Allow me to frame this new Notre Dame commercial and corresponding diversity issue from another perspective. In the Sept. 15 front page article in The Observer, "Ad sparks debate at meeting," Sarah Liu is quoted as asking, in regards to the new "Candle" ad for Notre Dame, "Where are the minorities? They are nowhere to be found in this commercial," arguing for the commercial to be pulled.
I agree entirely and believe that increased diversity would indeed increase dialogue within the classroom and provide proper preparation for the real world. I am atheist, Asian and liberal, and as such am not in the majority, yet I wonder if the lack of minorities within the advertisement is indeed, such a bad thing.
I still remember when I was still a high school senior, of attending that preposterous minority student weekend when Notre Dame decided to shamelessly reach out to unaware prospectives with their own group of minority hosts, afterwards being shown a cultural bonanza of events and subsequent after-parties (it was the only weekend of its sort during the year), designed as a means of masking the University's homogeneity. Even worse, was the phone call from the "fellow Asian" who spoke with me, trying to entice me to attend Notre Dame on the back of "diversity."
Certainly this cannot be much better than an ad which provides the proper message that it should: that the people of Notre Dame really are in fact, mostly Caucasian and of the Catholic faith. But it also infers (correctly) that the student body is made up of good people, the great majority of whom are kind and tolerant. I believe that the prospective coveted minority student should know exactly what they are getting into, and as such, choose to attend this University through his or her own unbiased decision.
Sean HuangseniorSt. Edward's HallSept. 15
