Omnivore - Young Republicans malign pastries

• www.colorlines.com

Pity the pastries. They’re called all kinds of crazy names. Some will kill you quickly. Others make you blow up slowly and explode — or get you fired if you say so.

But the worst humiliation of all occurred this week at the Berkeley campus of the University of California. Members of the virtually oxymoronic Berkeley College Republicans held a bake sale at which pastries were used, satirically, to express opposition to a somewhat pro-affirmative action bill awaiting signature by Gov. Jerry Brown. The New York Times reported in advance of the event:

Last week, the Berkeley College Republicans announced its “Increase Diversity Bake Sale,” scheduled for Tuesday. On Facebook, the group listed the price for a pastry at $2 for white students, $1.50 for Asian students, $1 for Latinos, 75 cents for African-Americans and 25 cents for Native Americans. Women of all races were promised a 25-cent discount.

The Republican event, dubiously satirical, provoked a counter-demonstration, “Conscious Cupcakes Giveaway.”

In photos I’ve seen of the Republican event, cupcakes were also the predominant pastry. Maybe their new political symbolization will terminate the fad that has turned the nostalgic icon, the cupcake, into a cliche.

By the way, as is so often true, the Republican kids’ representation of the bill under scrutiny is grossly exaggerated. And, yes, Republican students have maligned pastries in the same ways at other schools throughout the last decade.