The University of Kansas attracts thousands from all over the country and the world with cries of diversity. Freshmen orientation welcomes students with countless videos that show interactions between people of every race, gender, ethnicity and even sexual preference. The calls for peace, culture and acceptance extend beyond the KU campus.

So does the façade.

Just as I’ve sat in classroom after classroom filled with a typical sea of white, middle-class students, I’ve roamed the streets of Lawrence and noticed differences in “color” only in store signs and street lights. The hippies, who walk and ride their bikes up and down Massachusetts Street as emblems of love and approval, are white too. I understand, even in this age, how difficult it is to transform into one of acceptance a city in a state most of the nation sees as one packed with farmers (often hardcore Republican ones with pitchforks pointed in the face of change). But instead of pretending to have accomplished such change, be realistic.

This weekend I paced down Mass St. pondering questions like, “If not on campus, there must at least be multiculturalism elsewhere in this liberal, loving town?” A Japanese garden to my left and a man hoisting an aqua flag marked with a large “Peace” symbol to my right answered me with glimmers of hope. The lady walking in front of me with her adorable young daughter dashed this hope.

An apparently homeless, or otherwise “ragged looking” African American man approached the woman (yes, she was white) and attempted to ask her a question. I couldn’t hear his plea but I assumed it was for money just as I’m almost positive the woman did (based on her reaction). Without hesitation, she pulled her daughter closer and walked with a new-found purpose into the next open shop. The man didn't seem surprised as he continued toward me. He asked if I had the time.

That’s right, the time. Not a few bucks. Not a cigarette.

The above statement is a stereotype, and its point is not to condemn the mother. Even during my reflection on whether Lawrence is genuinely diverse, I played into the prejudice. Of course I told the man what time it was but only after I almost subconsciously sympathized with the lady and her daughter. After nearly four years in attendance at a proposed “diverse” university and a resident in a town that supposedly stands out from the rest of a white, Protestant state, I am still uncomfortable around other cultures.

To me, diversity should mean more than what Webster describes as a “state of difference.”The word should more genuinely stand for the symbol of multiculturalism that America prides itself in, a “melting pot.” The ingredients are here, but the melting is not. If KU wants to promote diversity through unbiased interactions across race, gender and culture, it must do more than provide exaggerated, if not deceptive slideshows each year at orientation. If Lawrence is going to make a claim for true diversity, it must do more than line Mass St. with Middle-Eastern restaurants and hookah bars, Japanese gardens and peace signs.

Stop pretending to be diverse. And soon enough, we all will.