Race could be factor in missing students cases

Yesterday (May 29) my wife and I read in its entirety The Gazette's long article, “Study in Contrasts,” on disappeared college students. We kept expecting some indication that the racial background of the two missing people might be a factor in their differential treatment. We waited in vain.

While race may not be the primary factor in why the University of Iowa, police, and the newspapers showed little concern about the disappearance of Jacques Similhomme, it is improbable that it had no impact on the search (or lack thereof) for this son of a black Haitian immigrant. Almost simultaneously, Iowa State University and the Ames community coalesced to conduct a concerted search for Jon Lacina, white son of a Grinnell lawyer. Yes, The Gazette has had to lay off reporters, and therefore has less staff to cover stories like this, and, yes, the university and police have many other competing priorities, but it is naive to pretend that Lacina's being “one of us” and Similhomme's being “one of them” has no bearing on the widely differing treatment of their disappearances.

It is easy to accustom ourselves to the privileged status conferred upon us by our pale skin and go blithely through life, unaware of our insensitivity and sins of omission. I suspect that the author didn't want to get mired in unprovable accusations of racism, but in so doing he ignored a probable factor in the different treatment of these two cases.

Jonathan and Karla Ice

Cedar Rapids