A mandatory seminar at the University of Wisconsin Law School reportedly instructed first-year students to share racial slurs and emphasized that “there are no exceptional White people.”
The session, led by self-described “social justice educator” Joey Oteng, included activities such as reviewing materials claiming “colorblindness” negates the experiences of people of color and asking students to share slurs associated with minority groups.
“By saying we are not different, that you don’t see the color, you are also saying you don’t see your whiteness. This denies the people of colors’ experience of racism and your experience of privilege,” a pamphlet read.
“Re-orientation is intended to do just that – reorient you now that you have your first semester of law school behind you and a new semester ahead,” Devine wrote to students.
“Let’s first define racism with this formula: Racism =racial prejudice + systemic, institutional power. To say people of color can be racist, denies the power imbalance inherent in racism,” the pamphlet read.
The seminar was criticized for its approach, while the law school stated it was held to fulfill educational requirements on bias and racism.
The seminar “was held in partial fulfillment of ABA (American Bar Association) Standard 303’s requirement that law schools provide education to their students on ‘bias, cross-cultural competency, and racism,'” law school spokesman John Lucas stated.
“When it came to slurs about Black people, Native Americans, Asians and Middle Eastern people, it was a very serious moment. When it got to White people and the derogatory terms used for White people, [Oteng] was implying that it was okay to laugh at White slurs because White people don’t have any problems,” one student noted.
“The student body is being subject to nonsense that ignores the rule of law and true equality in favor of a racialized way of seeing the world,” Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty President and General Counsel Rick Eisenberg said.