We are sorry as well, Will Ehrenfeld, that the existence of the Korean Students Association (KSA) and its organization of a cultural show gave one of our classmates the perfect opportunity to allegedly carry out a racist act. This connects to the piece you wrote on April 7 entitled "Cliques" about your discomfort with groups that don't quite fit into the image of Tufts you have in mind. Let's think for a moment about what the Tufts community named in your "Stuff Tufts People Like" article looks like. For instance, in "Cliques" you stress that Tufts students want to belong to an oppressed group. Doesn't this formulation exclude those of us who are already members of oppressed groups? Or does it say something even more off base -- that we, minorities, especially covet our social distinction? Well, we think the Tufts you envision is the Tufts you experience as a straight-identified white male from Connecticut with self-identified mainstream, liberal political views.
You're probably right, Will. If the freshman hadn't come across this group of students, he probably wouldn't have had the opportunity to behave in such a completely harmful and embarrassing fashion. Does that mean we should, as you suggest, scrutinize the members of KSA for not being "average mainstream" people and gathering together in a space where they may encounter a drunk person? Is that the answer? Ban all non-average mainstream people from gathering so people are not given an opportunity to carry out racism? We don't think that really solves the problem, Will.
You may also be correct to say that had he encountered the Tufts Dance Collective, the outcome and campus reaction would have been different. But, as you warn in your article, we should avoid speculating as to what might have been "if only..." We should stick to what we know, what has been reported in our impartial Daily: an allegedly drunken freshman encountered a group of Korean and Korean-American students practicing for their cultural show. An altercation ensued, and according to multiple witnesses, the allegedly drunken student used the term "gay" in a derogatory way, initiated physical violence, spat on members of KSA, and topped it all off with death threats, the hotly contested racial slurs, and other racially charged comments.
You contest that this may not be a bias incident. Again, you are right. This incident would much more aptly be referred to as a hate crime. You can look to Chapter 265: Section 39 of the General Laws of Massachusetts to confirm this. You suggest that because you can assume this student didn't plan well in advance on ending his night with a racist attack against students, it doesn't count. The law begs to differ. Premeditation, according to the law, can occur in an instant. And to clarify, nowhere in Massachusetts law does it say the perpetrator must come away unscathed in order for the law to apply and his/her actions to be labeled assault, as self-defense is protected.
Trying to downplay events like this serves to perpetuate the idea that racism is over and therefore maintains racism as the status quo. Racism is defined by Michael Omi and Howard Winant in their groundbreaking racial theory text "Racial Formation in the United States" (1996) as "social projects which create or reproduce structures of domination based on essentialist categories of race." So, a racist event would be one that employs racial stereotypes, or essentialist views about race (for instance that all perceived Asians living in the United States are immigrants from China) to demean targets while promoting the assailant's racial superiority. We agree on many points, Will, another being that we should take note of the violent aspect of this event. In fact, when racism is manifested in a violent way, it should be the most alarming -- so alarming, in fact, that it necessitates a campus-wide response.
Finally, you suggest that we should not rush to call for this student's expulsion. As far as we know (and we are familiar with the goals of the rally to be held on Thursday), there have been no calls for his expulsion on the part of the organizers of the rally and the Facebook.com group. We have no knowledge of other groups that may exist that have this goal in mind. We feel that this instance reflects greater problems at Tufts that extend far beyond this one student. Your article is a perfect example of the problems we are referring to: We as a campus insist on ignoring racism and other forms of oppression. We downplay racial violence as something other than what it is in order to avoid undertaking the difficult task of transforming Tufts into a safe learning environment for all of its students. And yes, Will, this is a challenge that exists outside of the Tufts bubble.
We know that racism and heterosexism are all too common in the "real world," but we reject the notion that just because something is common, we shouldn't "get up in arms over" it. In fact, precisely because racism and heterosexism are all too common and people like you insist on downplaying their very harmful manifestations, we absolutely must get all up in arms. To desire to disassociate oneself from what has happened is, by way of distance, tacitly to condone biased violence, which then breeds an environment that fosters the potential for more unchecked violence against marginalized groups.
--
Sofia Nelson is a senior majoring in political science. Sara Robbins is a senior majoring in English.
The ridiculous defenses that people are coming up for this guy just reinforces the self reflection the total student body at Tufts needs to have. Do the defenders have sympathy because they realize that after a hard night of boozing, this could have been them in this predicament screaming "Go back to China" after getting pinned to the floor.
According to Will Ehrenfeld, screaming the N word to a black person isn't racist if its in the context of an unprovoked fight...
The world isn't going to be like private school forever, kiddies.
he did say that he "did not want to discount the danger and perniciousness of racism," but in the very next breath he does precisely that by doubting that a racial slur is worth worrying about more than the fact that physical violence was used.
Racism is bad. Violence is bad. We like to think these are truisms, but at least everyone recognizes physical violence for what it is and for the damage that it causes. When he says that "there’s no evidence the attack was motivated by racial anger or bias" He fails to recognize the very real racism that went on here. And by that, I am referring to a system that made the drunk freshman think he could use racial slurs and dismiss them as mere "obscenities" when the damage they do runs deeper than surface scratching. By doubting the kid's real intentions in using the words, he makes the incident and discussion about racism about this one kid, when really, it isn't at all.
But even regardless of those two things, you make a huge jump by intuiting that Will's article is about "some minority group" overreacting rather than the Tufts campus in general. There's no justification for that. He does sort of allege that one or both sides overreacted /during/ the incident inasmuch as someone needlessly caused the situation to escalate to violence. But in that he is entirely correct. Furthermore he's not even indirectly implicating the KSA there.. the question of whether or not "bias" was the freshman's motive in no way impacts the question of whether or not the KSA was right to use violence defend themselves in response to the situation at hand. If the freshman was attacking them, they obviously had a right to do so, regardless of why he was doing it.
Sophia,
You say "This is not to say one's lens invalidates one's thoughts or prevents one from speaking on certain issues." Your invocation of Will's perspective, however, as a "straight-identified white male from Connecticut" heavily implies you are impugning the validity of his opinions on this issue on the basis of this perspective.You say, "I do stand by my belief that Will's response (one shared by many Tufts students) to this hate crime as merely some minority group's thirst for victimhood is dismissive of a very violent and racist act." I'm sorry but I really don't think that's a fair interpretation of Will's column. Nowhere in it article does he even come /close/ to suggesting the victims of this incident posses a "thirst for victimhood". This column was most definitely NOT titled: "Stuff Tufts People Like: Being Victims". It WAS titled "Stuff Tufts People Like: Alleging Bias". Even this title isn't really representative of his column as the point he's making clearly is that Tufts people are too quick to conclude that something was a bias incident, rather than suggesting they do so because they "like" it.