This memo from the Nettleton Middle School divides student offices by race.

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

(There are new reports that two of the four school administrators are black and they are saying it was a misguided attempt at affirmative action.) I’m not buying it. Limiting the blacks to a handful of seats and determining the race by the race of the student’s mother are not the elements of affirmative action. And, in particular, the fact (at least according to the news) that some administrators are black has no effect in my mind on whether or not it’s discrimination. Someday, people are going to have to wake up and decide that blacks have actual individuals in their midst who have their own points of view, do bad things, do good things, believe wonderful things, believe moronic things and just generally do that human being thing. That a black person says something about other blacks does not make it okay. That a (fill in the blank) says or does something that involves the (fill in the blank) race does not make it okay. Got it?

James Pilant