MADISON, Wis. – Once upon a time the progressive movement was focused on bringing Americans of different races closer together.

It was about more than guaranteeing fundamental civil rights for racial minorities. It was about building bridges of understanding between racial groups – particularly white and African-Americans – to counter hundreds of years of ignorance, mistrust and injustice.

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But in recent years the political left has been going in a bizarre new direction, selling anger to the black community by preaching the concept of victimization, and asking white Americans to acknowledge their “white privilege” and embark on a journey of self-loathing and repentance.

In short, leftists driving the races back into opposite, angry corners. That tactic was on full display earlier this week at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where the school’s Multicultural Student Center hosted separate meetings for white and black students and faculty members to discuss recent police shootings of two black men, as well as the murder of five law enforcement officers in Dallas.

While leaders across the nation were stressing the need for peace, understanding, and most importantly national unity in the wake of the tragedy, UW-Wisconsin was imposing its own politically-correct form of apartheid.

The left often says that “honest discussions” about race are necessary to heal the nation’s social wounds. How is that possible when a major taxpayer-funded university imposes racially- segregated meetings to discuss an incident with major racial undertones?

Did the white and black people who attended the separate meetings come away with a better understanding of each other’s feelings and perspective? Of course not, because they were not allowed in the room to hear each other speak.

“A post that has since been deleted  from the Multicultural Student Center’s Facebook page described the meetings as a place where students and UW employees could emotionally process the prior week, which included fatal police shootings of black men in Minnesota and Louisiana, followed by the targeted killing of five police officers in Dallas,” Madison.com reported.

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“Two of the meetings were for white students and UW employees, according to the post, while two meetings were for people of color.”

University spokeswoman Meredith McGlone explained that people who planned to attend the meetings preferred “a space to express feelings without the fear of being judged,” Madison.com wrote.

That might mean a few people probably expressed a desire to discuss the shootings with people of their own race, who presumably share their point of view.

That assumes that all white people view last week’s tragedies one way and all black people view them another way. That’s a grossly unfair and inaccurate stereotype. Millions of black Americans feel awful that a black man murdered five law enforcement officers in Dallas, Millions of white Americans are deeply troubled by the recent police shootings of black men in Louisiana and Minnesota.

There is a large degree of common ground on these issues, and it’s crucial for white and black Americans to meet, talk, listen and explore that common ground.

Racial anger and resentment has less fertile soil to grow when whites and blacks focus on the thoughts and feelings they share – as well as have honest conversations about areas of general disagreement.

“Today the Multicultural Student Center will hold open space for people to gather in community to process the past week’s events,” a UW Facebook post said on Monday, according to Right Wisconsin. “This is an opportunity to discuss, reflect and support one another.”

The announcement should have said that there would be separate meetings for two separate, racially-segregated communities, at a time when unity was crucial.