Monday, March 20, 2006
By Scott Norvell
Stairway to Nowhere, No Whites Allowed
June 02, 2005
The public art committee
in Portland, Maine is resisting the gift of a bronze statue because some of its members say the city already has enough statues of white people, according to the Boston Globe.
The statue, to be donated by the owner of a local minor league baseball team and placed outside the stadium, depicts a family of four going to a game. In an article about the statue, the local Portland Press Herald quoted a member of the public committee that must approve its placement as saying that the city had enough "white folks on pedestals."
Predictably, many locals didn't take too kindly to the comments, calling the committee arrogant, out-of-touch and ungracious. Comments to the paper's website have run overwhelmingly along the lines of those of Melissa Wolf of Scarborough, who said:
"I'm not racist, but there's nothing wrong with white people. Every city is different, and here, we're the majority. I don't see why diversity has to be shoved down our throats."