"There are too many caucasians in that picture"

I do love my job. BUT some things people say/do just make me wonder.

I always wondered why colleges use the images that they do. I understand that they want on the cover of their brochure, a picture of students all with books in their laps, smiling, happy to be at X University. And the picture will have one white guy, a black guy (which is a myth in college never mind grad school but that's a whole other topic), an Asian girl, a Hispanic girl, you get the idea. This picture perfect image of unity. Never mind some minorities are barely represented at some schools. But do these people REALLY sit around together? While you have some intermingling, let's be honest...the Asian kids hang out together, the white kids together, etc. And no one picks a college because the brochure has a picture of their ethnic group on the cover!

So today I'm working on a marketing piece that will be going to the Fire Departments, targeting firefighters to enroll in our degree program. So we need an image for it. Its not easy finding a picture of a firefighter, in uniform, that isn't in the midst of a fire....let alone their original idea of him, on a computer. So I finally find something I think will work - three white guys, and a white girl, in uniform, in front of a firetruck in the station. Close enough. My co-worker gonna say "its too Caucasian looking" and I replied "its just what the NY Fire Department looks like". "REALLY?" she says in complete shock. Uh, YEAH. Unless you live under a rock, you'd know about the constant criticism of the department for its lack of women and minorities. Oh so I thought. Because when I said that minorities are very underrepresented, she was still in shock. "REALLY?" she says again.

I'm not a kind of person that puts race into the cause and/or effect of everything. But sometimes, its very relevant, and blatantly obvious. Or is it? I don't have any particular ties to the department, don't know anyone that works there, or applied and was denied. So how come I'm aware of the underrepresentation? Do people feel like ignoring the obvious makes the obvious problem of race go away? Or am I stereotyping people when I say people of a certain social status are so far removed from the average person's plight, that they don't even realize that there's any struggle at all? Is it that there aren't fire hoses being opened up on groups of innocent people, therefore there is no longer a problem?? Or maybe I just dont' feel like finding a new picture.......