Every year the senior class is celebrated in a series of traditions—spanning from the “Big Brothers Big Sisters” Morning Ex, to the symbolic distribution of keys on Class Day. The purpose of these traditions is to honor the senior class, however, one senior tradition that never fails to stir commotion is the senior portrait display.

Early in the year, senior parents are asked to find baby pictures of their children. These pictures are later hung with each senior’s portrait below it outside of Nurse Anne’s office. The display is supposed to be a fun and sentimental way to honor the seniors, yet despite these intentions, the display becomes a crude reflection of how the roots of white supremacy continue to grip the walls of Parker.

Every year the senior portraits are heavily airbrushed and whitewashed, so I was fully prepared for that when I approached my own senior portrait. As a man of color, I know that the standards of beauty do not align with how I look.

American standards of beauty are to look as white as possible, a standard that as a man of color I cannot achieve. At first glance at the portrait, you could tell that my skin was lightened and airbrushed. All of my acne was removed, and my skin looked as if I was extremely malnourished. I looked like I had just come out of a Stephenie Meyer novel.

It was a difficult image to look at, but skin lightening is everywhere from Snapchat filters to night creams, so I tried to look past it. It was then that I started to notice more alarming edits. My near black colored eyes had been changed to green, the dimensions of my face were edited for symmetry, and my nose was edited to be smaller.

Upon noticing how my image was not only lightened but modified so I would look like I was of a different race, I decided to take down my picture and rip it up. A mix of tears, both from rage and sadness, ran down my face. I was distraught that someone’s idea of a cosmetic retouch was to completely change my ethnic features.

I was more upset at the fact that these pictures were hung without any consideration of the message they were sending. While I was deeply upset at my disfigured image, I understood it to be a manifestation of the white supremacy that flows freely through this institution. Picture a young man or woman of color, looking at those pictures and internalizing that the idea of beauty is to have white skin, green eyes, and perfectly symmetrical features. That image is bound to scar them psychologically.   

For some, the term white supremacy might invoke images of white terrorist groups like the KKK. While it is fair to associate the two, it is important to acknowledge that white supremacy can also manifest itself in daily actions. Although these actions may not have been intentional or purposely harmful, the whitening of skin color and adjustment of non-white features is a classic example.

Parker operates as an elitist institution where those with ample amounts of money can easily access the benefits of a Parker education while students with limited financial resources are forced to compete for a select group of spots every year in order to access the same benefits.

Until Parker becomes a tuition-free school that forces students to reapply for high school, it will continue to work as a tool of white supremacy that puts wealthy and white families at a huge advantage while leaving equally brilliant students who cannot afford or access Parker education behind. The high tuition cost and limited entry spots in ninth grade make Parker difficult to access for students who do not have the ability to afford a Parker education but are performing at the same or a higher level than many of the students who have attended Parker for years.

While it is important to point out how private schools are designed to uphold white supremacy, it is also important to understand that the history of white supremacy in America is deep and unavoidable. Take, for example, the land that Parker stands on. The land that Parker occupies, like all of America, is stolen indigenous land. While this land was stolen long before Parker was founded in 1901, we profit off the violence, displacement, murder, and trauma of Native Peoples.

Toxic racial standards of beauty lead to more severe consequences. Mental health disorders such as Body Dysmorphic Disorder and Depression are rooted in these acts of white supremacy.

For white people, skin color and ethnic features can be trendy. White people do not have the burden of being told that they are not pretty, so many white people can adopt features from people of color as they like, knowing intrinsically that they can always return to whiteness if they need to. Unlike whites, race is not a trend for people of color, because, for people of color, race has always been tied to life and death.  

While I write this with the hope that Parker will reflect on its egregious mistakes as an institution, I know that it is so consumed by the roots of race and white supremacy that the best I can hope for is reparations.