of that. Today, no one in mainstream American life is proud to call him- or herself a racist, but there are all kinds of holdovers that crop up, often unintentionally. I think racism remains as a background, often unexamined influence on all of us; because of outright practices that were openly sanctioned in the past, we can feel more inured to some people's feelings than to others'. For example, I suspect more people would be upset about the use of human bodies in the "Bodies" exhibition if those bodies were of caucasian Lutherans from Minnesota, rather than Chinese people.

But I agree that it's not valid to say, based on that his, that we paler individuals are permanently endowed with the power of the state to back up every ugly and offensive thing we might choose to do. It's not so, and to say this is to deny all of the good efforts people are making to move away from racism. Like everybody else, "white" people can be racially prejudiced and obnoxious; but our actions are only "racist" to the degree that they're explicitly backed up by state power.

In this sense, absolutely anyone can participate in a "racist" act, or in a reactive, counter-"racist" act, such as using the power of the state to bully people.

RE: What's good for the goose...ought to be good for all geese...: Racism is a belief, and only individual human beings can believe. Institutions of themselves are incapable of opinion or belief, hence my absolute discomfort with the term "compassionate government." Only people can be compassionate, and only people can be racist.

Now, it goes without saying that when racist people control an institution, it will reflect their attitudes. From what I've read, the actions of some administrators at Madrona Elementary were racist. By your definition and since they are in power positions at that school, Madrona is a racist school. Only it's racist against any who don't kowtow to a particular POV. Who are the victims of this racism? Primarily, though not exclusively, white families.

As I've said on this blog before, sin is sin. And sin can only be committed by...sinners. Individual human beings must be held accountable for their actions, and they must accept the responsibility for their actions. All too often, we dumb things down by blaming...institutions.

History is replete with examples of individuals with grit and determination overcoming inherent institutional obstacles. What I find distasteful is the attitude prevelent in things like the "White Privilege Conference" that perpetual victimhood is the fate of black kids in America. How would you like it if someone told your kid that he or she is a loser and doomed to be a looser for life?

Matt Rosenberg's op-ed in yesterday's Times addresses some issues that the race-baiting apologists never seem to want to discuss: the horrendous decline in two-parent homes in the black community, the rise in out-of-wedlock births, the negative impact of much of the hip hop culture, absent black fathers, declining home ownership, etc.

Don Imus ought to be fired and run out of town. As a father of two daughters both of whom once played basketball, albeit only in junior high school, his comments were personally offensive to me. But rapper Snoop Dogg is just as bad, if not worse. I wrote a LTE to the Times to that effect, and in doing some quick research on his lyrics, I couldn't find a one that wasn't sickening.

What are school officials doing to discourage the use of Snoop as a role model for young black men? In general, what are they doing about black on black destructive behavior? Or do they give dudes like Snoop a pass while reserving their indignition for a chuckle-headed putz like Don Imus, appropriate though that indignation might be?

Instead of blaming others and "institutions" for the pathetic nature of my life, shouldn't I start the clean-up process at home?

I was raised to believe that the only one responsible fo rmy life is...me.

The Piper

Where's the end game?: Do people really believe that the government should be sponsoring the promotion of hatred of any ethnic group in this country? Where do people think the end game will lead? When was the last time an ethnic group was ideologically vilified by a government for its success and "privileges" and "oppression" of other groups? It probably started out with harmless conferences on "Jewishness Privileges" in Berlin in 1922. . .

Asians have generally higher income and educational levels than we whities do. Why are Asians not being singled out and vilified for their "Asian privilege"?

This conference is frightening. I am frightened for my children's future. There has to be some place for all this government-sponsored hatred to go, and where it's going to go is at my blonde-haired, green-eyed, innocent children. There is an end game here, whether people want to acknowledge it or not.

RE: What's good for the goose...ought to be good for all geese...: The Piper wrote:

If we selectively apply standards of behavior or create different sets of rules for different people, then we become what George Orwell feared: "All animals are equal, but some are more equal than others…" Sadly, this seems to be where we're headed.

Dude, where have you been for the past 20 years or so? We're already there and have been for some time. The double standards are everywhere. The people who organize these types of conferences (and I admit, most of them are white "progressives" exploiting racial resentments against their own community) argue constantly that only white people can be racist. Some of the most radical even extend that idea to excusing (encouraging?) racially motivated physical attacks on us whities. Soon they will be calling us "racist" if we get upset or complain when our children are beaten up by a "person of color." Perhaps when we reach that level of madness we'll have hit bottom, but I don't think so. What a sad and sick outcome of something that started with the hope that everyone would be judged by the content of their character and not the color of their skin.