The Daily Egyptian is published by the students of SIU at Carbondale. Except during vacations and exam weeks, The Daily Egyptian is published Monday through Friday during the fall and spring semesters and TWThF during the summer semester."

The BAC is playing a racism card that was not dealt

I would like to express my disdain not only for the actions of the crowd outside of Carboz on the night of March 20, but also for the BAC's reaction to said actions. According to sources quoted in the DE's March 29 article, approximately half of the 200-person crowd outside of Carboz that night was illegally in possession of alcoholic beverages. In addition, some of them had "blunts". (I can't say I know of too many people who smoke blunts packed solely with tobacco.) The crowd's level of unruliness was so great that Carboz owner Brian Callahan was unable to negotiate conditions for allowing the people to enter the nightclub. What's worse is that some of the female Carboz staffers were harassed by some of the potential bar-goers to the point that they feared for their safety. So not only did members of the crowd engage in dangerous and disrespectful behavior, they broke the law as well.

Surely a disinterested observer would consider the crowd's behavior deplorable. In fact, it is almost surprising that there was not police involvement, potentially involving arrests.

Nowhere in the DE's article was any mention made of the ethnicity of the crowd members. However, the BAC's reaction implies that the crowd was primarily black. One would think that the BAC would condemn the actions of its disorderly brethren. But rather than do so, the BAC has done the unthinkable. It has cried wolf, claiming racism. Not only has the BAC taken issue with Callahan's decision to not open Carboz, a choice that ANY reasonable bar/club owner would have made, they have stated that Carboz' dress code is racist. Somehow, inconceivably, the BAC has concluded that Carboz is a sports bar, not a nightclub. That asinine claim notwithstanding, the BAC believes that Carboz's dress code, which prohibits certain items such as sports jerseys, discriminates against blacks. The fact is that, like Callahan was quoted as saying, dress codes like Carboz' are not uncommon amongst bars in general, not just nightclubs. It appears that the BAC would rather play the racism card yet again rather than acknowledge the unacceptable behavior of members of the group they represent.

Speaking of which, perhaps the BAC would like to hazard a guess why the Carbondale Police, which they have on occasion purported as being racially motivated against blacks, did not promptly respond to the March 20 disturbance.

Dave Mack

Carbondale

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