Written by Nicholas Vetrisek
The Berkeley Unified School District recently announced that they will be renaming both Washington and Jefferson Elementary Schools as part of a broader “Resolution in Support of Black Lives Matter.” The resolution was passed unanimously by the Berkeley Unified School Board. Once again, the left has hit a hot button topic to attempt another win in the broader culture war.
The plan to rename Jefferson Elementary has been in the works since 2005. The death of George Floyd merely gave the board enough momentum to put it into effect. This fact alone shows that the intention was never to get rid of racist names, but to erase American history and culture. Like the statue controversies, I initially thought that this idea was ridiculous, but there’s really no denying it now. First, it was General Robert E. Lee, now it’s George Washington, next it will be Abraham Lincoln. After that, who knows?
Berkely Unified Board Member Ka’Dijah Brown even said it herself: “This is the first—but not the last—of our work around ensuring that we move from the thought of equity to excellence.” Yes, the change is symbolic, but symbols clearly mean something or they wouldn’t be there.
Brown went on to spew typical leftist rhetoric about the “school to prison pipeline” and “systemic racism” as if she was in Watts in 1962 and not 2020 Berkeley, one of the richest cities in the country. The area she represents is so progressive that there is probably more racism towards white people than black people.
After a discussion about the protests, Board Member Julie Sinai stated that “as a white person on this board who has two and a half years on this board to have an impact, I need to be uncomfortable, I need to be challenged.” Typical white savior complex. In an effort to feel superior and holier than thou, she seeks to be scolded like a toddler about issues that were solved more than half a century ago in order to Do Something™ about it. It’s a common affliction among white liberals that has yet to be explained: guilt over qualities that they can’t control, namely their race.
Brown’s statements about leftist buzzwords like the school to prison pipeline and school pushouts are so ridiculous that a response is almost unneeded. This article was originally going to be a highly detailed piece with facts and figures showing what a farce her claim is, but any response to it deserves the same amount of research and effort she put into her claim: zero. As Christopher Hitchens once said, “that which can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.”
This is not a battle worth fighting. Anyone that believes this garbage won’t be convinced otherwise and everyone that has been paying attention should be able to see through it. These attempts to erase names and topple monuments using buzzwords as justification are just attempting to use their vitriolic power to create perverse change.
