Black Menace group at BYU
 

I saw someone on cougarboard mention this, as a reason why his kids are no longer willing to wear BYU gear at school (in Missouri, I think he said). Apparently they are embarrassed or made fun of.

I had never heard of this ?Black Menace?, so I looked it up:
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article...ktok-interview

I guess not much has changed at BYU all these years. My thoughts:

1. I didn?t have a close black friend at BYU. I would say my closest friend that was black was actually one of my teachers. I was actually over at his house once. He later became somewhat BYU-famous later when he spoke out more. I won?t mention his name here. He?s no longer at BYU.

2. There weren?t many black students at BYU period when I was there. I took a class about African-American literature. A black male student in the class complained that everyone always assumed he was on a sports team at BYU. Seemed impossible, I guess, that a black male would go to BYU just to go to BYU.

3. One of the students in my freshman English class, she was from rural Washington. She said growing up she never once met a black person.

4. I wrote an article about blacks and the priesthood for the Student Review where I basically made the case that it was policy with no doctrinal basis, with plenty of evidence that it came from Brigham Young?s personal (racist) views. When the archives for the SR where on the web, I was told it was the most viewed/downloaded article.

So here we are all these years later, fighting the same old battles. I don?t criticize the church leadership, because it doesn?t do me any good, or anyone else any good. Why steady the Ark? Not my job, not my responsbility to care. I don?t use my energy to ?lead? the church from the foyer. My views are not solicited, and that?s fine. I?ll use my time and energy for other things. It?s very freeing to not care at all.

Addendum: it’s in God’s hands. Not mine.