Sitting cross-legged last Friday evening on a wooden deck, wind in the trees above me and the murmur of a lake in the background, I found myself opening up to a circe of eight strangers about one of the more difficult experiences in my life: a time when I, as a black woman, had been treated differently because of my race.
As I gazed around the circle of Ole Miss students that made up my group - one of eight small groups at the past weekend's One Mississipp Retreat at a lakeside camp in Louisville - I felt certain the three black students there would understand the all-too familiar feeling of exclusion, anger and hurt I was trying to convey.
I only hoped the white students in the group would not feel offended by my honesty or, through their silence or blank stares, make me feel as though stories like mine were hard to believe or easily dismissed as isolated incidents at a great American public university like our own.
The response I got both surprised and shamed me.
The white students in my group empathized and condemned the treatment I received; they too shared moments of feeling disconnected and unwelcome at Ole Miss when stepping into a room where most of the faces were a few shades darker than their own.
They understood exclusion, anger and hurt as well as I did.
They wanted as badly as I to make sure our campus became a place where the kind of behaviors that sparked those emotions were non-existent.
It was the first of many moments of clarity I had during my three-day experience at the retreat.
My understanding came in bits and pieces: through conversations and laughs in large and small groups, over buffet spreads at meals, in cabins of stacked bunks, at a Saturday night dance that I spent cheek to cheek with white and black males, in unity circles and walks through wooded trails.
I realized that both the inherited, institutional and self-imposed social segregation at Ole Miss is held together by the most tenuous of strands.
With an open mind and commitment to, ahem, changing the culture, students like the 80 of us can rip those strands and create new methods of tying ourselves together that will aid in personal student growth and improve the atmosphere of the university.
Yet, from my experience as editor of this newspaper, I have also come to realize there are many in this community who deny that the atmosphere needs to be improved or that students of diverse backgrounds need to be brought together.
I have received letters and phone calls from some who deny that racist and discriminatory behavior still exist in any form at Ole Miss, and don't want to hear anything else about either.
Others acknowledge the groups of separate races and ethnicities clustered around tables in the Union, the predominantly white crowd at bars on the Square, the predominantly black crowd at the Southern Breeze - but don't believe it is within anyone's power, right, responsibility or desire to create change.
In the words of Anita Parrott George, a civil rights and anti-racism activist who roused us all with her speech at the retreat, the power to combat social segregation is within ourselves.
As members of the Ole Miss family, we have the right and the responsbility to do what we can to make this a place where we all feel connected.
After spending time with the other 79 students at the One Mississippi Retreat, I know there at least 80 people on this campus who desire change.
The retreat trip is over, but a new journey is just beginning.
It will require communication, effort, time and patience, but the goal of an integrated, diverse Ole Miss is worth the work it takes to get there.
I started the retreat in a circle of unity and compassion and I ended it in a circle of unity and compassion.
Now that we are all back on the Ole Miss campus and back to our old routine, may the circle be unbroken.
-Marti Covington, Editor
This weekend's Respect Mississippi Retreat was an eye-opening experience for this Midwestern white kid. Let me be the first to admit, issues like racism and social segregation have not been high on my list of priorities during my time in Oxford.
Apathy, in fact, was quickly identified as a primary stumbling block to achieving the sort of social integration envisioned on the retreat.
Like a typical white student here, I have a handful of black friends. I don't use racial slurs, I am more a fan of Grant than Lee and I appreciate the music of Kanye West. If I'm not part of the problem, why should I be part of the solution?
This weekend, I came to realize that my position, while convenient, was rather narrow-minded. Maybe I'm still brainwashed from all the group building and hand holding, but I discovered this weekend that something really does need to change. But what?
As a group we were asked to picture in our minds a campus without social segregation. Looking around the room after that challenge, I have never seen so many smart people looking so bewildered. So much for beginning with the end in mind, but we had to start some place.
So we discussed and listened and said things in mixed company that we were embarrassed to say. Over the course of a weekend, the elephant in the room gave way to wisdom. Never mind campaigns and elections, opposing political world views or (most obviously) the range of skin tones. We were successful in finding some common ground, but translating that into a plan of action is a much more ambitious endeavor.
We would have to break down the apathy to convince the white pre-med student she'd need to learn to communicate with her future black patients.
We would have to convince the black Alpha that The University of Mississippi could be more than Ole Miss.
We would need to create events that were not just black events or white events. We would need to understand why the dorms seem to have black floors and white floors. We would need to know why Night Town is white on Monday and black on Friday.
There are plenty of problems to be solved one by one. They won't happen quickly, and you may not notice the difference, but my eyes are a little more open.
Respect Mississippi is a step in the right direction. Let's make sure it becomes a springboard for a more inclusive university.
-Eddie Smith, Opinion Editior
