It’s common knowledge that when someone says something like, “No offense, but...” he or she is about to contradict him or herself. After watching a YouTube video making the rounds this week, we’re beginning to see those phrases as red flags. We’re talking about the video University of California — Los Angeles student Alexandra Wallace posted disparaging Asians she saw talking on phones in the school library.
In an instantly connected world, it’s more difficult to consider the plethora of consequences that result from posting racist caricatures. Once something’s on the Internet, it has a life of its own — especially if the topic is incendiary and the creator easily identifiable. Most of us understand this concept on at least a visceral level, but let’s take it a step farther. The fallout from this woman’s rant did not only affect her and the people she was railing against. She was acting as a representative of her university to the people who viewed her video without a previous UCLA experience. It’s bad enough to wreck her standing in society, but Wallace’s actions reflected poorly upon all American college students. After all, how could she get accepted into a prestigious school and advance this far in her education without considering her rant reprehensible?
It boils down to what our mothers told us. No, not, “If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all.” Sometimes you need to call someone out, and talking in the library might be one of those cases. We just ask that people think before they speak, especially when they’re speaking for others.
