University of Wisconsin Law School Mandates ‘Re-Orientation’ DEI Training for First-Year Students

‘University of Wisconsin Law students were taught during a mandatory “Re-Orientation” training on Friday that believing in “colorblindness” and rugged individualism, or saying that “people of color can be racist,” are all forms of racism that should be challenged.

The diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) workshop was part of the larger Re-Orientation program for first-year law students who just completed their first semester.

Documents obtained by the conservative legal firm Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty, or WILL, show that in the lead-up to the DEI session, students were asked to read a document that suggests: “28 common racist attitudes and behaviors that indicate a detour or wrong turn into white guilt, denial, or defensiveness.” The document often turns to broad generalizations of things that “whites tend to” do. It includes things like apologizing for the behavior of other whites without taking “antiracist action” and being overly deferential to people of color.

In a press release, WILL said the training document calling out forms of racism was itself racist, and the organization demanded that the school remove the subject matter.

The UW Law communications department did not immediately respond to emails and phone calls from National Review on Monday afternoon.

Notes from the training obtained by WILL indicate that students were instructed on “deconstructing racism,” “lifelong racial literacy,” and “anti-racism intervention steps.” They were also provided with a “Race Timeline Worksheet.”

“The student body is being subject to nonsense that ignores the rule of law and true equality in favor of a racialized way of seeing the world,” Rick Esenberg, WILL’s president and general counsel, said in a prepared statement. “It is distressing to see our state’s only public law school requiring students to be ‘trained’ in a set of concepts which shreds the rejection of racial discrimination that so many fought so hard to make the law of the land.”

According to the document obtained by WILL, believing in colorblindness, or trying to see beyond race, is actually racist, because “you are also saying you don’t see your whiteness. This denies the people of colors’ experience of racism and your experience of privilege.”

It is also racist to say that people of color “are just as racist as white people,” according to the document. While “people of color can be and are prejudiced against white people,” the document says, “as a social group, [people of color] do not have the societal institutional power to oppress white people as a group.”

The document, authored by antiracist organizer Debra Leigh, calls out the late conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh for once saying that the civil rights movement has “gone to the extreme” and that the movement is “no longer working for equality but for revenge.” Limbaugh’s comment and other “reverse racism” claims “are loaded with white people’s fear of people of color and what would happen if they gained ‘control,’” the document states.

It says it is racist to believe in the fairness of the judicial system, calling it a belief that “clouds reality,” and generalizing that “whites tend to look at isolated incidents rather than the patterns of institutionalized oppression.”

Suggesting that minorities are at fault for any struggles they have in the workplace is a “blame the victim” behavior that avoids “the real problem: racism,” the document states. “Blame the victim” behaviors also “take away from the picture the agents of racism, white people and institutions, who either intentionally perpetuate or unintentionally collude with racism.”

According to the document, it is also racist for white people to try to solve problems for minorities, to engage in “pseudo-anti-racist posturing,” to expect “positive reinforcement from people of color,” or to grow exhausted with or take any break from anti-racist work.

“One of the elemental privileges of being white is your freedom to retreat from the issue of racism,” the document says.

Racism in the United States “won’t end because people of color demand it,” the document concludes. “Racism will only end with a significant number of white people of conscience, the people who can wield systemic privilege and power with integrity, find the will and take the action to dismantle it. This won’t happen until white people find racism in their daily consciousness as often as people of color do.”

One UW Law student, who spoke to WILL on a condition of anonymity, said Friday’s training, and others like it, are part of an effort to shut down debate about issues of race and racism.

“Programs like these make me feel as if I cannot speak openly in my classes, or with my peers,” the student said. “I do not feel that this culture promotes intellectual diversity, but rather a singular way of thinking. I should not feel ashamed that I do not choose my friends by the color of their skin. I should not feel ashamed that I believe in diversity in thought, rather than diversity in appearance. It is disheartening that this institution does not agree.”

Last month, the University of Wisconsin Board of Regents agreed to a deal with Republican lawmakers to cut back on diversity initiatives in exchange for $800 million in state funding.

Universities across the country ramped up their DEI departments and programming in the wake of George Floyd’s death and the racial-justice protests and riots of 2020. While UW Law is still requiring DEI training, many schools and private companies have begun paring back their programs in response to court challenges and push-back by lawmakers in Republican-led states.