Seeing this article in The Epoch Times:

https://www.theepochtimes.com/tennessee-college-to-charge-unvaccinated-students-1500_3865411.html

I immediately started going through all the arguments for and against such a position, and what role government should play in this scenario with a private university. But then it occurred to me...replace the word "unvaccinated" with "black", and how would the scenario change? To extend the analogy, should universities be allowed to charge an extra fee for black students using the argument they "might" bring more crime or start a crime wave on campus? How is this any different than saying the unvaccinated might increase health care costs or bring disease? There is no evidence to suggest either, and yet the mind revolts against one and is willing to consider the other. But that wasn't always the case. 100 years ago I doubt society would have the same aversion to the 2 scenarios. So this isn't a simple case of objective facts. It is a case of values, both personal and societal.

Which begs the question. Does the government have a right and/or responsibility to make the Covid unvaccinated a protected, political class, free from persecution, just as they do today for various other classes? Such a consideration would immediately render mute all of the arguments that people use to say a private institution or employer can discriminate against a certain group that they don't like. Given that I don't see the administrators of these schools coming to an enlightened decision on their own, and the fact that the huge endowments, brand names and good will these universities have generated over decades can not be reproduced in a realistic timeframe by a startup, it does not seem fair or American to allow these private university boards to use the resources of the institution to project their personal political biases. We wouldn't allow them to use institution funds to indulge their personal financial pleasures. Why should we allow them to misuse these more ephemeral resources simply to indulge their political prejudices?

Would love to hear arguments for/against the proposal to ask our Congress critters to make the unvaccinated a protected class.