I'm sorry this is coming out so late, but it took me a while to think about The Primary Source's offense and our response to "O Come All Ye Black Folk" as a university and a community.
I think our generation has a problem. Most of us have grown up comfortably: We have been far removed from war though war has not stopped, far removed from poverty though poverty has not stopped, and far removed from racism though, clearly, racism has not stopped. The Civil Rights Movement was our parents' generation; Jim Crow is only in skimmed chapters of history books.
I think the wool has been pulled over our eyes. We have ridden too long on the radical actions of previous generations. Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther King, Lucretia Mott: their triumphs have not been forgotten (in fact they are almost ruthlessly drilled into our heads), but I'm afraid they have been corrupted. We learn about the Civil Rights Movement as a fait accompli instead of a work in progress. Instead of being inspired to pick up the work of Alan Ginsberg, we feel like everything has been taken care of. Our generation has become stagnant, and I include myself completely when I say that.
I read "O Come All Ye Black Folk" and didn't think much of it at first. You would think that as a black freshman I'd be offended; the "satire" is about as close to a personal insult as it could be. But instead I frowned, thought about how closed-minded "some people" are and put it out of my mind.
I think most of us had or have this reaction and it took me a while to see how detrimental it is. We have been taught not to get upset, to be tolerant (which is important), but in all this teaching I think we've become numb. We're blind. We're so blind and numb that we cannot see brazen displays of hate-speech, and cannot get mad, even when it is put in front of us.
I think we need to get angrier as a generation. We need to reclaim our right to be outraged and find our generation's outlet for it. Of course we won't solve all the world's problems, and we may not solve anything, but we have to try. We have to pick up the thread where it has been left for us, and press forward so that our children have somewhere to start, somewhere to look for examples of courage and radical behavior. At the very least we'll get some good music or art out of it.
Kyle Halle-Erby is a freshman who has not yet declared a major.
