The Office of Housing and Food Services made an attempt to acknowledge the birthday of civil rights leader Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. last week. Among the foods served to students were barbecue ribs, collard greens, smothered chicken, red beans and rice, and cornbread. The only thing they forgot was watermelon, but that's probably because it's out of season.

I consider the menu choices a slap in the face to the honorable Dr. King and all that he worked towards. The African Americans who are descendants of slaves are the only American immigrants who did not come here by choice, to escape religious persecution to share in the American dream. In case anyone forgot, they were brought to America as a source of cheap labor.

They also didn't keep their ethnic foods as so many other immigrants have kept as customary. Lawrence Young, director of the Paul Robeson Cultural Center was quoted in the Collegian as saying, "It is no more stereotypical to include those items than it would be to include spaghetti at an Italian meal . . ."

Yet he ignores the fact that tomatoes and pasta are a true part of Italian culture --a dish enjoyed and which has been prepared for years in Italy. African Americans didn't choose to eat collard greens as a tasty side dish, nor was it brought with them from their homeland -- it was cheap food.

Congratulations to Penn State's dining halls for their insenstivity toward cultural differences and also to Findlay's breakfast entertainment of 97 FM whose Tom and Karen Show proudly and unthinkingly ridiculed Asian people's flat noses Tuesday morning, the day after King's birthday.

Social injustice and racism are not things of the past, but it is alive and brewing, just more subtly. It is a sad realization that so few of his goals have been attained. Someone in America shot and killed its chance to close the gap between segregation and assimilation. I, unlike some white students, don't groan about hearing the "I have a dream" speech over again, because I take its message to heart.

Next year, perhaps the dining halls will take Veronica Conway's suggestion to make a birthday cake with his picture on it and do away with their half-hearted attempt to recognize such a great man.