Student Outlook -- Matt Meredith

Dennis Rodman has been acceptably complacent lately. Trustee Wendy

Leece has not stirred up controversy with her conservative ploys in at

least a few weeks. There are not enough surfers in the winter for us to

care about sharks, the blueprints for the Costa Mesa skate park are

somewhere in the Bermuda Triangle and trustee Jim Ferryman has not caused

any new trouble.

Luckily, the Newport-Mesa area has a new issue, fresh out of the oven

and straight to your breakfast plates for shameless consumption: there

was a Confederate flag on the football field.

I am sure everyone has heard all about this infamous incident. A

Confederate flag -- yes, like the kind carried 140 years ago -- was

displayed during a Newport Harbor High School football game’s halftime

show, apparently as a historical reference. A few saw this symbol of

secession and were offended. Ugly words like “racism” were uttered,

paranoia spread like stray bullets and soon every upper-class white guy

in Newport Beach began to see his humble abode as the quasi Fort Sumter

it had always been.

Needless to say, the response to this issue was sad and disappointing.

First of all, the action that took place on the field was wildly, grossly

and quite absurdly misinterpreted. How could anyone in his right Yankee

mind see the event as anything but harmless and well-intentioned?

To think that the Newport Harbor band would purposely and blatantly

attempt to offend a group of people like that is downright ludicrous. To

take it to the next level, does anyone else see the irony? The whole show

was planned three months earlier, and it just so happens that Harbor is

playing a predominantly African-American team the night the performance

was executed. It was not a racist act, but an ill-fated misconception at

worst.

Secondly, these misinterpretations were harbored and fed by ignorance.

Soon, everyone was speaking of the racism exhibited by Harbor. Then,

everyone was speaking of how this issue had gotten out of hand. Shortly,

everyone will laugh at the absurdity of it all. People already laugh at

sexual harassment, remembering the man who was fired because he told a

dirty joke. People already laugh at environmental activists, remembering

the man who hugged a tree for days to save it. A bad example diminishes

the whole.

Racism is a problem, and not one to be taken lightly. Harbor

recognizes this, and is taking significant strides with Unity Month, the

Ambassador’s club, Advancement Via Individual Determination and more.

However, when people now think of racism in high school, they do not

think of the hundreds of students at one particular school that are

invisible or less than a person because of the color of their skin; they

think of a school waving a certain patterned piece of cloth at a sporting

event.

Racism will soon or already has become a joke because one harmless yet

ironic incident was taken out of context by yet another William Lloyd

Garrison.

So, let us give this issue a burial at sea and focus on something new.

Something pertinent to most people -- something that can really affect

any man at any time these days, but cannot get blown out of proportion.

What is both tangible and fresh? But of course: anthrax!

* MATT MEREDITH is a senior at Newport Harbor High School where he is

editor-in-chief of the Beacon. His columns will appear on an occasional

basis in the Community Forum section.