Arizona is enjoying a small amount of redemption after public pressure and protest forced officials to reverse a blatantly racist decision. A decision made earlier this week by school officials to force artists to lighten the complexion of faces represented on a green transportation mural was reversed on Saturday.
Controversy at Miller Valley Elementary School in Prescott Arizona began after City Councilman Steve Blair asked school Principal Jeff Lane to order the mural artists to lighten the dark skin complexion of students represented on the mural. In response, Principal Jeff Lane ordered the mural project’s leader to lighten the skin tone.
However, Saturday, Principal Jeff Lane apologized, and said the decision was a mistake and that they "went back with their original theme". Lane's apology, and the School District's quick action to reverse the decision, is admirable. Yet the larger problem remains.
Why was the decision made in the first place? The decision was racist and cowardly. Lane and the school district administration were too quick to cave in to the demands of one bigoted city councilman, Steve Blair.
Blair's racist request, and the school officials' decision to grant the racist request, shocked and horrified a nation.
The racial madness in Arizona has been frightening: legalizing racial profiling, banning ethnic studies, dismissing teachers with accents, lauding "ethnic cleansing" policies, militarizing the border, seeking to abolish the 14th Amendment (the one that makes the bill of rights applicable to the states and makes anyone born here a citizen).
At least this is one place where Arizonans managed to do the right thing. Let's hope this is the beginning of a change towards tolerance and compassion in Arizona, and a move away from a bitter and angry inhumanity that has recently cursed the state.
Yet until Arizona repeals SB1070, or the courts throw it out for being unconstitutional, good and decent Americans are left with only one option: Boycott Arizona.
