sections |
An Erase the Hate Rally and March will take place at the Free Speech Rock on Thursday, April 14, 2005, at noon, to respond to the continuing acts of prejudice on campus. On Sunday, April 10, 2005, a West Tower resident witnessed a bias-related incident.
Other incidents occurring on the same day included spit on the Office of Multicultural Affairs (OMA) glass display case showing LGBT events for Gaypril; and the words "Nigges Sux" written on another glass display case adjacent to the OMA. And the preceding day, Saturday, April 9, 2005, the prism flag was stolen from the flagpole. These incidents no longer relate to simply race or sexual orientation, but instead point to a larger theme: hate. So, in response to these continuing acts of prejudice, an Erase the Hate Rally and March has been planned for noon, Thursday, April 14, 2005, at the Free Speech Rock. Students from various organizations will be in attendance. The support and advocacy of faculty, staff, and administrators will be both expected and appreciated. Cordially, The African Latino Society, prism, Caribbean Students Association, the Diversity Council, Feminist Majority, Students for a Just Peace, Habitat for Humanity, Created Equal, Asian Culture Club, and MLK Scholars Erase the Hate Rally Comment from
aelliso1 on
04/13/05
I wish I could go to the rally, but I'm not even in the country right now. Ignoring the problem won't make it go away. It will just allow it to continue more quietly. That people would even suggest that ignoring these incidents would help shows the extent of the ignorance on campus.
We can't ignore the problem. We need to find effective ways of dealing with it. |
© Copyright Ithaca College. All rights reserved; unauthorized use prohibited. All material on this server is produced by our community but, except for designated pages, is neither approved nor verified by Ithaca College.
I think it is true that if we ignored these incidents, maybe they would stop. But the underlying problems that have given rise to them would not go away. The fact is that these incidents reflect intolerance and ignorance on our campus. No matter what motivation the perpetrators had for doing what they did, their actions reflect insensitivity and ignorance that I think is more pervasive on our campus than we would like to think.
The positive result of these unfortunate acts is that we are forced to talk about diversity and tolerance and examine the reality of prejudice and hate on our campus. If the discussion leads at first to more biased acts, so be it. I believe it is better to have these issues out in the open so that we can deal with them. For this reason, the Erase the Hate Rally and the ongoing discussions of diversity and tolerance are important for us all to participate in.