2. Evergreen’s Day of Absence was not “reverse racism.”
In order for a propaganda campaign to succeed, it needs a Big Lie. At Evergreen, the Big Lie is that Evergreen’s Day of Absence demonstrated “reverse racism” as whites “were forced to leave campus because of the color of their skin.” It is stunning to us how often this “alternative fact” has been repeated until it has become unchallenged truth. The truth is that the Day of Absence has long been an accepted — and voluntary — practice at Evergreen. On the Day of Absence, people of color who chose to do so generally attended an off-campus event, while whites who chose to participate stayed on campus to attend lectures, workshops and discussions about how race and racism shape social structures and everyday life. Many classes embraced the opportunity of Day of Absence to focus attention on how racism has impacted their own disciplines. For instance: a scientist might choose to address how race has historically and inaccurately been traced to genetic differences. A filmmaker might look at the histories of exclusion of people of color from mainstream filmmaking, or cultural stereotypes of race. The Day of Absence follows an important tradition of caucusing, in which people who share a common identity find value in creating autonomous space to share experiences. At Evergreen the Day of Absence is always followed by a Day of Presence where people have the opportunity to reconnect to the larger community by participating in shared learning activities, including a keynote speaker, a performance, and workshops.

Last spring the organizers switched the two events; the event for students of color was held on-campus, and the event for white students was held off-campus. As always, participation in some form was assumed, but attendance at the events was voluntary; the announcement to the campus read, “On Day of Absence, you can choose how and where to participate.” Nevertheless, faculty member Bret Weinstein denounced it on the faculty listserv, arguing that the college was engaging in “a show of force” and that whites were being coerced to leave campus. Although numerous colleagues attempted to show Weinstein that he was mistaken, he persisted, urging the college to “set phenotype aside.”

Evergreen’s Director of First Peoples Multicultural Advising Services invited Weinstein to discuss and clarify the purpose of Day of Absence, but he never responded. As Evergreen professor Jon Davies put it in the Seattle Times, the Day of Absence is “always voluntary, always something people could participate in or not. To characterize it as mandated? It’s very hard to mandate anybody to do anything on this campus.”

On the April 12 Day of Absence, the off-campus event took place at a local church which had space for only 200 people. Since the white student body numbers about 2,800, it was obvious that more than 90 percent of white students would not be able to attend. Not all people of color chose to attend the on-campus event either. Many faculty who understood the principle of caucusing found ways instead to incorporate the discussions into their class themes.  For example, a class on natural disasters watched documentaries on the history of racism, and discussed how racism contributed to the damage caused by disasters such as Hurricane Katrina.

“Reverse racism” against whites (like “states’ rights”) has long been a key trope used to critique civil rights. Weinstein was espousing an ideology of “color-blindness” that denies the depths of racism in our society. H. Richard Milner IV, director of the Center for Urban Education at the University of Pittsburgh, explains that “color blindness” on the part of college faculty and staff contributes to “opportunity gaps,” as key parts of students’ identities and experiences go unseen. Weinstein’s opposition to the Day of Absence was part of his continuing campaign against the college’s equity emphasis, including our Equity Council’s proposal to prioritize the needs of struggling students of color and first-generation students.

When the Council made a mild suggestion that the college should actively recruit faculty (of any race) with the knowledge and skills to teach about race, Weinstein commented, “In order to find professors who are good at what we Evergreen professors do, we need the largest pool of applicants possible. If we are prioritizing race over everything else, we would succeed in finding those unusual professors much less often.” Essentially debunking affirmative action, Weinstein’s stance, similar to the Trump administration’s insistence that affirmative-action “discriminates” against whites in universities, ignored the history of exclusion of people of color from faculty positions, and failed to explain why faculty of color would not be equally adept at the teaching Evergreen values.

The misleading claim that the Day of Absence was “reverse racism” caused confusion on campus. Some faculty believed Weinstein’s claims of coercion, or out of a sense of humility or guilt they stayed away from campus, or suggested that their white students stay away. This confusion confirms one of the problems identified by our Equity Council: many faculty whose disciplines do not include extensive examination of race and culture sometimes lack the tools to address these issues in the classroom. (Imagine if a social scientist had started aggressively denying that humans cause climate change, and other social scientists found they were ill-equipped to address such denial in their classrooms.) The Council proposed that faculty trainings would deepen understanding of racism’s underlying institutional structures, rather than viewing it as merely individual guilt or “prejudice” that can be overcome with an “I don’t see color” reaction. Trainings would offer opportunities to listen to faculty, staff, and students who have studied or lived these realities for years or decades.