51 Comments
An email from Dean Colombo to Carman residents reveals that some homophobic graffiti was applied to the pillar outside the freshman dorm on February 11th, and was removed about a week later. Colombo’s email, reproduced below the jump, asserts that the slow response time in dealing with such incidents will be looked into in the future and improved. In the meantime, the administration has met with student council representatives and LGBTQ community leaders, and will be hosting events meant to address the issue. An investigation has also been launched with Public Safety.
Bwog continues to look into the incident and is awaiting further details from Dean Colombo. One pressing question: the pillar is visible and accessible to anyone walking through that part of campus, so why have (apart from the aforementioned student leaders) only Carman residents been involved thus far?
-CJS
February 27, 2007
Dear Carman residents,
I am emailing to update you on the biased writing that was drawn on the
pillar outside of Carman. As many of you know, on Sunday, February
11th, an RA reported the graffiti to Public Safety. The graffiti, which
consisted of homophobic language, challenged the very core of our
community’s values. This is not acceptable to you, to me, or to any
members of our community.
Once Residential Programs and the Office of Multicultural Affairs were
made aware of this act of vandalism, we immediately acted to ensure that
steps were being taken to remove the graffiti, to inform and counsel key
constituencies (including LGBTQ student leaders), and to launch an
investigation with Public Safety. These actions were based on agreed
upon protocols designed to respond to incidents such as these. Despite
several attempts, however, the language was not effectively removed
until over a week after the incident. We have spoken with the offices
of Housing & Dining and Facilities, and they have expressed regret for
the delay that it took for those words to be entirely removed from the
entrance to your home. In response to this, Housing & Dining and
Facilities have evaluated their methods for immediately covering and
then permanently removing such graffiti. These two offices are also
acting to acquire the necessary equipment to improve response time in
the regrettable case that it is needed in the future.
I understand that this incident violated your sense of home, and we take
that very seriously. On March 2nd at 2:30pm in the Carman lounge, the
Office of Multicultural Affairs will be hosting a program to bring us
together in understanding how biased actions and behaviors impact the
community as a whole. This program, Not in Our Home: Communities in
Response and Dialogue will discuss how we can support and be allies to
one another, what we can do collectively to address the issues at hand,
and what proactive measures we can take to continue educating each
other. We hope that you will participate in what promises to be an
important and engaging event.
Incidents such as this one remind us of the need to continually work
together to strengthen the procedures and protocols that we have
designed to uphold our community values. The success of our work thus
far is in large part the result of student input through key
constituency leaders, our Community Principles Initiative committee, and
Student Leadership Summits. The work of those groups continues as we
explore how to improve immediacy of response, educate those around us
about acts of hate and intolerance, and engage all members of our
community to work actively towards a sustained, supportive environment.
We all share a responsibility to maintain the values of our community.
The Division of Student Affairs is committed to ensuring that this
campus is a home to all of you. I look forward to working with each of
you as we empower ourselves to overcome acts of hate.
Sincerely,
Chris Colombo
Dean of Student Affairs
Columbia College
The Fu Foundation School of Engineering
and Applied Science
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51 Comments
@ichbinsehrkalt i identify as queer and i’m actually annoyed that people care about this crap. the bottom line is someone felt like being an asshole, basically on a whim. so you scribble shit and now BWOG readers and the administration legitimize you. this person, whoever it was – could have been anyone! – doesn’t deserve this debate.
but i do take issue with Colombo’s “I understand that this incident violated your sense of home, and we take ?that very seriously.” BS. Queers live on the margins – that is our home. I don’t want to speak for anyone else, but I LOVE the idea that I won’t be tolerated – and the LGBTQ community thrives on perpetuating that idea of existing OUTSIDE. It’s certainly invigorating.
Unfortunately, the person who wrote that shit is not.
To LGBTQ students who were offended: don’t waste your time or thoughts.
@Anonymous CTV News does a pretty good job for its limited resources.
@DUH CTV is just a bunch of stupid liberals!
@McFister CTV is totally gay.
@McFister I think homophobia is totally gay.
@CC'10 OMG! LIKE STOP DISSING ON OUR CLASS! JUST BECAUSE WERE WAYYYY COOLER THAN YOU PEOPLE! JEEZ! WHO SAID DOING COKE WAS BAD?
@well If bored@butler has taught us anything, it’s that this freshman class has its fair share of racists and homophobes.
@ummm explain the chemical process behind that one.
@I'm sad that Some people are trying to argue that the vandal meant “[Some, but not all,] queers rape boys”. Give me a break.
@Well Some queers do rape boys. In fact, I bet most male rape victims were raped by men. It seems only fair.
@sick #36: This does not mean that the rapists were queer–straight men rape the most men and women.
#37: I agree. It is just another indication of the homophobia on this campus.
I’m sure the Catholic ministry on campus would take graffiti that reads “Catholics rape boys” lying down.
@Any reason Any reason you said “lying down” instead of “sitting down?” You weren’t trying to create some sort of rape imagery, were you?
Also, the argument that straight men rape men is a difficult one to make. Generally speaking, you fuck a man in the ass and you’re gay for life.
@so wait i identify as gay but i’ve fucked a girl. am i straight for life?
sexual orientation isn’t black-and-white, asshole.
@Nope No, you’re gay for life. Heterosexuality is the “norm” state and any deviation from that is FOREVER.
@i think men rape women = queers rape boys, and both are bad
@Where's Nellie Bowles now???????
@barnard lesbian amen amen amen amen amen amen!
@I'm schocced! Have you ever considered that maybe someone is having a laugh at your expense? I’m mean come on– racist crackers, queers rape boys… sounds like a dumb joke to me.
@Cam Now there’s a much more interesting question. Two givens: A) we should watch for, and do our best to wipe out, bigotry and hate crimes, but also B) we shouldn’t pay too much heed to blatant trolls, online or off, who are merely screaming for attention. So where’s the line?
On my last campus, there were two rounds of official emails and news buzz for days after someone scratched a couple of swastikas on the corner of a building in pen. They were about as tall as the brick. The response seemed excessive. But is it valid to make judgement calls based on visibility? Hate speech is hate speech, right? Does it matter whether it was chalk or paint? Or should we discard intent entirely?
@STOP STOP HATE ON COLUMBIA’S CAMPUS
@hmm i dont think that the take back the night folks would be down with posters saying ‘men rape women.’ it doesn’t seem to me that the purpose of take back the night is to disseminate the idea that ‘men rape women,’ but rather to provide a safe space for all people who have experienced sexual violence, regardless of gender, and to work towards a world where no one (male, female, etc.) will have to deal with the consequences of rape.
also, ‘queers rape boys’ is undeniably homophobic. not only does the word, as another poster mentioned, have a history of pejorative use, but the plain meaning of the statement is that all ‘queers’ engage in an activity that is illegal, hurtful, and wrong.
@oh, wait i meant to write “to note that,” not “to find out that.”
@clarification not to repeat what #18 said, but i think it’s important to find out that A) usage of the word “queer” depends on the context because it can be used as in a pejorative, antagonistic manner, and B) many LGBT people don’t use the word “queer” to identify themselves because of its connotation as a homphobic insult. i, for one, am gay and do not identify as “queer.”
given the word’s history as a discriminatory insult, it’s hard not to see this graffiti as blatantly homophobic.
@oh lord not really to question, but what word, meaning gay, has not been used as an insult.
it seems awfully likely that this was probably some idiot’s idea of a joke. does that make it ok, not really, but it does change how we should respond, just to be productive. i’m not really a fan of making martyrs of idiots.
@Sprinkles Don’t worry, Columbia didn’t do anything substantial to punish the people who committed a hate crime in Ruggles last year…don’t expect this year to be any different.
@i bet you it was one of those damn culture warriors.
@i am fucking sick and tired of people comparing the two statements. “men rape women” is not the same as “queers rape boys” because there is no constant struggle for men in general to be accepted, there is no history of hate and violence towards men in general, and being just a man is not as big of a sensitive issue as being queer. to make such a broad statement without taking into account context is both ignorant and insulting.
and regarding the word “queer,” it’s not just a black-and-white issue on whether or not it is okay for people to say it or not. it is obvious that the meaning behind the word is what really caused the commotion. there is a big difference between someone saying “i identify as queer” and “those fucking queers”.
@oops “whether or not it is okay for people to say it or not.”
didn’t mean to be redundant.
@why it's phobic most queers don’t rape boys.
just like most XXX aren’t (insert problematic racial category here)
@Anonymous When, what the University determines to be, bias valdalism is directed at some groups (Ruggles), the University response is almost instantaneous. When its directed against other groups (EC, Carmen), the University response is abhorrently delayed.
Last year, the President’s Student Advisory Committee on Diversity repeatedly asked Bollinger why the University didn’t respond quicker in EC, at multiple meetings. He never pretend to respond to the question. Now a similar delay in Carmen.
The same mistakes, over and over again. Not even a token effort to improve response. This is shameful.
@comparisson if we want to draw comparissons lets talk about how long it took the admin to deal with the kids from minutemen. oooo ya. dat was sum longgg time.
@ccsc Back to the most important issue facing Columbia right now: will this cause ripples on the CCSC campaign trail?
@Assasin I think you mean:
“Back to the most important thing on campus. Will this cause ripples for Assasins?”
@instigator Let’s break this down. Homophobia is wrong, obviously, and I don’t think that there’s any question that that was the spirit in which those words were written.
However, unless I’m mistaken (which I may well be) “queers” is a term that is appropriate for use by all. And certainly it is true that there are members of that community who have committed sexual violence, just as it is true of most communities.
If Take Back The Night had put up posters saying “Men Rape” would this be a similar situation? Granted, graffiti is different from posters, but would the sentiment be the same?
Is there only the one (though significant) difference: that men can be empowered in our society, while homosexual, bisexual, transgendered, etc. people are often not?
@kam I don’t think that it was written in chalk because I heard that it took a lot of effort to get off. Wasn’t it paint of some sort?
And I thought that it said “queers rape boys” with “boys” misspelled or something like that.
@how is that homophobic?
@uhhh well, let’s see, operating under the assumption that we can agree that “homophobic” means some sort of fear or contempt for gay people, it should be pretty clear how this is homophobic. speech like this mess is hateful and both represents and spreads contempt for gays.
has there been any sort of official response by the queer alliance? a press release or something?
@i don't see how the message is certainly homophobic. queers rape (boys) is a statement of fact and not of opinion. its veracity can be proven either true or false. the same way that one might write men rape women.
phobias refer to either false statements of fact or opinions that are not deemed acceptable.
truth, cannot make someone ‘phobic’.
or can it?
@Sprinkles Jesus Christ. There are none so blind as those who ignore the obvious. Has your Columbia education not yet taught you how to make an educated judgment? It scares me that there are people at this school who don’t see the homophobia in this. OPEN YOUR EYES.
@my columbia education has taught be to problematize everything. judgments don’t write 10 page papers.
@you have got to be fucking kidding me
@X.J. Someone posted about this in the comments awhile ago. I believe they said the graffiti said “Queers Rape” in chalk. I’m not sure that I would necessarily call that ‘homophobic graffiti,’ but I’ll leave that to the community as a whole to discuss.
@umm are you sure the CTV thing was about homophobia? are you sure it wasn’t *islamo*phobia?
@Yellow The story was reported first on CTV News on Sunday as a brief, not a full story.
@First bias incident of the year
@and auld lang syne
@oh.... my bad
@Blue Uh…Bwog didn’t break this story. It was reported on CTV News on Sunday.
@hah but no one watches ctv news. sorry.
@Hah- wrong I watch CTV News…
@scoop! thanks to Bwog for breaking this story!