Editor:
I’m proud to be an alumnus of the U8212;except when I’m ashamed. Yesterday, while visiting the campus, my wife heard an employee at the Red Onion Cafe refer to an African-American woman as “flat-nose” and “tree-climber” when it came into question whether the woman had paid for a drink refill.
I have lived in the still somewhat racially charged South for 10 years now. And I have never heard such language come from the mouth of a Tennessean. To come back to Utah and witness such blatant racism and hatred is disillusioning, to say the least.
I know that racial harmony has progressed at least somewhat in this state in the last 40 years8212;perhaps this just doesn’t apply to certain employees of the Red Onion. Needless to say, my wife and I (and many of our friends) will not be patronizing this establishment again.
Matthew Flinner,
U Alumnus
Nashville, Tenn.
Shamed by racism at the U
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