Shad's response Last week, Mississippi State’s spokesman Sid Salter went on statewide news and implied I was lying about Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion programs on campuses. These crazy DEI programs push ideas like “whiteness” is evil, and they waste money on big salaries and grants for nonsense like equity-based preschool yoga. Salter said that “is not what we’re doing at Mississippi State University” and “I don’t think it’s what we’re doing at the other universities in Mississippi.” This isn’t some slip of the tongue for him; it’s the second time this month he’s said something like this to statewide media. So let’s talk about why Sid is lying, with evidence taken straight from Mississippi State’s website. The truth is Mississippi State, like many universities, is shot through with crazy racial ideology. Examples: - The university issued a press release praising itself for “whiteness” research and its deep exploration of “white privilege.” Sid knows this because he was Chief Communications Officer for the university at the time. - The university also promoted a “Whiteness Seminar” during this period. Sid Salter, what is “whiteness”? We all know it would be obviously racist to praise someone if they did research claiming “blackness” was bad. So why is “whiteness” research any different? Mississippi taxpayers, who are footing the bill for this stuff, want to know. - Entire departments at State have released written statements professing loyalty to “antiracist” ideology, and if you haven’t heard of “antiracism,” the main idea behind it is the notion that “the only remedy to past discrimination is present discrimination.” It’s nuts. Sid Salter, why do whole university departments promote this brand of discrimination? How does this move Mississippi’s economy forward? Taxpayers want our universities to relentlessly focus on training the next generation of engineers, architects, and scientists—to be the engine that will power Mississippi’s economy. Wasting money on this garbage I describe above distracts from that. - These examples are just the tip of the iceberg at Mississippi State. There are hundreds of pages of research into topics like “systemic racism,” “colorblind racism” (whatever that means), “white privilege,” etc. This “whiteness” trash is weird and divides us as a state rather than brings us together. Universities need to only spend our taxpayer money on the things that make common sense.