By Elizabeth Cajayon and David Chung
The Racial Privacy Initiative is a dangerous initiative put
forth by UC Regent Ward Connerly that would prohibit state agencies
from collecting any data based on race, ethnicity and national
origin in the state of California.
Supporters of the RPI say ending the collection of racial and
ethnic data will help end racism and create a
“color-blind” society. The Racial Privacy Initiative,
however, is deceptive because it has nothing to do with the issue
of privacy or ending racism. In actuality, the RPI would ban any
information that could be helpful to ending racism and
discrimination.
The initiative, scheduled to appear on the March 2004 ballot,
needs to be brought to the attention of the Asian Pacific Islander
community immediately because we cannot allow it to promote racism
through its deceptive language and narrow exemptions. The RPI
devastates the API community and attacks our survival by getting
rid of information that would help end educational disparities,
save lives, and track hate crime activities.
The RPI will deprive us of critical information needed to assess
the educational needs of the API community. For example, according
to the California Board of Education, Pacific Islander high school
students had the fourth largest drop-out rate in the state of
California for the academic year 2000-2001. Access to this data on
ethnic-specific educational disparities provides the state,
community-based organizations and student groups the necessary
information to target their outreach efforts towards struggling
communities.
For example, the statistics on Pacific Islander drop-out rates
gives PIER, the Pacific Islands Education and Retention Project
here at UCLA, the basis to work with Pacific Islander high school
students on graduating from high school and entering institutions
of higher education.
Without access to this data, it would be nearly impossible for
student initiated outreach projects like PIER to identify and work
on the educational problems. It is also foreseeable that these
important outreach programs would suffer a significant loss in
federal and state funding with the proposed information ban. After
all, how would we justify the need for these important programs in
our funding proposals if the data to prove these problems existed
were banned? It is evident that Connerly’s information ban
will only lead to the dismantling of important educational outreach
programs and greater disparities in public education.
In the area of public health, the RPI could hinder programs
designed to treat and prevent diseases such as post-traumatic
stress syndrome, suicide and breast cancer that occur in higher
concentrations in certain Asian Pacific Islander communities such
as Southeast Asian refugees. Under section 32(f) of the
initiative, data gathered through public health programs would be
banned because such data does not lie under the title of
“medical research,” the one narrow exemption for health
services listed under the RPI. One program in San Diego was able to
effectively use ethnic data about suicide among Pilipinas to design
a suicide prevention program and save lives, not to discriminate
against them.
The RPI would also hinder efforts to track hate
crimes. This is troubling considering that in Los Angeles
alone, hate crimes based on race rose over 20 percent in 1999-2000.
The South Asian, Muslim and Arab communities in particular
experienced significantly greater incidences of racial profiling
and hate crimes after Sept. 11. Under section 32c of the RPI,
the state would no longer be able to require hate crime data
collection and reporting.
Consequently, the RPI would not prevent racism, but would
instead allow it to grow unchecked, possibly resulting in more
serious injuries and loss of life. The information used to prevent
everything from suicide to hate crimes through state funded
programs would be wiped out.
Proponents of Connerly’s information ban will accuse vocal
non-supporters of trying to use the “race card” to push
a particular agenda. However, the simple reality is that
Connerly’s initiative would deal a crushing blow to all
communities. It is critical for Asian and Pacific Islander
students on this campus to take a proactive role in joining others
to protect all Californians from this attack on our human
rights.
We encourage all students to learn more about this initiative
through upcoming campus and community forums. We also
encourage students to register to vote immediately. Although the
initiative will not appear on the ballot until March 2004, it is
important that we are all prepared to take a stand against this
dangerous and irresponsible measure.