How do you know the race of the people that approached you? I am Hispanic, and have many friends that are both caucasian and Hispanic (yes, some of them look "white"). On so many occasions, I have had to ask my Hispanic friends to stop saying things because it made me so uncomfortable. I have heard racist slurs from Hispanics AND black students directed at other Hispanics, other black students, Asians (many, many times), Jews (many, many times), and other minorities. I have also heard it from my white friends. Should we make a plea that no Asians should come here because I once witnessed a drunk Hispanic person taunt an Asian student that he didn't know?

To discuss race is fine, and I would agree that I have seen an alarming amount on campus, but to define racism on Penn's campus as white on black, and to plea for all HIspanics and black students to not come here because of that incident seems like an over-simplification of a more complicated issue.

It's incredibly unfair the blame the university because you feel like you don't belong, or because you had a run in with some drunk racist students.

Freshman year when I came out as a lesbian to my hall mates, one of my friends stopped talking to me. Last spring some drunk guys on Baltimore threw full beer cans at my girlfriend and me as we walked home holding hands. Last week in Hill someone called me a dyke. Sometimes, being a minority sucks, and sometimes it's really painful. But it's not Penn's fault.

I grew up in a sheltered, liberal environment, and it blew my mind that there are people at Penn who are homophobic. At Penn! In my community! Thanks for the wake up call, Penn, because I'm sure there are a whole lot more intolerant people in the real world. And thanks for having resources to help.

Penn would be doing all of it's students a disservice by not accepting some ignorant students. It's Penn's job to get a bunch of brilliant young people from diverse backgrounds together, and it's our job as students to spend the next four years teaching and learning from each other. Penn provides many different student groups and resources to facilitate minority events and education. If you want our school to be more welcoming, take advantage of them, and encourage your peers (especially underclassmen) to do the same. Some incoming freshman have probably never met a black person, or a gay person, or a Jewish person. It's also not Penn's fault that not enough qualified black males apply, and by discouraging them, you're making the problem worse.

If you want to belong here, prove that you do. Find the resources you need to feel safe. Find people who make you feel accepted. If you're graduating cum laude and you're from such a disadvantaged background, then I'm surprised you haven't taken a more positive initiative. An article like this will only weaken and shrink our minority communities by discouraging students form applying. This is college, not high school, we are adults, and it's up to us as students to proactively define our school.

It's disingenuous to claim that Penn has no accountability for fostering a healthy and productive academic environment. It's one thing to allow prejudiced people admittance into the university, but it's another thing entirely to allow their ignorance free reign. Students have a responsibility to cultivate an accepting environment among their peers, but no amount of student activism can counteract what amounts to the administration's tacit endorsement of this sort of goonish, drunken, racist culture.

It's great that some minority members at Penn are able to overcome the outrageous levels of adversity and discrimination in the academic environment, but it should not be obligatory. The best way to eliminate discrimination in the world is to foster a culture that refuses to tolerate racism.

I think the biggest cause for concern about this article is the prevalence of microaggressions against minorities on campus. Whether it's to racial minorities, sexual minorities, religious, whatever -- the subtle prejudices show that many Penn students still harbor attitudes that are hurtful to their peers. I've seen my own friends drop those subtle comments, citing everything from "It's harmless" to "It's their [the minorities] fault for being so self-segregating" when I bring the issue up.

True, it's not everyone. In fact, it might be just a small amount of students. I've even seen comments from other related articles that criticize the racial climate of Philadelphia in general for facilitating this environment. But when you're on the receiving end, hearing these types of things from students who are your equal peers, even one instance is hurtful.

True, Penn has the resources, safe spaces, and population of sympathetic, understanding students willing to rise up against racism. But as a top-tier institution whose graduates are likely to go far in society, there is also still a surprisingly pervasive racist subtlety amongst the students at this school. The social structures of this school allow these types of thought to fester, and no one is there to shake their head and tell you to play nice.

Don't write off this article, or Chris's experiences, because you disagree with the conclusion of warning minorities not to come to Penn. Before I came to Penn, I would've liked to know that this type of attitude did sometimes exist here -- it certainly wasn't like anything I had experienced before college. I know there is a lot each minority student can do to make their experience better, but that doesn't mean the rest of campus can't meet them halfway. As fellow students, we should be reevaluating the incidents and overall attitude of undergrad life at Penn and act as a community to make every student feel more comfortable. I don't know when it became socially acceptable to engage in racist behavior, but we need to recall those elementary school lessons on how we should properly treat our classmates.

Let's not consider Fling and extreme intoxication. Let's not blame poor upbringing or wider society. Let's certainly not permit that some people remain - despite the efforts of so many to the contrary - stupid, ignorant assholes.

Instead, let's blame one of the most diverse and welcoming schools in the nation. And, as a solution, let's encourage minorities not to come here anymore.

That makes a lot of sense.

We have to understand that "Penn is a lot different from most schools?" Yeah. It's better and a hell of a lot more tolerant.

Your charge that few black men attend college? Is that really Penn's fault, or the fault of a much larger set of problems in sore need of fixing?

Look at Penn's rich fabric of minority groups and coalitions. Look at the many avenues they have for direct administrative access, and the pains that our University takes to correct many perceived wrongs. More broadly, look at the passion which so many Penn students - of every creed and color - pour into West Philly schools.

These are not indicators of a racist institution.

Sorry for your experience, but your blame is misplaced, and your "solution" is wrong.

Needless to say, I am disappointed by much of the feedback from individuals who seem to be your peers, Christopher. It is also clear to me that quite a few people chose not to take the optional class on race. Had they taken the "optional" class, they would know how to define racism. Racism is not just about little comments people make within or between groups. Instead, racism is about POWER and about how institutions in our country are set up to protect and privilege those with racial and class power. This is not just about unruly and drunk students, it's also about an institutions that allows public drunkenness to be displayed, reeking havoc on the entire community and instead of punishing these students, it is allowed to happen and the institution even has its own police force so that when students are detained, they can ensure "a slap on the wrist". It's about an institution whose police accost black male students and accuse them of having guns when they don't (it happened just this week), but allows white students to spew filth in drunken rage.

I'm truly disappointed...why? I hear a Hispanic person saying to you, we all do it, it's not Penn. I hear a lesbian telling you 'get over it and join a student group' I hear let's protect Penn and not call them out for their role in allowing the filth from larger society to seep into it's fabric

What I don't hear is compassion for a student who is hurting right now. What I don't hear is outrage against these disgusting acts - outrage that a high performing Black male came to Penn and was successful academically, but is still made to feel like an outsider. I hear lots of excuses for Penn and frankly, if you can't have empathy and compassion then you've totally missed the boat on how to move forward. You have to start with validating the negative experiences of your peers before you can begin to organize around them.

I know Penn all too well as a doctoral student who has worked diligently to make change. You can fight and work all you want, but at the end of the day, when you're tired from studying, working, and fighting, you're a human being and being called a "nigger" hurts - it hurts enough to make you feel like telling Black student not to come to Penn, not to subject themselves to the inhumanity of the people here and an institution that allows UNsafe spaces to thrive.

The only way to fix this problem is to resettle all non-native peoples to their respective homelands by force if necessary.

@OGK: While the blatant racism that the author experienced was undeniably inappropriate, this article is not solely about racism at Penn and an urge for greater campus-wide tolerance of minorities. Greater acceptance is always the ultimate goal, and one that the above commenters (and myself) do not deny or call into question.

However, some of the specific tactics and comments that the author makes are indeed questionable. His desire to dissuade minority students from attending Penn is misguided. If racism exists here, at a relatively liberal and progressive school, does anyone believe that it doesn't exist in some form at every other university in the nation? Racism is ubiquitous, and it is obviously impossible for a university to know every opinion harbored by every student it admits.

Rather, one, especially a minority student, should be encouraged to choose a university with a diverse student body and a myriad of minority advocacy groups, much like Penn. So I think the author's insistence that minorities not choose to attend Penn is very backwards.

Additionally, he again faults the university for the fact that he counted only two black men among visiting pre-freshmen. Besides the fact that black men only comprise between 1-in-15 and 1-in-20 of the total population of the country, Penn and other elite private institutions already practice de facto affirmative action. So while some may contend that the university is not doing enough to increase its minority population, it certainly does make efforts to accept qualified (underrepresented) minority students - at greater rates than whites and Asians, might I add. In any event, a perceived dearth of minority students at Penn is at least as much the fault of greater political, economic, and social issues than it is of the university.

Also, on a lesser note, I find it a bit sad that someone, especially a minority student, would view race in such simplistic terms as to note that he counted zero Hispanic students among the pre-freshmen he encountered. While it certainly may be true that he did not pass any Hispanic pre-freshmen, one should know that what a "Hispanic" person (or a person of any race) looks like does not always fit neatly into a certain phenotypic ideal or stereotype.

My point is that, while the argument that Penn should do a greater job to combat racism among its student body may certainly be valid one, many of the author's points of attack are misplaced, and that's the charge that this comment and some of those above have made - not that the incident that occurred to the author is insignificant or that greater tolerance and acceptance of minorities at Penn is unnecessary.

You're a white racist?

Can we please take some time and focus on the people who are actually in the wrong here? That is to say, the white upenn students who were extremely racist, with one white student actually calling Chris a nigger? Please, can we focus on their actions, and the culture around them that lets them think this is okay?

I see a lot of nitpicking about Chris's reaction to being called a nigger. You know what? Sure, we as a student body and a people don't have to agree with the author 100%. I suppose it could be productive to figure out what the author's perfect response should have been, what an ideal version of the author's thoughts would be. However, I personally would ask of us: can we please stand in solidarity with someone in our community who was just called a nigger, by someone who's also supposed to be one of us?

Seriously. What is wrong with y'all?

Two points --

This column also mentions that Abreu is College of Liberal and Professional Studies, which from I understand is targeted at "adult" students. Might it be possible to say that his undergraduate experience and community has been different from that of standard undergrads?

Also, judging from his email, I'm guessing he's probably 28 or 29 years old? Perhaps the fact that he looks older led the white students he encountered to challenge his status of "belonging?"

I don't condone what the white students did; that was unequivocally wrong in my eyes. However, I do feel there is probably more at play than what it seems at the surface, in terms of Abreu's particular context and academic experience. Too many moving parts here to draw much of a conclusion.

P.S. Abreu seems to equate "minority" with black and Hispanic. I'm an Asian Penn alum, and while we are perhaps not "underrepresented" per se, it seems like a bit of hyperbole/generalization for him to say "I would not encourage minority students to attend Penn" due to his experience.

If this occurred during Spring Fling (when many students from other schools visit Penn), or even at some other time, it's very possible that the culprits weren't even Penn students. A lot of assumptions being made in this column, it seems to me.

Which is not to say that the described conduct is any less reprehensible, or should not be totally condemned. It's just not clear that Penn, as an institution, should be condemned for this. To the contrary, Penn constantly goes out of its way to promote and welcome diversity, starting at the very top (see President Gutmann's Penn Compact).

It's important to note that this occurred on 4/10-11/11 and not during Fling.

The more I think about it, the more I think minorities should take their money somewhere else in these situations. It worked for the bus boycott in the 60s. This whole "changing the attitudes" thing is b.s. How are you gonna change a bunch of rich white kids attitudes (in this case), or anyone else's for that matter? It is kind of a ludicrous notion. If you can't even walk down the street at night without being harassed, then take your tuition money somewhere else.

Maybe the way to get the university to take this seriously is low enrollment numbers and poor diversity scores. Maybe then they would address issues like this seriously.

MC, you say perhaps the fact that Abreu looks old is why the students questioned his belonging? After they called him the N-word and speaking to him in mock slang? Come on.

I think we need to cut Abreu some slack here - I agree that it would certainly not make much sense to discourage minority students to attend Penn - it's diversity was a plus I did consider when I chose to enroll here, I am mixed race, a minority without much of a community at all. I realized pretty quickly though, that despite the numbers showing diversity, people here tend to segregate into their ethnic/religious communities, which often correlate with certain interests in the arts, traditions, etc. It has been more challenging for me to find "my place" since there is no pinpointing of a community for me, but not that I would really want that - I am blessed to be friends with people across racial boundaries.

It is up to everyone to choose how comfortable they feel with people different from them, how wide they want to expand their horizon in that sense - I don't think it is right to condemn people who choose to stay in their tighter circle if that's where they feel best. But what is UNDISPUTEDLY condemnable is intolerance. Stick to your group, but how dare you attack someone else. I think Abreu's emotions are speaking when he says he was counting the black males in a crowd, and yes, there really is no prototype "latino." I believe Abreu's statements are the result of indescribable hurt. He says himself: "Maybe I'm writing this to make myself feel better." The rest of the world may certainly be as racist, if not more racist, than Penn. But just because everyone else is doing it, does not for one minute excuse the disgusting behavior of the racist individual. If we have that problem in society, why don't we start small, start here, at Penn. I find the attempts of justifying or diluting the wrongfulness of this racist behavior startling and completely misplaced. Whether the racists are drunk, high, actually white-looking hispanics or just a Penn-styled subset of the wider world's racial discrimination in no way makes them more acceptable. Their actions are disgraceful, their morals severely twisted.

I think many individuals, minorities or not, are very sensitive to these issues. Sometimes I feel out of place here to the point where I want to pack up and leave. Like that time I went to a Jewish party and the guy at the door said to me and my Vietnamese friend "Ew, what are these Chinese people doing here?!". This guy is a Penn student. It wasn't Fling. I am not older-looking. It is my ethnicity that equates me as not belonging. I think this is what Abreu is talking about when he talks about his feeling throughout his time at Penn, the most recent occurrence is just so outrageous that it made him speak up. It shouldn't even be a question - Penn must aim to build a tolerant community, in whatever ways it can. Unfortunately a few racist individuals overshadow the many more tolerant ones. But nothing justifies intolerance, at Penn or elsewhere.

The United Minorities Council (founded 1978) provides a forum of advocacy, reflection, and action on issues of concern for ALL minorities at the University of Pennsylvania.

In our following GBM this Wednesday we will be exploring the idea of racism at Penn in response to this article. Christopher Abreu will also be there to share his story and participate in the discussion on how to move forward.

There will also be Mexican/Spanish Food.

Find more info and RSVP here: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=164236986966279

I am Mexican and hence I am a minority. While I understand your concern for racism and I fully support it, your solution is not at all useful. Of course I hear jokes about Mexicans having to clean up or not being able to speak English correctly or even about going back to Mexico to sell drugs, but that would never make me try to dissuade Mexican students from coming to Penn. If at all, I would encourage more Mexicans to come to Penn because only then can sufficient people realize that we are not like the stereotypes indicate. The more Mexicans, the merrier. If we are going to address racism we ought to do so with a working solution, not run away from it. I chose to come to Penn because it is the Ivy with the highest degree of international students and by convincing other Mexicans to come I only help that statistic and myself. Recommending minorities not to come to Penn only makes the issue worse off.

I have a friend who goes to Georgetown, and she complained that kids at school were hanging nooses around campus. Now, to any person, a noose can be very offensive, symbolizing most commonly the unjust deaths of African Americans by lynching (though there are other incidents of this in history such as during the witch trials). My friend went to Administration, asking for someone to do something about it...no one did to this day.

I have dealt with my own share of racism, even down to my roommate claiming that I'm only here because of affirmative action. Yes, I was so mad I could crush her. So, I understand your concern and your anger.

Words DO hurt, and people miss that.

However, I feel that it is our job as minorities and people in general to rise above the ignorance because that's all it is. We have a job to serve our community to the best of our ability. Comments like that can only make you stronger. Use it as fuel to light that passion in your heart to strive and make a change in this world.

And in the end, there will always be a little bit of people who hate on others, but we have to rise above them and continue to strive and press on.

And for anyone who doesn't know, real fact: the most beneficiaries of affirmative action are caucasion women. :)

It was fling those kids were black out by 5 pm. If I were called a nigger I would not have reacted we well as you but I would not have blamed the university for a few messed up kids. What is the solution, banning fling, making curfews up for under classmen so people don't get drunk and say stupid things? You won't get much support for that even from students who sympathize with you.

I'm not sure what disgusts me more: the fact that this happened to Chris or the ignorant comments people have been posting. If this had been an article about some white sorority girl being raped, the comments would be a lot more simpathetic. However, I'm not surprised. Penn is filled with over priviledged white children who still live off Mommy/Daddy's paycheck. I wouldn't expect those types of people to show a little compassion about an individual who didn't look/dress/act like them. Racism is real people. You mean to tell me you pay $50,000 and you still don't know that? Ignorant.

I was sad to find that my black daughter and her friends at Penn have had these same experiences - being asked where to find fried chicken, being spoken to in fake slang. Pathetic. I guess I'm glad I didn't know it until a month before graduation.

But I was pleased to find that my daughter doesn't seem to take it personally - she ignores it and moves on. I would like to think that she knows an idiot when she hears one, and focuses her attention on the people that matter.

That said, I hope the larger Penn community will step up to this issue. Students and faculty need to spend less energy on making excuses and more energy on honest conversations about race, class, and who "belongs" at Penn. White folks need to get over being scared of being called racist, and enter courageous conversations about the real state of things in America with regard to race. Listen to the stories like Christopher's with an open mind - don't rush to make excuses ("Maybe they weren't Penn students..." please.) Ben Franklin's legacy deserves no less.

Although what has happened to the individual was horrible, stating that the university does not go out of its way to support or foster a minority community is a bit exaggerated. Beginning with its course offerings and ending with the many outreach programs benefiting the West Philadelphia community, the university's efforts at promoting diversity and awareness of minorities has been substantial to say the least.

This being said, certain deplorable acts and bad habits will always be around. Just as a future world without homicides only exists in one's imagination, there will always be taunts and ignorant comments. But if anyone thinks that people at Penn, or Philadelphia or in this country have it bad, I would urge him or her to visit any other part of the world and find a more pluralistic and accepting environment. That's right. They don't exist.

Finally, people should be reminded that racism is everywhere and it isn't solely white on black...or latino on asian...or pashtun on nuristani. If I wrote an article for every time a west philly resident said a racist comment to me while I was walking home alone to 48th and chestnut late on a friday or saturday night, I'd probably fill up several pages of the dp. Thankfully, however, I don't base the value of my college experience solely on the insults of a few *ssholes.

Christopher, I'm just honestly sorry that this happened to you. My thoughts and sympathies are with you.

No, the community's actions are not overkill. If anything they are distinctly underkill.

Obviously the things that were said to you were terrible and no one should ever say that, but the rest of this column? Come on...

Penn has worked tirelessly to promote diversity, and as a recent DP correction stated, diversity is only increasing at Penn. In no way is the institution of Penn promoting racism, so you really shouldn't say that because it will only hurt our image. Blame the individuals who said those things, not Penn at large.

Then you get to make blanket statements basically implying that every white person at Penn is racist. Am I allowed to be offended by that, or would that be racist? What about the countless times that my girlfriend has been harassed and called things by black men in west Philly while she is there volunteering her valuable time at a welfare center? Those men were wrong to do so, but I'm not about to go write to the DP and call all black men racist against white people because of a few incidents because I'm smart enough to realize that most black people are not saying things like that, just like most white people aren't being racist towards black people.

And Hereforchange1, how can you be furious at being accused of getting in because of AA and then basically accuse white women of getting in for AA?