NASHVILLE, TN—Freshman Charles Von Smithson (who prefers to go by his stage name “the C” and is regarded as an “up and coming suburban rapper”) claims to have experienced a life changing moment during his second Visions meeting. In an exclusive interview with The Slant, Charles revealed that he came to the shocking realization that racism still exists in America after a member of his Visions group, Mia, discussed a moment when she was insulted on account of her race. Though Charles initially challenged Mia, suggesting that the perpetrator “probably didn’t mean to be racist and probably had plenty of black friends,” he experienced a true “eureka” moment upon realizing that “reverse racism wasn’t the only type of racism in twenty-first century America.” Shortly after his Visions meeting, Charles decided to place an American flag next to the Confederate Flag sticker on his laptop, expressing a desire to be more open-minded toward others and has since identified himself as “hella woke.”

“A couple of weeks ago, I overheard my classmates talking about being ‘woke’ and something called ‘institutionalized racism,’ but I wasn’t really paying attention – I thought they just meant they were awake. Like, kickoff was going to start in a while, and I still had to pick up my new Sperrys at the mall, so I dipped out.” Charles has since embraced the term after finding out it means “being aware” and “knowing what’s going on in the community” on Urban Dictionary.

It’s been weeks since Charles’ groundbreaking transformation. His VUceptor has stated that his contributions to the group have been “very engaging” and has highlighted the “interesting” point of view he brings to discussions. Unfortunately, Charles was not able to attend the past two meetings as he had “prior commitments”. Charles had since defended his absences by claiming that he thought meetings were only “optional.”