Fifty years ago, young people who matriculated at Elizabethtown (Penn.) College were required to sign a pledge that, under penalty of expulsion, they would not use alcohol.  Weekly chapel was mandatory.  E-town, as both the college and community in which it is located are known locally, is affiliated with the conservative Church of the Brethren.  Back then, if the administration learned of an undergraduate's alcohol use, even at home during summer vacation or holidays, suspension was automatic.

Times have changed at Elizabethtown College.

Beginning in mid-February, the Elizabethtown College Democrats began distributing all-white pins in the shape of puzzle pieces.  They are intended to be worn only by white students to make them more introspective about race and remind them of their "white privilege" – "especially in a predominantly white area of Lancaster County."

Where to begin?

Snotty, self-superior, out-of-town college kids have always looked down on "townies."  E-town College Democrats typify the phenomenon.

In 2010, 93 percent of Elizabethtown's community population was Caucasian; 1.2 percent were African American; another 1.2 percent were mixed race; Hispanics were 2.2 percent; and 1.1% were Asian.  The average family income was about average, but Elizabethtown's cost of living and housing remains below the national average.

Nearly two thirds of E-town College undergraduates are female.  The college is ranked number 2,228 nationwide in ethnic diversity, with a student body composition below the national average: only 2.6 percent black, 1.6 percent mixed race, 3.7 percent Hispanic, and 1.8 percent Asian.  None is dramatically above the community's numbers.  In 2014, E-town College accepted nearly three fourths of applicants.

Demographics suggest that there is no conspiracy to exclude them, so why don't more minorities choose to live in E-Town or attend college there?

Perhaps, as the college Democrats' soporific white pin project suggests, there simply isn't enough to do in a small town on a smaller campus.

Aileen Ida, president of the College Democrats, said, "Discussions about race are often perceived as being only open to people of color, but ... it is just as important for white people to partake in conversations about race."

Only racists and race hustlers are obsessed with melanin levels.  To Ida, anyone who is not as fixated on race as she appears to be is somehow responsible for racial oppression.  She suggested that, unless they actively work against it, white people allow for a system of societal, institutional racism.  In other words, whites' inaction or inattention equals guilt.

Ida insists that people of color live with racism while whites don't, even though people like Ida work constantly to convince perfectly innocent white people of their subliminal racist predispositions.  Why isn't that racist?

The Elizabethtown College Democrats' effort "forces everybody to think about racial issues people face daily."  The campaign is expected to last through February and beyond, one suspects at least until the 2018 midterm elections.

This is merely one more example of the left's endless, senseless virtue-signaling, another empty gesture designed to perpetuate divisive left-wing Democratic Party identity politics.

In his book Liberal Fascism, Jonah Goldberg wrote: "The White Man is the Jew of Liberal Fascism."  In the place of Star of David armbands, sanctimonious E-town College Democrats are marking their targets with white puzzle pieces.

Ironically, puzzle pieces are well established, iconic symbols used to promote a popular, genuinely noble cause, autism awareness, so sanctimonious E-town College Democrats have clumsily appropriated a perfect metaphor for the left's own social, cultural, and political developmental disabilities.

Jerry Shenk can be reached at jshenk2010@gmail.com.