On Tuesday, the Berkeley College Republicans held a highly publicized bake sale, that garnered national attention. (The ongoing campus saga and its repercussions can be followed at the student newspaper's Bake Sale page.) The sale's cupcake prices -- meant to point out how "racist" affirmative action measures are -- were based on customers' race and gender.
Price List from the BCR Facebook Page:
White/Caucasian: $2.00
Asian/Asian American: $1.50
Latino/Hispanic: $1.00
Black/ African American: $0.75
Native American: $0.25
$0.25 OFF FOR ALL WOMEN!
The stunt was a half-baked replay of a similar action the College Republicans had taken in 2003 -- and on other campuses around the country in the past decade -- and as such, it was
protested vehemently. It's surprising how hurtful and uncomplicated these Republican groups' understanding of race and gender issues can be.
Or is it?
What if the Berkeley College Republicans are much more aware of race and gender issues than we realize, and we're just failing to give them credit? What if they were trying to bring up legitimate critiques of the University's admissions process?
Below is a short story that was postered around the UC Berkeley campus on the day of the Bake Sale.
With the show of hands, it was settled: nine in favor and three against the “Increase Diversity Bake Sale,” and it passed modified consensus, without any major objections. Derrick, who had been taking the meeting’s minutes, tallied the votes and once done, indicated to the facilitator that he was ready to transcribe what followed. As President of the Berkeley College Republicans, Sean knew that this protest would be their most visible action in recent memory and felt it appropriate to share a brief reflection on their vote.
“Folks, I just want to say how excited I’ve been to do something like this for a long time. It feels like the culmination of all the anti-racist workshops we joined on campus last year and then started running in the spring. I know that there are some regrets that we couldn’t use this demonstration to touch on all of the issues that we care about” – Sean gave a knowing look to the three thumbs-sideways votes – “but the campus dialogue needs to start somewhere, and it was said many times in our discussions that we can’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good. To me, the metric of success for the ‘Increase Diversity Bake Sale’ will be whether or not we are able to ignite a campus-wide discussion on race and gender.”
The meeting minutes – as well as those of the previous two meetings and a few sub-committees – touched repeatedly on a few contentious issues for the group. At times, it had felt they were running in circles. Sean himself was the most disappointed that the demonstration would not reflect the access of transgender people in the admissions process: the pay scale for the cookies was “locked into the oppressive logic of the gender binary” as he put it a few times. On the first occasion, he asked aloud “Who else’s story are we writing out of our bake sale?” and after a few moments of thoughtful reflection, someone (the minutes are unclear at this point) raised their hand to make a direct response, “Mixed-race identified people.” In the end, the group decided that using the same logic of binaries and single-race categories as the university admissions department would point out its perversity all the more starkly.
Until this final vote, it was not clear whether a demonstration would ever have taken place. The group had already voted down the “Real World Bake Sale” in which the prices were inverted: “White” “Men” getting cookies for free with prices on the scale up to “Native American” “Men” who would pay $1.75, with a surcharge of $0.25 for anyone the seller judged to present as female identified. The problem with such a demonstration was that it was too “distant,” as Vice-President Mya put it, “speaking to inequalities across society,” rather than the dynamics of the Republicans’ own campus community here and now. Morale reached a low after the “Real World” demonstration was voted down, re-proposed, and voted down a second time at the end of the previous week’s meeting. Their new idea, to “Increase Diversity,” appeared as though it would suffer the same fate, until Sean – its most vocal critic – had changed his vote in the last moment. He knew on a level of emotion, rather than reason, that this would be an important step for the College Republicans.
He concluded his closing speech, “My deepest hope is that the campus community will take the time to reflect on our peaceful protest and will respectfully join us in fighting oppression.”