Oberlin College has cancelled classes for the day in the wake of “a report of a person wearing a hood and robe resembling a KKK outfit” walking around campus. But the cancellation isn’t a public-safety lockdown.
The KKK sighting, which is still under investigation, is the latest in a string of bias incidents on campus. On five separate occasions in February, graffiti bearing swastikas and racial and homophobic slurs were left at various campus locations, often defacing multicultural offices or event posters. On February 17, a student reported that he was robbed and knocked to the ground on campus by an assailant “who made a derogatory remark about his perceived ethnicity.”
In response to this string of incidents, the Oberlin administration has suspended “formal classes and all non-essential activities” for the day, and will be holding “a series of discussions of the challenging issues that have faced our community.”
Today’s events will include a noon teach-in by the Afrikana Studies department, a 2 pm “demonstration of solidarity,” and a 3 pm community convocation.
Tuesday Update | As many as a thousand students — one third of Oberlin’s enrolled student body — attended yesterday’s solidarity demonstration in opposition to the hate crimes of the last month, which culminated in a march through the city of Oberlin. Some five hundred students attended the earlier teach-in and planning session at the Afrikana Studies department.
Oberlin was one of the first racially integrated and co-educational colleges in the United States. It has admitted black students since 1835 and women since 1837.
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March 4, 2013 at 10:35 am
alia
well, fuck.
Oberlin is my alma mater; the institution takes a lot of pride in its history of being the first college to accept african americans… but history is always more complicated than sound bites… they didn’t actually accept/graduate a person of color for many years after the official line, and that was just so they could get funding from the Tappan brothers, ardent east coast abolitionists.
(Story!) their ultimatum was “hire Professor Finney (who had just been kicked out of his last teaching position for his ardent abolitionism), and we’ll give you the money you need to continue.” This wouldn’t have been a problem, but Finney had an ultimatum of his own “accept my students that were kicked out with me, and allow African Americans, and I’ll come.”
it was a close vote: exactly half the board voted against. the vp was the tie-breaking vote, and that was just because he didn’t want to be the one who voted to let the college die.
history is made up of interesting combinations of fear, i think.
March 4, 2013 at 6:00 pm
Oberlin Cancels Classes After Month Of Hate Vandalism « CrimeAlertBlog.Com
[…] to the website Student Activism, the sighting of a person dressed like a KKK member is the seventh hate incident at Oberlin in the past […]
March 7, 2013 at 1:11 am
Jay Knott
Another Oberlin alumnus is Michelle Malkin. She has a very different take on the alleged wave of ‘hate’: http://michellemalkin.com/2013/03/05/oberlin-college-still-manufacturing-hate-crimes-hoaxes-after-all-these-years/