Is Sarah Palin a racist?

The New Yorker book review of "Going Rogue" offers this interesting bit of information on sister Sarah.

Palin, though notoriously ill-travelled outside the United States, did journey far to the first of the four colleges she attended, in Hawaii. She and a friend who went with her lasted only one semester. “Hawaii was a little too perfect,” Palin writes. “Perpetual sunshine isn’t necessarily conducive to serious academics for eighteen-year-old Alaska girls.” Perhaps not. But Palin’s father, Chuck Heath, gave a different account to Conroy and Walshe. According to him, the presence of so many Asians and Pacific Islanders made her uncomfortable: “They were a minority type thing and it wasn’t glamorous, so she came home.” In any case, Palin reports that she much preferred her last stop, the University of Idaho, “because it was much like Alaska yet still ‘Outside.’ (Not to mention the population is as white as the driven snow.)

So does this mean that Sarah is a racist? Well not necessarily, but it does demonstrate that she feels much more comfortable surrounded by people who are "like her", whether that be racially, religiously, or politically.

In the interest of full disclose I should tell you that I also attended college in Hawaii. At that time we could attend without paying out of state tuition, so it was a good deal for a struggling college student who was working his way through school. But it was also a chance to go to Hawaii, and stay for almost a year. I jumped at the opportunity.

And like Sarah I also suffered a little culture shock. Growing up in Alaska you are surrounded by white folks. In the seventies especially we did not have a great deal of diversity.

At college in Hawaii I was most definitely in the minority. They tried to make us feel comfortable by pairing Alaskans up with Alaskans as dorm mates, but I ended up with a big old farm boy from Idaho. He was a hoot, but damn that guy got on my nerves some days.

However unlike Palin I was very fascinated with the culture of Hawaii, and made friends with the locals fairly easily. For me it was quite informative to see myself in the minority and it helped to shape my perceptions of how people view each other depending on what side of the equation they happen to be.

I would think the experience would prove invaluable to a person if they were someday to govern a state like Alaska. The ability to understand what it is like to feel isolated by the color of your skin, your religious beliefs, or your cultural differences should give you a unique perspective when it came to dealing with the native population, or other ethnic minorities up here in Alaska.

But based on what we observed during Palin's short, yet memorable, stint as our governor, it was not evident that her experiences afforded her the same kind of personal understanding that mine afforded me.

(You can read the rest of the book review by clicking the title.)