While we’ve been offering perspective on the discriminatory actions of reviewing instructors for their accents, the economic feasibility of graduate school and the change in the UA Main Library’s public hours, the rest of the Pac-12 has been delivering opinions on the notion of affirmative action and a college campus’ response to it, as well as racism and what justice means in modern America. Take a look at what the Pac-12 has to say:

California
The Daily Californian

“I noticed Berkeley College Republicans’ recent attempt at a satirical “Increase Diversity Bake Sale” kind of blew up in their collective face. If the goal was to merely create attention for their cause, then bravo, but the decision to create a “satire” challenging SB 185, which seeks to make affirmative action-type policies legal again, was a let-down…instead of delivering satire, you delivered a mean-spirited joke…the main problem with the “Increase Diversity Bake Sale” is of course, the pricing structure. While the higher cost of cookies for whites is analogous to the higher standards of admission whites might face if increasing racial diversity becomes a factor in university admissions, you failed to consider the hypersensitivity of modern day America on the issue of racism. Like it or not, an analogy like yours could be sensible enough, but when cheaper pricing is associated with minorities and women, the readily offensible (sic) P.C. crowd hones in on the link created between cheaper prices and a group’s general economic status. This was not the intention, but the fact is that people have always been sensitive to their income level, and today there is less shyness in pointing out anything that could potentially come across as racist.”

— “Berkeley College Republicans’ Yellowcake” by Christopher Coulter

Arizona State University

_The State Press _

“On Tuesday, the Berkeley College Republicans at UC Berkeley hosted their controversial ‘Increase Diversity Bake Sale.’ According to the L.A. Times, the event was designed to protest Senate Bill 185, a bill that would essentially reinstate affirmative action in California universities’ admissions process, by satirically pricing cookies and muffins based on race and gender: $2 for Caucasians, $1.5 for Asians, $1 for Latinos, $0.75 for African Americans, $0.25 for Native Americans and a $0.25 discount for women. The baking event was met with hundreds of angry student protesters, an unflattering media spotlight, and countless accusations of the event being ‘racist.’ But isn’t that exactly the point the Berkeley College Republicans were making? It was supposed to be racist — a reflection of the SB 185 bill itself…I don’t intend to marginalize the pain and suffering of victims of racial discrimination in America. It is the nature of democracy that minorities will get trampled — the French writer Alexis de Tocqueville called it the “tyranny of the majority,” and argued that it is the most oppressive social and political force on the earth — far more even than a tyrannical monarch or a cruel dictator. But discrimination has not been government-sanctioned since the ’50s, and now I think we can safely proclaim that it is no longer socially sanctioned either…It seems that when it comes to affirmative action, white people better take it with a nod and a smile or be instantly labeled a ‘racist.’”

— “Sticks and stones and cupcakes” by Daniel O’Connor

University of Oregon

Oregon Daily Emerald

“For every innocent man we put behind bars, and even more for every official execution within the United States, we prove to the world that we have no moral standing. We point to China, Russia and Middle Eastern regimes when we discuss secret prisons, barbaric punishments and the faults in the rule of law, but we need to focus the lens of scrutiny back on ourselves. Do we not imprison people without due process? Do we not torture? Do we not kill? It is a shame that in such a great country, we still employ Draconian punishments the rest of the westernized world has long since banned.

I call for an end to this barbarism. We must hold the system to the same standards it holds on us. We must use the tools we have such as the camera, the voice recorder and the Internet to capture truth and to expose abuse. Be not afraid because we deserve a more perfect union, but in order to ensure that happens we must not be afraid to act in our own defense.”

— “Justice requires public accountability” by Ian McKivor