No, it's not still 1960. No, it's not Alabama, Georgia, Tennessee, Mississippi or any other deep South state.
But it's still racism.
And in Missouri - and nationwide - it's still our young people who seem to best understand the continuing stupidity and unfairness of racism.
For weeks, racial slurs have had students at the University of Missouri calling for the ouster of the university president because he failed to take seriously or do anything about the repeated incidents of racial taunting and intimidation throughout 2015.
The recent protests at Missouri began after the student government president, who is black, said in September that people in a passing pickup truck shouted racial slurs at him. In early October, members of a black student organization said slurs were hurled at them by an apparently drunken white student. Recently, a swastika drawn in human feces was found in a dormitory hall - a repeat of an incident in another residence hall last spring. On Sunday, two trucks flying Confederate flags drove past a site where 150 students had gathered to protest, a move almost certainly aimed at intimidation.
One of the participants, Abigail Hollis, a black undergraduate, told reporters the campus is "unhealthy and unsafe for us. The way white students are treated is in stark contrast to the way black students and other marginalized students are treated, and it's time to stop that. It's 2015."
For eight days, another student, Jonathan Butler, was on a hunger strike, but the story about his protest of racial problems at the premier university in the same state that arguably saw the most racial unrest in decades (prompted by the Ferguson, Mo., shooting by police of an unarmed black teen Michael Brown) received no major news coverage until the two dozen football players announced they would not participate in team activities unless University of Missouri System President Tim Wolfe was removed.
Head football coach Gary Pinkel and athletic director Mack Rhoades said they stood with the players.
Pinkel posted on Twitter a picture of the players linking arms, along with this message: "The Mizzou Family stands as one. We are united. We are behind our players. #ConcernedStudent1950 GP"
The Concerned Student 1950 group organized the protests. The group took its name from the year the university accepted its first black student.
The school's undergraduate population is 79 percent white and 8 percent black. The state is about 83 percent white and nearly 12 percent black. Another student demand is the school adopt a mandatory racial-awareness program and hire more black faculty and staff.
Practice and team activities were canceled Sunday, Pinkel and Rhoades said in a courageous and joint statement. Wolfe resigned on Monday shortly before noon.
In his resignation speech Wolfe accepted responsibility. "It is my belief we stopped listening to each other. We didn't respond or react. We got frustrated with each other and we forced individuals like Jonathan Butler to take unusual steps to affect change. This is not, I repeat, not the way change should come about. Change comes from listening, learning, caring and conversation. We have to respect each other enough to stop yelling at each other and start listening. And quit intimidating each other - through either our role or what other means that we decide to use. I take full responsibility for the inaction that has occurred."
Had the football players been forced to make good on their no-play statement, the school would have had to forfeit Saturday's game against Brigham Young University in Kansas City. Canceling the game would have cost the school more than $1 million - perhaps edging toward $2 million - in television and bowl revenues, according to several media estimates.
The Mizzou story raises two disquieting questions.
Why does racism still exist anywhere in this country? And why did it take the action of the football team to bring the story of continuing racism in Missouri to national headline attention.
Shame on us in the media. Shame on us in college faculties. Shame on us in schools and police departments and city halls and county courtrooms if we let racism continue. Shame on us all.