Hello again readers, Benjamin Studenski here. I’m attempting to test-out of my ISU diversity requirements by privately studying alternative lifestyles. Hopefully, I can convince the registrar to give me six credits for watching Jerry Springer. Today’s episode: “transsexual minority vampires with eating disorders.”

Unfortunately, my research is very time-consuming, so I’ve invited a special guest-columnist to fill in and write this week’s article. She is none other than ISU’s favorite grad student in English, Lorena Madonna Chavez.

Greetings womyn and nonwomyn! I am Lorena Madonna Chavez, spokeshumyn for the Outraged Student Organization (OSO) at Iowa State. I write this article not as an open-letter to our so-called president Jischke, but instead as an open-letter to the students of ISU.

In a recent column entitled “Blinded by Multiculturalism,” Benjamin “Studenski” (if that is his real name) was highly offensive and hurtful to all the outraged students of ISU by his criticism of multiculturalism. As a leader of the OSO, I want to offer an explanation of the positive influence multiculturalism has in promoting the diversity of ideas on college campuses. In addition, the OSO has developed an exercise to help all students grow so that they too can promote multiculturalism.

Spelling out what exactly multiculturalism is can be difficult. After all, multiculturalism means different things to different people. To some, multiculturalism means “Ronald Reagan is a fascist!” For others, multiculturalism means “Clarence Thomas is a fascist!” Such a diversity of views shows that multiculturalism is not shallow and full of partisan political biases.

However, multiculturalism should not be so simple a philosophy that it can actually be explained. After all, are not life’s most wonderful things such as love, childhood and the popularity of Angela Davis the things that are the hardest to explain? Just have faith in those of us in the OSO. We will periodically update the definition of multiculturalism. We will make sure it stays true to its principles and doesn’t become a political tool. Trust us.

But multiculturalism can’t succeed without your help, or at least your being afraid to speak against it. To that end the OSO has developed a special quiz.

Give yourself one point for each of the following ten statements that you are able to say aloud in a serious voice without rolling your eyes.

Test your multicultural IQ, and repeat the following:

1) Only whites can be racist because they have all the power.

2) The media has a strong conservative bias because it accepts corporate advertising.

3) OJ was acquitted because he was rich.

4) Women never lie about sexual harassment.

5) 10 percent of Americans are gay.

bonus point — And that is a conservative estimate.

bonus point — And that is based on census data.

6) Individualism is a code-word for racism.

7) Today America is more racist than ever.

8) Political correctness does not exist; it is a term used in a backlash against advances by women and people of color.

9) We don’t have quotas, we have goals.

10) Students can only have role-models who are the same race and gender as themselves.

Scoring

10 points or more — Honorary grad student in English

6-9 points — You’re causing others pain

2-5 points — Hey Adolf, why so hostile?

0-1 points — Mandatory sensitivity-training

Thanks for taking the multicultural quiz. The Outraged Student Organization and I hope that this quiz has made you more tolerant and less full of hate. We recommend you try this quiz again some time, and see if you can improve your score. Once you master this quiz, we’ve got a few more waiting. After all, multiculturalism is a journey, not a destination.

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Benjamin Studenski is a junior in industrial engineering from Hastings, Minn.