‘America Is the Land of Opportunity’: Microaggression on Campus!

Former U.S. Director of Homeland Security and current University of California President Janet Napolitano is reportedly training professors in the UC system how to avoid using alleged microaggresions, which now include such patriotic expressions as “America is the land of opportunity,” “There is only one race, the human race,” and “I believe the most qualified person should get the job.”

According to The College Fix, these documents were sent out earlier this year by Napolitano’s office as part of a series of faculty leadership training sessions, and brought to their attention only recently by a UC faculty member. Other sayings deemed unacceptable include:

• “Everyone can succeed in this society, if they work hard enough.”
• “Where are you from or where were you born?”
• “Affirmative action is racist.”
• “When I look at you, I don’t see color.”

In one handout labeled as a “Tool for Identifying Implicit Bias,” educators are told not to use the phrase “raising the bar” because it is “elitist.”

Another curious choice The College Fix points to is a reference of a Supreme Court decision that is at odds with the views of a group of Michigan voters who sought to ban race preferences in college admissions. Obama-appointed justice Sonia Sotomayor suggested that the case is founded in discrimination. It is suggested that the case’s inclusion in the classroom could convey the message that a faculty member’s approval of race-neutral admissions policies is a microaggression as well.

The seminars are reportedly intended to help faculty identify and “interrupt” microaggressions. They also include tools to aid professors in considering whether to nominate an Asian-American female colleague for tenure, The College Fix notes.

Harvard is in the midst of a heated lawsuit alleging the Ivy league school holds Asian students to a much higher standard during its admissions process. And some college admissions counselors in California and elsewhere have been coaching Asian-American students to appear “less Asian” in an attempt to help them be accepted into the nation’s most elite schools.

In March of this year, Breitbart News broke a national story about UC Irvine’s student government banning the American flag from flying on one of the school’s common areas in order to avoid “triggering” hurt feelings among illegal immigrants.

Follow Adelle Nazarian on Twitter @AdelleNaz and on Facebook.