cism (a fact adroitly cut from most news accounts of his comments). Blacks, by definition, can't be institutionally racist. They simply don't have the power. Maybe someday they will, but now, you can't point to any institution, and very few corporations, in which African-Americans have enough power to even exercise the thought of implementing institutional racism. Lee was right.Also, true racists shy away or become silent when they are asked to criticize various aspects of their own ethnic history. How many Germans talk about their treatment of Jews in the 1930s or 40s? How many Americans talk free and easily about the genocidal attitude taken towards Native Americans in the 19th century?But when Lee has been asked about some of the more virulent aspects of rap music, he is first careful to highlight what rap he likes. Then, without fear, he marches on to attack with stinging accuracy the deep strains of women-hatred and self-destructive death-lust which runs through much of the gangsta rap compilations. Lee is not afraid to criticize his own, and criticize them harshly.Let's face it. Spike Lee may be an *censored*. But nothing he has done, said, or portrayed in his films can brand him convincingly with the stain of racism. There is no reason he shouldn't be coming here. This is the campus that welcomed Darryl Gates as a speaker for Christ's sake. By that standard we would have to allow Lee here even if everything his worst critics say is true....
