Somewhere out in Texas there is a girl that goes by the name of Abby, and she is mad. Why is Abby mad, you ask?

Seven years ago, back in 2008, Abigail Fisher was a senior in high school who was completely torn when she was rejected from her number one choice of college: the University of Texas. Abigail Fisher is white female who applied to a program at the University of Texas that only accepted the seniors in the top ten percent of their senior classes. Unfortunately for Abby, she did not meet this criteria. Not only did she not meet this criteria, but she did not meet many others, as Abigail’s GPA and SAT scores were not high enough, and throughout this seven year ordeal (since her denial, Abigail has been pursuing U.T), the University of Texas said that Fisher was never getting into their school. Abigail failed to see her performance at school and scores on her standardized tests as a good enough reason for her not getting accepted.

Abigail believes that there were students with lower credentials then her who were let in because they were not white and that this is all due to affirmative action.

According to Merriam Webster Dictionary, Affirmative Action in the United States is the effort to improve the employment and educational opportunities of women and members of minority groups through preferential treatment in job hiring, college admissions, the awarding of government contracts, and the allocation of other social benefits. Abigail claims that this is the reason that she was not accepted. She truly believes that her spot was taken by black students. What I don’t understand, Abby, is why you think so, when black students comprise 4.3 percent of The University Of Texas's undergrad student body. How is that possible? You are holding 4.3 percent of the college campus’s population responsible for you not getting in and not the other 95.7 percent? How does that make any sense?

Apparently this makes sense to Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, who said the following this past Wednesday:

“There are those who contend that it does not benefit African Americans to get them into the University of Texas where they do not do well, as opposed to having slower-track school where they do well. One of the briefs pointed out that most of the black scientists in this country don’t come from schools like the University of Texas… They come from lesser schools where they do not feel that they're being pushed ahead in classes that are too fast for them… I’m just not impressed by the fact that the University of Texas may have fewer. Maybe it ought to have fewer. And maybe some — you know, when you take more, the number of blacks, really competent blacks admitted to lesser schools, turns out to be less. And I don’t think it stands to reason that it’s a good thing for the University of Texas to admit as many blacks as possible.”

That, ladies and gentleman, is from a man that we have in charge of assessing and upholding our rights. A man who is supposed to be known as being unbiased when it comes to decisions of the law, who is showing what little faith he has in minorities. If this is not a perfect example of institutionalized racism, I don’t know what is. Scalia is basically saying that blacks are incompetent and don’t belong in higher colleges or more rigorous schools because the classes are too fast for them and that they would be better off just staying in lesser schools.

Scalia is one of the reasons I don’t believe we will ever get rid of institutionalized racism. When people in positions of power and privilege who are the ones making up the rules still have archaic views like Scalia does when it comes to minorities, that is one terrifying thing. Regardless of the color of our skin, we are all still humans, which means everyone deserves to be treated with respect. The fact that there are still people in our society that believe that certain races are lesser than others in terms of intelligence is extremely sad. Everyone wants to believe that, as a society, we have come farther than that, and that we don’t see color, but we do. It is a world full of people who can’t learn to see past the pigment of an individual’s skin. With people in our society who still think like this, it is understandable that Abigail Fisher thinks her case has any merit.

As a response to Scalia and Abigail Fisher, the following hashtag has been trending: #StayMadAbby. Black graduates from the not only the University of Texas but everywhere are posting photos of their success while attaching the previously mentioned hashtag.

Abby should stay mad. Mad that her position of privilege has fogged her common sense and made her think that she is being discriminated against, all because she didn’t get into a school that she wanted.