Excuse my ignorance, but I always thought the whole point of diversity was that it’s much harder to hate those with whom you work closely. There’s a bit of research on that, particularly involving prejudice against gay people. Folks who have family or co-workers who self-ID as gay are less likely to support public policies to disadvantage gays.

In another context, I’ve found diversity in my classes to be very much in the interest of those of light complexion and legacy admission. Teaching about the civil rights movement (don’t be upset — it’s not a required course) is much easier with a diverse class and by that I don’t mean just African-Americans. International students have perspectives that are quite useful.

But, of course, my teaching style involves give and take and I warn my students on the first day that I do not intend to go over anything in the textbook, so if they have questions from that source they need to raise them and I’ll fold their questions right into what I intended to discuss that day…or, more correctly, I intended the class to discuss.

So it could be I welcome weird students because I’m weird. There’s nobody weirder in this nation that those of us indigenous to it.