TigerFanForum
GENERAL CATEGORY => The West End Zone => Topic started by: TigerCub on January 29, 2015, 09:21:50 AM
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Building’s name actually is a symbol of progress
I am a fifth-year student at Clemson who has felt welcome from day one. I cannot imagine any scenario that I encountered that, in any way,that would change that.
Each and every person I met and spoke to from the very first day were excited for me to be taking part in the university that they had come to love over their time here.
There are discussion sessions that every freshmen takes a part in pertaining to the various races and cultures that we all have an equal chance of coming from as we pursue our dreams.
Imagine my surprise, when I hear something completely different. The iconic building that I have come to know and love, which even served as the location in which I proposed to my now-fiance, offended people based on the name.
When I hear that they felt less welcomed based on a name of a building, it is a frame of mind that I cannot imagine. It exposes a mindset that doesn’t seek to embrace what is the past of our great country. If people feel that they aren’t receiving the same opportunities as others, what better way to be encouraged than to hear the stories of Ben Tillman, and see and feel the vast differences between his time and ours?
When I see a building as beautiful as Tillman, and hear the name, and know what he stood for, I don’t see a symbol of racism. I see a symbol of progress. We can see that building, with the name of a person that lived within the norms of his society, and see just how reprehensible his viewpoints were, but at the same time fully embrace that the society in which we currently live is far from his. We can hear all the terrible things he said and stood for, and see and learn just how wrong that was.
Tillman is not a symbol of racism, as those students in the “Coalition of Concerned Students” claim. It serves as a reminder of the terrible times that minorities lived in many years ago, but more importantly, a symbol of the progress that has been made, and still is being made today.
Marcus Anderson