Administrators’ response to a recent targeted attack against a campus community has been disappointingly neutral and failed to take advantage of an opportunity to address problems concerning race on campus.
Last week, self-made stickers were posted on the bulletin board outside of the Afrikan Student Union and a few other spaces on campus, displaying bigoted and offensive statements concerning the death of Freddie Gray in Baltimore.
Until an interview with the Daily Bruin Editorial Board on Monday, UCLA administration remained strangely silent about the stickers, offering neither a condemnation of the racist act nor a voice of support for the black student community on campus. This slow reaction to the appearance of the stickers is particularly disheartening considering Chancellor Gene Block’s timely responses to other instances of bigotry on campus.
Earlier this year, when offensive posters accusing Students for Justice in Palestine of anti-Semitism were spotted around campus, Block took two days to respond with a campus-wide email.
Block has consistently responded in a timely manner this year to instances of hate or intolerance against the communities involved in the heated debate over UC divestment from companies that some say profit from alleged human rights violations in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
All issues concerning race and ethnicity on campus should be treated with the same level of concern and invoke the same kind action from school administrators.
In his interview Monday with the board, Block said that his decision to not immediately address the racist incident last week stemmed from a desire to avoid drawing attention to the issue. He said that each situation attacking a community on campus merits its own separate response.
But his failure to issue a timely response was a failure to adequately support a community on campus that, as of today, makes up only 4 percent of the entire student body at UCLA. Racist incidents on campus – especially incidents this direct and despicable – cannot and should not be swept under the rug.
During the Editorial Board interview with Block Monday, UCLA Vice Chancellor of Student Affairs Janina Montero provided a letter to the Daily Bruin criticizing the “inflammatory” nature of the stickers. The letter was published in Tuesday’s paper.
Montero’s response came considerably later than students needed and expected, and it also failed to truly condemn the stickers for what they were: an unequivocally bigoted, hateful attack on an already vulnerable and underrepresented campus community.
While the perpetrators of the racist stickers are unknown, the essence of the action must be more adequately addressed. The offending party cannot be identified and therefore cannot be directly disciplined, but the intention behind the episode could and should be more directly tackled by those in power.
This issue is far from over. Just yesterday, yet another round of stickers was found on campus by the Charles E. Young Research Library and Campbell Hall. Their messages targeted the issue of illegal immigration, once again invoking insensitive and damaging rhetoric. The administration has yet to respond to this event.
Let’s get one thing straight here, the Afrikan Student Union put up those stickers themselves. It was told to several members at they would do so. Who else would go through the extraordinary length to find out where a random bulletin board for ASU in Kerckhoff is. Just like when the Vietnamese Student Union sent themselves that racist flyer (who on earth knew which random mailbox was theirs other than them?). They are self victimizing to try to win over empathy, particularly after being crushed in elections.
But what if it actually wasn’t them?
I think it might have been some individuals who have a lot of money and resources and power. I can actually picture them rubbing their hands together in gleeful joy over watching us tear each other apart over racism. We all need to understand who the true enemy is and its not us.
You’re obviously talking about all the White people 1%ers. You couldn’t possibly be implying some other group.
Yes, numbers are skewed but there are easily 6 million of those 1%er types trying to pit us against each other.
The DB Editorial Board answered their own question “While the perpetrators of the racist stickers are unknown, the essence of the action must be more adequately addressed. The offending party cannot be identified and therefore cannot be directly disciplined.” UCLA Administration can’t make a statement when details are not substantiated. Sure they can come out and condemn the messages on the stickers, but even then students won’t be satisfied. Perhaps the administration is smarter than to jump on any and every alleged incident of bias, bigotry, racism, homophobia, xenophobia, or general personal offense without all the details in order. The most recent incidents really only require UCLA to release the same message already handed to the DB from VCSA Montero.
The correct course of action is to arrest ever single White and Asian student and water board them until they confess to their vile racist views. Then expel them for life and contact all of their employers and families and tell them how evil they are.
See this is why the devil cave dwellers forced us into integration! They create a climate of racial fear where we don’t have knowledge of self. Then its easier for them to mix with us to replace their defunct, recessive, genes. We don’t want your bony Beckys anymore bruh, what are you going to do when the melanites WAKE UP?!
ABsolutely we need brave people of color to rise up and throw off the oppressive yoke of white western civilization! We need to return to our natural roots like the tribespeople
Perhaps it would be best if our people just had their own countries. Crazy idea.
Activist groups pull false flag stunts all the time for attention. If they can’t find someone to punish then there isn’t anyone to punish. That’s how justice works.
(signal beacon activated)
The war against communism has arrived at UCLA. The pinkos can’t hide in the Ivory Tower forever.
Dont you bring communism into this. Communism has yet to be properly brought to the masses and hopefully with Bernie Sanders or Hillary Clinton in charge we might actually get to live out the true revolution of the masses!
You right wing conspiracy nuts need to take off the tin foil…smh..this is WHITE SUPREMACY IN ACTION!
This is outrageous! Gene Block is literally the next Hitler for not addressing this right away. People of Color should protest and refuse to even listen to these hate enablers.
Isn’t it “bigoted and offensive” that Freddie Grey supporters burned down their own city and attacked random White people? Or is that an “authentic expression of marginalized people of color”? When Whites finally give away all of their countries to browns and blacks who are incapable of building civilizations of their own, will Whites be afforded such leeway?
Devil thats how the original (read:REAL) man exercises his agency. Our melanin resonates at the same frequency and we already know the deal. That’s how we birthed civilization and built pyramids, HOTEP!
Absolutely not! White people, as brave professor Noel Ignatiev of Harvard University said, we need to eliminate whiteness from the face of the Earth! Betraying the white race is true patriotism. Only when whites have been bred out of existence will things start to heal!
I definitely trust ‘white’ people like Noel Ignatiev, Paula Rothenberg, and Tim Wise (who are totally white and not of a certain ethnic group at all).
They are crackers tho and the real Israelites are waking up! The trans atlantic slave trade was predicted in Deut 28:68, YHWY made US in his image and when God’s kingdom come back you’re going into bondage devil
WOW if you dont see the racism in this you are BLIND to reality my friend!!
How would YOU like it if someone put a bunch of stickers saying that George Zimmerman is guilty outside the White Student Union? What if YOU couldn’t feel safe in your White History course or if people didn’t take your Men’s Studies major seriously? TRY PUTTING YOURSELF IN SOMEONE ELSES SHOES FOR A CHANGE YOU VILE RACIST
We need to understand the vibrancy of people of color such as my personal hero Afrika Bambaataa I cant believe racist capitalist whites appopriated his music for grant theft auto vice city
http://i.imgur.com/tDcFdrd.jpg
Hey, at least it wasn’t a noose.
Let me say it: I hate white people.
I agree. We should separate from them immediately.
That’s really brave of you. Hating White people must be really hard in 2015. Wow. #SoBrave
Waaah people aren’t paying attention to me!
A vulnerable campus community?
A college.
In the United States.
In 2015.
Cry me a river.