A new YouTube video has surfaced that once again illustrates just how far we, as a society, are failing the younger generations. At the University of California, Berkeley, several students objected to an exam and demanded the instructor provide them with a “take-home essay with significant time to prepare.” And what was the brilliant reason for this request?
"Our well-beings are being put on the line because of our emotional, mental, and physical stress that [Berkeley] is compounding with what is already going on in our everyday lives,” one of the students in the video proclaimed.
Another student had this to say:
"The content of this class and the way it is being taught is not satisfactory. And even if it is ... we feel that we haven't had the opportunity to interact with the text and information. We demand that you make and [hold space] to [study] the voices of students of color.”
Students arrived at the classroom as usual; most of them prepared to take the scheduled exam. They weren’t prepared, however, for a few of their classmates to demand special privileges because they are students of color. The protesters claimed they needed extra consideration, including time and a “space” to take the test (other than the classroom, of course) because of the natural disasters happening in their home countries.
The video – which was taken under the cover of a desk from an unknown student’s lap – is a prime example of students using whatever methods they can think of to get “privileges” because of their color or heritage while also screaming out against “white privilege.” The ironic idiocy of all this nonsense knows no bounds.
The protesting students did not ask for a meeting with the instructor to talk about their concerns. They deliberately interrupted the class, wasting the other students’ time (and money) with their bogus claims. If they had talked about personal experiences such as family members still missing or worse, it would be a little more understandable, but it still should have been discussed privately with the instructor.
Wearing a striped dress and tennis shoes, a female protester said:
“We are talking about communities of color. You have people in our homelands who are experiencing devastation ... students that are undocumented ... how can you [inaudible] to prepare for this exam with all this going on?”
Apparently, she didn’t get the memo that life still needs to go on. Yes, it’s a tragedy, and we all feel remorse and empathy. Thousands of people are doing what they can to help. But, the world still needs to spin on its axis. We still need to continue with our lives; working, going to school, taking care of our children and so on.
The context of the protest started out as an outrage that students should be taking an exam when so many people were devastated by the recent hurricanes and earthquake. But it didn’t take long for the entitled “children” to blame it on white privilege.
During the long, drawn-out protest, a student asked if the speeches were a filibuster, and was met with an angry response from a female protester wearing a shirt blazing with the caption: “Caution. Educated Student of Color.”
“You listen! You have to listen, okay? Listen to us, okay? You talk so much already, okay?... Are you trying to silence us right now? Is that what you're trying to do?” The student told the belligerent female, “I’m trying to take my test,” and was again verbally attacked by a male protestor who said, “We’re trying to live our lives … white boy with privilege.”
This “educated student of color,” with her nose ring and angry posture, definitely sounded refined as she dropped the “F” bomb in nearly every sentence.
When Professor Harley Shaiken tried to speak, the protesters kept interrupting him or rolled their eyes when he did get a chance to communicate. It was obvious by their body language that the young, entitled protesters didn’t care what he had to say and were listening with a deaf ear. Professor Shaiken spoke of the right to free speech and his belief in it (which is probably why he let them torment the classroom for so long), but that there was a time and place for everything. He spoke of the demonstrations in Guatemala to have the president there impeached and imprisoned. “Anyone who marched in those was truly risking their lives,” he said.
“At the University of San Carlos, which we are in touch with, they held classes, they gave exams. You may disagree with it — and I respect your opinion for disagreeing with it; I respect you getting up here and stating your disagreements — but with that, we are going to go ahead with the exam, not despite the demonstrations, but to show that all of us, as part of a community, are capable of doing what a university does absent that kind of interference. Otherwise, anytime 25, 50, or 1,000 people want to stop this dead, it becomes their possibility, and we've demonstrated that that's what will happen.”
The protesters were not happy and said they were going to take the matter to the school superintendent then left the classroom – without taking the test of course.
Then, Miss Educated herself had to stop to berate the students still trying to take the exam. While jutting her hip out angrily and pointing an accusing finger, she said:
“I don’t know why you’re still, like, sitting down, y’all. I don’t understand. I really don’t understand. Y’all can take your f**king test, but people are dying out there. ... Y’all can take your test, but this [university is] protecting white supremacists, and y’all are protecting them, too.”
Perhaps if these protesters used the time they spent dreaming up reasons to cause dissension and revolt and instead turned that time towards their studies, they would graduate and find a good paying job and join the ranks of “white privilege.”
Lord help us if this is indicative of our future.
