Other people on campus also wrote about this, several
of them on their FB pages. On several of these pages, people got comments about
how “we” should just ignore these posters. Some said we should ignore them
because we had better things to do; others claimed it was their free speech
right to put up the posters.
One person, though, defended those who put up these
posters.
He said that we needed to understand that
"most" people who felt this way (the way those who posted these
racist posters did) were "every-day, hard-working" people who were
just frustrated with the way things have been going in America -- the
disrespect shown toward the military and the police, and toward "our"
religious institutions.
Frankly, this attitude strikes me as worse than open
racism. Note what this person is saying. First, he implies that anyone who
condemns racism and hate is not hardworking -- perhaps it's only the elite, or
those on welfare who would think racism is wrong?
Second, he claims that racism and bigotry are a proper
response to police protests. He ignores any possibility that those protesting
against the police might have just cause.
Finally, the point about disrespect toward
"our" religious institutions, given that one of the posters is an
attack on Islam, is especially vile.
These posters are openly racist, they are openly
bigoted, they are a clear evil that we can understand and condemn.
This comment
-- and his other comments, which were equally troubling -- are more dangerous.
They are like the Southern moderates of the 1950s, who didn't put on the Klan
costumes, who didn't beat up black men and women and children in the streets,
or lynch them, but who very civilly argued against passing laws, or making
changes, or doing anything at all to stop those who did, because after all
those people in the white hoods, they had their point of view too, didn't they.
Open racism and open bigotry will not be the problem
over the next four years. Moderates and appeasement politics, those who just
want to be devil’s advocates, those will be our downfall.
7 comments:
I have a similar story from this week I can't go into detail about because it would be easy to locate me geographically based on the incident (or sadly, maybe not). But our student leadership bravely condemned something similar and got a similar response to the one you discuss from one of our (white male) practitioners. And the dean shut him down and praised the student response and reminded us about the anti hate events coming up. So I'm feeling pretty good about our leadership and our student body. We can't be quiet and we can't let people tell us to be silent without a fight.
Most of our students are outraged; most of them are condemning the posters. Only a few are like this one guy. A few is too many.
Worse news, though -- the local news covered the story, and the comments on the news page were horrific. Racist AF.
I really like the way our dean responded to such douchery. It's good when those few get shouted down by powerful white men. I guess I'm saying the response to the few who aren't being blatantly racist but are enabling racists is also important.
Yes, I'd like more of a response from our university leadership. Our dean of students put out a statement saying that this did not represent the views of the university. But that's all.
Silence is consent, and a refusal to condemn is tantamount to acceptance.
We've had a lot of racist incidents since I've been here and the response from the college president, faculty senate, and so on has always been quick and appropriate. Possibly one reason I've been willing to stay here so long. We're not a liberal campus, but the leadership is strong and made up of decent people. Bad things happen but they respond like mature adults.
Has anyone asked the president's office why the president hasn't said anything yet? Some of us (including my chair) were thinking about doing that with our latest incident but then the president sent out a statement before we did, so we didn't have to.
We should think about that. I know our reps are taking this to the senate.
Good on your reps! I feel lucky that our president spoke *before* our senate did (since committees take time), but the important thing is that admin takes action.
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