Will Obama visit Hampton University??

So a few days ago on Twitter, as I was looking through recent tweets by people I am following, and I came across one that stood out:

@MissMedinaJ Miss HU is NOT black… Hmmm

and then more followed:

@MissMedinaJ The bitch is NOT black… And wrote a letter to the local paper… RT @Ms_ISA: Huh?! RT @MissMedinaJ: Miss HU is NOT black… Hmmm

@MissMedinaJ I did NOT attend a HBCU for a white female to represent me.

@MissMedinaJ Do u know why? Bc she doesn’t even attend MAIN campus!!! RT @jayhenny: @jayhenny have u even seen her before??? (via @MissMedinaJ) hell no

@MissMedinaJ RT @Errrkkaa: So whos gonna throw away their childs recruitment letters from Hampton? I kno I will…no HBCU for my children Ivy league only

@MissMedinaJ I said the same thing! RT @Love2bbri: RT @Love_Ley: Token ass Hampton…..lol I bet Howard would neva do no dumb shit like dis!

@MissMedinaJ I don’t want to hear your opinion about #MissHampton being white unless you attend/attended a HBCU #pardonMYback

@MissMedinaJ Conclusion: Because President Obama is black I have to accept a white female as #MissHampton. (Is this what change is really about?)

@MissMedinaJ #MissHampton is white and my intial reaction is disgust but apprently I should be in support of it bc our president is black @blackfacemusic

@MissMedinaJ @blackfacemusic she doesn’t even attend main campus. She attends va beach which has a total of 90students.

@MissMedinaJ @blackfacemusic (cont) she doesn’t represent hu she hasn’t even experienced it

I attempted to ask why my fellow twitterer was upset over a non-black person winning this post, that would in turn represent the almost 6,000 students of this HBCU, Hampton University, the only quasi-response I got was:@MissMedinaJ I don’t want to hear your opinion about #MissHampton being white unless you attend/attended a HBCU #pardonMYback.

This response is the reason for this blog post. So let’s get into the nitty gritty of it all. We have Nikole Churchill, who according to http://blogs.dailymail.com/donsurber/archives/1467 father is from Guam and mother is Italian, that won the Miss Hampton University scholarship pageant. She ran against 9 black students, and to note again, at a Historically Black university. Apparently the charges against her are 1) she doesn’t attend the main campus with the bulk of the population of the university, and instead attends a satellite campus consisting of about 90 students compared to the 5700 on the main campus. 2) she is not black.

Like Ms. Churchill, I attend a satellite campus (that houses roughly 10% of the overall population). Like Ms. Churchill I entered a competition and won, I am the President of the Graduate Student Body at Brooklyn College-CUNY, my major is Urban Policy and Administration and I attend classes at 25 Broadway AKA the Graduate Center for Worker Education at Brooklyn College, a satellite campus (out of borough actually as the main campus is in Brooklyn and my classes are housed in Manhattan). I do struggle to find any sliver of cogency in this claim (1). She is obviously a student at the University so to say she can’t “represent” the university because she doesn’t frequent a particular part of the university is by far the most absurd thing I have heard. I wont even go on any further as I don’t wish to give any credence to this trivial claim. So onto claim (2): She is not black.

Regarding claim (2), I think by asking one simple question we can give validity to this claim: Is being black a requirement to participate in the pageant? If you can answer in the affirmative then this blog is meaningless and I shall concede. (I will be waiting for an answer)

I can’t help but wonder why there has been no uproar over the her ability of being “allowed” to participate in the pageant based on claim (1) or claim (2). Thus I find it hard to understand why the uproar over her winning. Correct me if I am wrong but I do not believe being black is the criteria for being accepted to a HBCU or for being allowed to partake in the campus activities. Again, I find it hard to understand the uproar over her winning.

Lastly, I must address the comment: “@MissMedinaJ I did NOT attend a HBCU for a white female to represent me.”

Food for thought: Hampton University, in the great state of Virginia (birth of slavery in the United States), was one of the many universities birthed by the Freedman’s Bureau. The Freedman’s Bureau was established, to help slaves get education and other social amenities, by President Lincoln and Congress during the last years of the Civil War. Most of the Commissioners or Agents of this Bureau were high-ranking members of the military (all white) and subsequently the majority of HBCU’s are named (in some relation) after their founders (most likely an agent of the bureau). So while you may not want a “white female” representing you, if it wasn’t for a white person (man to be exact) you wouldn’t be where you’re at (literally). Every time you say HU it acknowledges the benevolence of a white man who founded a university to inscribe his legacy in history for centuries to come. Your attendance at this university pays homage to him and your degree, once conferred, establishes you as a representative of him and his university.

Perhaps  @MissMedinaJ is right and Howard wouldn’t do something like this, but perhaps another incident at another HBCU would garner a similar outrage:

Remember this http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,356296,00.html.

Tags: Barak Obama, beauty, Black, Hampton University, HBCU, Howard University, HU, Miss Hampton University, Nikole Churchill, obama, pageant, racism, racist, twitter, white