I’ve been selling my “diversity” to law firms, 

Feeling special I could apply to diversity programs that others couldn’t, 

Recognizing that my “asian-ness” and my “woman-ness” were my only qualifications but, 

At least they got me through the door right?

“At least you’re diverse,” I tell myself, 

“At least you have a diverse story to tell.”

I feel like that’s all I have now– that’s the only reason I was able to come here in the first place,

That the only way I’ll get a job is if a firm lost an asian and needed me to replace one, 

That the “diversity” that I am using to get in, 

Is the only thing that’s keeping me out. 

Today in class, a student suggested that professors’ children should be given preferential treatment over the children of support staff when it comes to educational opportunities because professors children are “smarter.” Maybe that person and all those who laughed along should check this out: http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-calculus-wiz-20160127-story.html

In light of the racially charged events that continue to ensue at the Law School, I offer the following 13 anecdotes as a person of color who has worked in the employ of this school for well over 5 years. I offer them in vociferous dispute of the widely held assertion that racism—in all of its pervasive and amorphous forms—does not exist in this most hallowed institution.

1. I get asked if my hair is real, if I wash it, and how often. Can they touch it is usually next, and they often already have their hands in it before they ask. Things like this occur with alarming regularity. When relating these experiences to some white people, I have been told that I should “be glad that people are taking such an interest” in my hair.

2. A faculty member asked me “how do you people"—then quickly corrected herself—"how do you take care of your hair?”

3. A faculty member joked that if I was ever falling off a cliff, I could just use my hair to reach out to the nearest tree and save myself. There was a student present when this “comment” was made. As an aside, where do people get the idea that black people’s hair in certain configurations is somehow prehensile like the gorgons of Greek myth?

Can we agree there is a problem here, or do I need to keep going?

4. A faculty member flat out called me an “idiot” during a call, then went on to suggest that I "probably shouldn’t be working here.” This is a person who had prior knowledge of my racial identity before said call, and could not claim innocence on the basis of anonymity.

5. A manager and I were in a one on one meeting, during which he described a black coworker who happened to be overweight as “slovenly.” I never heard him apply this description to any of the white staff who could be considered overweight. Incidentally, the coworker to whom the comment was directed is no longer employed here.

6. There is a presumption of competence that gets extended to my younger white male colleagues, despite my being a 17 year veteran in my chosen field. I’ve been asked by staff, faculty, and students if I know what I’m doing during service calls. And I have been passed up for promotions owing to decidedly nebulous circumstances.

Can we agree there is a problem here, or do I need to keep going?

7. When I was once relating the difficulties inherent in being a person of color in an institution such as this to a manager, I was told that my grievances were a “bullshit excuse,” and that I simply “have a chip” on my shoulder.

8. A former head of my department once told me, after I submitted the “most extensive” Position Description Questionnaire (PDQ) he had ever seen during his tenure here—“I had no idea you could write like this.” To this moment, I am sure he believes he was paying me a sincere compliment.

9. On several occasions, my younger white colleagues have gone to management to report that I was “intimidating,” “unapproachable,” and/or somehow making them feel uncomfortable. When they were pressed to cite specific examples, none were ever produced. When I myself asked management for specific examples, none were ever produced.

Can we agree there is a problem here, or do I need to keep going?

10. I’ve had people confuse me for an employee in the Hark, and even a colleague in my own office. This colleague happens to stand nearly a foot taller than I, is several shades lighter than I, several inches slimmer than I, and several pounds less heavy.

11. A manager during a one on one meeting was enumerating all the ways that I supposedly didn’t contribute adequately enough to my team. The tone of his censure was condescending, infantilizing, and belittling, and I realized beyond any measure of doubt that my work ethic was being impugned. At which point, I actively withdrew from the conversation in offense and protest. In a final jab, no doubt meant to provoke a bellicose response upon which my immediate termination could then be justified, he said—"come on, use your words…“

12. During a meeting in which new temporary staff were being introduced to the department, a manager asked one of the newly hired coops to tell the group something interesting about herself that wouldn’t be immediately obvious. She mentioned that she was from China, to which the manager replied, “We could tell that by looking.”

13. I’ve been regarded as something of a rabble rouser in my department because I am outspoken about glaring disparities I see in hiring, with respect to who gets promoted and under what circumstances. I’ve been accused of being resistant to change, when in reality I seek to draw attention to instances when implemented changes were not evenly applied across the department.

In citing these examples, the point I wish to make is thus: The lived experiences of people of color are not to be dismissed, disavowed, and ignored simply because they make certain people uncomfortable. They have a cumulative effect on us that has been legitimized by researchers and social scientists inside and outside this country for years. If you think it makes you feel uncomfortable, and/or defensive just to hear about things like this associated with HLS, and by extension many of the people who comprise its workforce—how do you think it makes students and employees of color feel to actually be on the receiving end of these experiences, and to also get fresh reminders on a recurring basis in 2016?

For any white people reading this, it would help to consider the following: One of the first survival skills that people of color are forced to learn in this society is how to make others (usually white people) feel more comfortable around us. We end up employing a number of behaviors toward this end, from changing the way we inflect our words so that your speech patterns are reflected back at you—to carefully modulating the tone of our voices so that you don’t feel threatened and imperiled by any perceived excess of personality or expressions of negative emotion. Consequently, our personalities are regularly repressed in the name of assimilation.  And we have never enjoyed the same freedom to live authentically, while being considered individuals, and have the benefit of doubt extended to us at every opportunity—the way you do in this society.

A small sampling of the things we contend with as people of color:

• Daily micro and macro aggressions
• Disparities in health outcomes on account of biases leveled against us by physicians and other medical staff
• Discrimination in employment
• Presumptions of criminality and pugnacious behavior
• Predatory and subprime lending practices in housing and finance
• Bodies of research that show that white people (children included) actually perceive people of color to feel less pain
• Bodies of research that show that children of color are widely perceived to be older than they are, less innocent, and inherently dangerous
• Regular, unequal treatment by law enforcement in this country, culminating in extra-judicial grievous injury and death

So when one of your number strides up to us and arrogantly asserts:

• “The way to end racism in America is by not talking about it.”
• “This isn’t really the time or place to discuss these issues.”
• “You’re being too sensitive and need to just get over it!”
• “If you just worked as hard as everyone else, you’d have a better life.”
• “You just had to pull the ‘race card’ didn’t you?”
• “Maybe this isn’t the right place for you to work…”
• “We have a black president, what’s your problem?” 

Statements like these are rightly decried as colossal invocations of privilege that prioritize white racial discomfort over our continual lived experiences. You also have the privilege of universalizing your experiences, because you are considered “normal,” and the “default” in this society, so many of you assume that if you do not personally witness (and/or willfully ignore) examples shown above—ergo, racism doesn’t exist. The derailing statements listed above also smack of incredulous hubris and insensitivity, tantamount to telling a freshly stabbed murder victim to not get any blood on your marble tiled floors.

I would assume that most people would have no trouble feeling sympathy and empathy for the hypothetical murder victim, but something entirely different seems to happen when otherwise well-meaning white people are asked en-masse to examine their treatment of people of color both interpersonally and institutionally. The question now remains, why does this continue to be the case in an age of unprecedented access to written and digital information, alongside the collected experiences of millions of people of color? My guess? Because to name the problem is to have awareness of the problem. And to have awareness of the problem invites an onus of responsibility in resolving the problem. Racism does not occur in a vacuum. It is inculcated into every layer of society. That includes this university. And this university is widely regarded to be “the best” at everything.

It’s amazing how diverse the TAW faculty are. I mean that in every sense of the word: race, gender, advocacy style, life experience, type of law practiced, etc. It’s so refreshing and inspiring. I only wish the full-time
HLS faculty reflected this diversity, too.

Professors should recognize how the exam format affects the outcome by giving an advantage to some kinds of students over others. Or the outside world should face how arbitrary grades are. 

Another student asked me in class once if I was speaking as a lawyer or as a human being. When I speak as a lawyer, I will be speaking as a human being. The fact that people assume there has to be a difference frightens me. 

Yesterday’s community gathering showed that. Keep speaking up. Keep sharing your stories. Many of us are listening, and we want to change how students and staff are treated.

- A white student ally

I am the student who made the Voodoosim comment in my colleague’s post below. I apologize if I was insensitive but with all due respect, I feel that the claim being made has been taken out of context and has been rewritten in a way that does not reflect the point that I was making at all.

The point I was making was actually the exact opposite and, paradoxically, in line with the sentiments of my anonymous friend.

The question in class was this: should a seemingly unreasonable attempt like Voodoo also count as attempted murder? 

The topic of Voodoo had actually come up earlier in the semester and I had pointed out then that we have a bias against practices like Voodoo because we do not live in a society that takes it seriously. I said then that in other societies, if they deem it to be a legitimate threat to another human being, it could be considered a legitimate attempt to murder and that it might help us not to write those things off simply because we ourselves don’t adhere to those views. A court in a society that holds such beliefs may legitimately and reasonably hold that they attempted murder. 

When Voodoo came up again this week in our attempt class, I was actually reiterating that exact point. I expressed my misgivings about the “reasonable person” standard the court in the case had used and asked what “reasonable person” we were talking about. Was this a reasonable person in the United States? Or were we talking about a reasonable person in an area such as Central Africa where, from what I understand, Voodooism is indeed considered a legitimate practice? 

I was then asked by the professor as to whether I would then uphold the conviction for attempted murder for a Voodoo case here in the United States, to which I jokingly replied, “No, I think such a sentence would be disproportionate to the harm they were causing but I may enjoin them to school.” I did immediately regret making my point in that way and I apologize to my colleagues for my insensitivity. The only point I was trying to make was that at least in the United States, where people do not take Voodoo seriously, a conviction for attempted murder, which would result in the same sentence as murder itself, would be disproportionate for the defendants precisely because we do not have the same fear of Voodoo as some other societies do. We had laughed about juries using Ouija boards to come to decisions in murder cases and I thought it would be understood as I meant it - as a joke. 

Again, I apologize for my comment. It was insensitive. I do feel hurt, though, that my comment would be interpreted in this way. I don’t think the way you presented me to this open forum is true to how you view me as a person, or at least I would hope that you know me and my intentions better than what you’ve presented here. Seeing my own person put up in this way was a fearful and troubling experience but I do take responsibility for what I said. I promise to be more careful with what I say, especially when I am being lighthearted. 

Ms. Rosa Parks once said to Bryan Stevenson: “That’s going to make you tired, tired, tired.” She was talking about the fight against systemic racism in the death penalty, but I’ll admit that this crest movement already has me tired, tired, tired. I’m ready to work with the institutionally disadvantaged communities around us.

I wonder what the people who can’t be represented by TAP, Defenders, or PLAP due to lack of student attorneys would say about this crest and the human capital currently slogging through the Huffington Post, MSNBC, and the Boston Globe?

A student made an extremely insensitive comment regarding Voodoo, claiming that it is a practice unique to Africa that was without merit. They went as far as to suggest that those who practiced Voodoo were in need of proper education.

1. Voodoo is a religion, just a much as any other. Ignorance based on mainstream depictions of Voodoo practices  (AHS: Coven as a recent example) does not excuse your intolerance. 

2. “Proper” (read: Western) education is no solution to religious understanding. Western/Eurocentric pedagogy has been the preeminent tool of religious intolerance since its inception, positing Christianity as the dominant narrative to the exclusion, erasure, and oppression of other faiths. FOH with that. 

- Anonymous.

We went over Attempt in Crim today. McQuirter v. State stood out to me as a case where race was clearly a part of the judge and jury’s calculus. A black (read: “Negro”) man was charged and convicted of Attempted Rape based on a confession that the defendant denied ever occurred. As a part of the court’s holding, they mention that “the social conditions and customs founded upon racial differences” could be considered in determining guilt. 

The only mention of the case came from a brief student comment linking that same implicit bias to xenophobic/islamophobic responses to terrorism. This goes to show that even when our casebooks explicitly analyze race and the ways that the law has used it to oppress marginalized groups, it can still be skipped over with no concern.

- Anonymous 

I came to listen to students, and to concrete proposals.  So far it’s been 35 minutes of administrator monologuing, and lots of “we’re doing stuff! Go us!”  and lots of check-the-box laundry lists of issues, and little real substance.

Being a conscious student of color at Harvard Law School is like having at least 10 more credits. ‪#‎BlackOnCampus‬ ‪#‎BlackAtHarvard‬

When another POC lets you know you’re both here ‘cause of affirmative action. And your jaw drops thinkin like, 'wow, we’re oppressing ourselves now?’

Damn homie, they really got to you, huh? 

#BlackOnCampus #RoyallMustFall #BrownOnCampus

It’s time for a change. I’ve been playing games for too long. The yessir’s and the no ma’am’s. As if enough of these phrases would make them look at me differently. As if I were to pronounce them just a little bit differently, then they would listen.

I was, I had realized, their mouthpiece. And a pretty good one at that. My dark skin notwithstanding. We’re too loud, I thought. Just put your head down and lay low. Are you mad? Do you feel discriminated against? Do you feel alone? That’s fine. That’s good even. Let your books be your friend, and show them that you can do everything just as well as they can.  Sometimes even better. Get the right grades, get the right internships, meet the right people. This approach worked for me. Ivy undergrad. Harvard Law. Approval.

            But, did this approach really work for me? Today, I questioned my critical life decisions. Today, I felt that no matter how hard I have worked, no matter how much I have tried, I will never be accepted. For the first time, I admitted that I could never feel as American as my white neighbors in the suburbs. Aunque el chango se vista de seda, chango se queda. At least in their eyes.

            When I heard about Mizzou, I was initially critical of the protestors. Their apparent disrespect was unbecoming and … that Yale girl. How dare she. Who does she think she is, making us look bad like that. We’re never going to get anywhere with people like her around. But, with these perspectives, I was the one who was stuck.

            I’m not black. I’m Latin@. The dark kind. More importantly, though I sympathized with what my undergrad course of study would call “black issues,” I never considered them my own problems. Blacks were looking for ways out of the system, whereas Latin@s were looking for a way in. Still, looking up at the defaced pictures of the black Harvard professors, I finally understood what happened at Mizzou. I understood why the girl I initially found unseemly yelled so loud. It wasn’t immaturity. It was rage.

            Today, I didn’t see the black-brown divide or the black issue or Latin@ issue. I felt unwanted. Like I didn’t belong. Attacked. How strange: this wasn’t the Ivory tower I worked so hard to be a part of. This wasn’t the Ivory tower I knew. Oh, because my friends wouldn’t do that. They’d made me feel like I belonged. Now that I felt attacked, I should rely on them to reassure me that they were beside me. I started off by going to my friends from undergrad.

            I texted the story. I got a one-line response, “Oh wow, weren’t there cameras to discover who put the tape?” Then, the text moved on to talk about the latest startup and its funding. I usually like talking startups. Not today. Today I felt attacked. 

            I tried again. Another friend from undergrad. “Oh, is this about the Royall must Fall thing?” The “thing.” Yesterday, Royall must fall was another thing for me too. Another one of those pesky causes that distracted from letting us get at real success. Today, it was a cause worth fighting for. Anything to feel validated, to feel like someone was listening, like someone was on my side.  I didn’t respond. Apparently my silence was an invitation for an announcement that Uber was facing a 50 million dollar fine for evading regulatory oversight.

            My undergrad friends didn’t get it. Maybe that’s not their fault: they weren’t here. If they were here. they’d get it. Right? As it turned out, I was the one that didn’t get it. I ran to the nearest Harvard person, a blonde-haired, blue-eyed, Kentuckian. “We have to do something. This is insane! How could this happen?” “Now, hold on, wait a minute.” He responded in a most condescending drawl. “What would a racist really have to gain from this?” Okay, here it was. Dialogue. “Well, maybe, it wasn’t racism. Maybe whoever did this felt so frustrated, so muted in light of recent events, that they felt that this was their only mode of communication.” That was a more palpable response to me. Maybe they weren’t attacking me? I was calmer. But, this wasn’t the answer my blonde haired, blue-eyed classmate was looking for. “Nah, you’re being too generous. See, what likely happened was that they wanted a reason to spark their cause. This gives it to them.” I couldn’t believe it. Was he really insinuating that black students would deface their role models? I felt the bubbles coming up again. I was mad again.

            My phone buzzes. Text message. Oh good. My HLS friends. The people I really should have talked to from the beginning. They’d stand in solidarity with me. I unlock my iphone. “lol protesters interrupting our class to whine at Minow.” Really, dude? But, what was I expecting? I suddenly remembered that time I stayed up until way too early in the morning with this blue-eyed charmer because he was arguing that the government couldn’t make stores sell goods and services to black people if the stores didn’t want to sell to black people. In the light most favorable to this guy, his text chain continued on to say that he merely thought that the disruptions were simply “bad optics” and that there was simply a better strategy for the blacklives matter movement to take. Yessir.

            Yesterday, I would have agreed. I would be mad at something like this. Today, I finally understand why the movement looks the way it does. You’re attacked and you have no idea what to do and the people that are supposed to do something don’t do anything and you look for support and there isn’t any and you just want to do something and you want to do something now because you feel like your existence is being challenged and because sometimes you feel like you’ve just had enough and you cant wait any longer. I’m sure you think that it sounds stupid to say there’s no time for rational thinking. But, today I feel like rational thinking is nothing more than what my white institutions have taught me to think. Yessir. Today, I just want to think in brown.

            I got a text from another friend. I shouldn’t expect much there either. This is the guy that always defends that girl that refuses to acknowledge my existence because I’m the wrong shade.  Not in the, “oh I think she’s cute and she doesn’t even know I’m there” type of acknowledge my existence. More of the, we stand in a group of five and all four get asked about their upcoming weekends but me “acknowledge my existence.” In case you didn’t get it, she likes her boys white. Oh, but I definitely got a good moral lesson about how I shouldn’t talk about that experience without her in the room from this friend of mine. That would equate to me talking bad about her behind her back and that was immoral. Yessir.

            But, I couldn’t be mad at him for that. This happened early in our acquaintance and I continued to befriend him. I had purposefully built this bubble where attacks on my skin color couldn’t harm me. Today, it burst.

            I felt attacked and had no one to go to battle with but myself. And it was my own fault. My internal politics had alienated me from my most logical allies.  Maybe if I hadn’t studied extra hard for that test and gone out to protest as an undergrad, I’d have friends that understood my hurt. After all, what good is my pristine GPA now? Maybe if I had been more honest and open and loud in law school, then I would have friends that understand my hurt. I don’t know if loud suits me. But, one thing is for sure. I’m done with the yessir’s and the no ma’am’s.