64 Comments
A crowd of about 100 people marched from Earl Hall to Teachers College around 11:00 PM tonight in response to the incident earlier today involving a hanging noose found tied to the door of an African American professor. Earlier today, WNBC identified the professor as Madonna G. Constantine, who teaches psychology and education.
Protesters yelled several different chants including “We will not be silent!” and “Bollinger’s house for justice!” at which point about twenty people broke off from the main crowd on the steps and attempted directing the protest towards Broadway. Organizers quickly hurried people back toward the steps.
The chant changed to “Strike if we must!” Bwog asked a Teachers College student (who prefers not to disclose her name) what exactly the strike was supposed to
accomplish. “We will wear all black tomorrow and we are going to walk out of classes. We’re trying to change this racist organization. We’re going to the Town Hall meeting tomorrow.”
The march occurred after 9:00 PM emergency meeting that filled the main auditorium in Earl Hall. At the meeting, students decided to support a rally at 2:00 PM tomorrow at the 120th St. gates. NBC and CBS were there under mountains of black umbrellas and were pulling students under cover for interviews and pull quotes, one reporter furiously Blackberry-ing the entire affair.
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64 Comments
@does TC not have cameras? This could not have happened at 3 pm on a weekday.
@Alum I’d hate to think it has cameras pointed at every nook and cranny of its buildings. The idea that there wasn’t a camera pointed at this particular office door should not be such a surprise.
@hmmmm http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,,-6989248,00.html
@She She probably did it then
@Richard Weaver The spirit of SDS and The Weather Underground lives on in the guise of this manufactured crisis. Take a look at how Columbia grad Mark Rudd portrays himself and his fellow 1960’s Columbia terrorists in an avuncular light here:
http://www.markrudd.com/home/why-were-there-so-many-jews-in-sds/
Columbia students, please read this self-serving article and think on it a bit. My hope is that some of you will wake up to who, and what ideology, is pulling the strings and is manipulating your perceptions.
“Racial tension” has always been guided and exploited by those who stand to gain the most from it. A careful read of Rudd’s brief memoir of his radical days might give rise to an examination of who, and what ideology, is promoting idiocies such as the outrage over this piece of rope and the ersatz “furor” over the Jena 6.
Left vs. right has little meaning to these puppetmasters; note that Rudd pays homage to neoconservative guiding light Leo Strauss in the same paragraph where he praises Marx. Destruction of the pillars of traditional society was- for Strauss and Marx and Rudd- the overt and sometimes covert goal. Please ask yourself: Qui bono?
–Richard M. Weaver
http://www.antiwar.com/stromberg/s022701.html
@Alum How is CU (or TC) a “racist organization”? TC alone has hundreds of faculty and thousands of students; the actions of one person — who may even have been an outsider — are not those of the school and do not reflect its character. And even if they did, why does this one act overshadow the vastly larger number of compassionate acts by members of the CU and TC communities trying to combat racism? Or those of the institutions themselves?
@it was more like 25 students that marched from earl hall, but whatever.
@I call 'em I call ’em Gissers
@ugh To the people “shocked” at the “latent racism” exhibited on the internet, you clearly aren’t familiar with the greater internet fuckwad thoery:
http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2004/03/19
@Claremont transfer There was an excellent walk-out and rally sparked directly by the Kerri Dunn debacle at the Claremont Colleges that Wednesday. An entire series of racist incidents that I certainly hadn’t known about were brought to light and discussed alongside the (faked) trashing of Dunn’s car.
Hell, before the Kerri Dunn thing, a lot of people hadn’t known about the utter shitheads who BURNED A CROSS in a dorm lawn in front of a black kid’s room over that previous winter break.
Everyone who I had seen show fear on the night the car was trashed – everyone – was comforted, reassured, and strengthened by the rally. By finding people they knew within it.
Yeah. Remember Kerri Dunn. And remember what we made of it.
@Glad to Glad to hear it wasn’t a devastating incident, and congrats for the transfer – unless you’re GS, in which case it doesn’t count
@Yay Why don’t you just start calling all GS students N****rs while you’re at. I mean how far apart is racism and elitism at the end of the day?
@Wondering if maybe the same person is behind both the sipa incident and this. It seems to me this is most likely some asshole trying to jerk the student body around. I find it hard to believe that someone racist enough to do this would choose to go to a place as diverse as Columbia. Certainly they could have found somewhere a little more to their liking? There is probably someone out there somewhere really enjoying all the uproar they have caused.
@FOX i noticed that we made fox news again and of course, the article mentioned ahmadinejad and i thought, “hm, maybe this is all an attempt to keep columbia in the noose”
@b@b i didn’t think that racism was such an issue here, since i assumed that of all people, columbia students should be the most open-minded. then boredatbutler came into existence and i was horrified by what i saw. haven’t looked at it since, so i don’t know what it’s like now, but it showed me a very troubling side of the student body.
@The King of Spain yeah, but bored at butler was filled with idiots venting and being insensitive, not genuinely evil people physically and mentally threatening a person.
@bah The idiot who placed that noose must be getting a thrill out all this outrage right now. You know, because there is a chance that it is just one guy working alone, right? That this garish statement of racial insensitivity isn’t a slip-up made by the otherwise methodical and clandestine racist juggernaut that secretly pulls the strings of the entire school for no other purpose but the enjoyment of brutally oppressing people who supposedly possess no power to begin with?
@a little compassion Guys, this wasn’t just racist, it was threatening. I don’t know this professor or her work, but she’s got to be pretty unnerved. She’s got to be worried about her own safety and possibly that of her family. Whoever did this was sending the message: “I know who you are, where you are and I don’t like you because you are black.”
I’m not going to walk out of class tomorrow, but I am going to wear black to show that I’m thinking of this professor. I probably won’t see her tomorrow or her me, but I just want to show that crazy racists are not the majority of this campus.
@haha Mm, crumpets, delicious.
What’s that you say, I’m not angry and righteous? Why I must be a bigot, then!
@"strike" Why will students going on strike affect anything? When a factory goes on strike, production ceases. The factory manager no longer has goods to sell, and cannot profit. When students go on strike and do not attend classes, the professors have a nice day off and drink tea and eat crumpets.
@The King of Spain Isn’t the perpetrator likely sociopathic, or at least unafraid of consequences? I don’t believe that with all the protests and condemnation that has blanketed the campus that this event would happen as a result of a racist culture at columbia. Insensitivity to race, race issues, and racism is one thing, but attacks are another; an anonymous poster being a dick and a felony-committing monster are totally different things
Do you really think that this guy saw some joke about the graffiti in SIPA and felt that was support for him getting revenge from a teacher? Or was it some dick decided that he could scare the shit out of this woman and insult her work based on hatred for her and her race, something that would have roots in deeper evils and problems within the individual?
@why don't they find out what happened in detail before getting fired up and go all weather underground? what happened to analysis and assessment? that TC student who said she’ll be wearing black & walking out of the classes is a trip; she says she’ll go to the townhall meeting AFTER the walking out. nice one.
@sportsfan Kerri Dunn was that Olympic gymnast who got injured but still did well enough for the US Women’s team to win the gold medal, right?
What does she have to do with this?
@kerri strug idiot
@Anonymous Can we be tired of having the terms of debate about race defined this way? I’m just so blah. I’ve never heard anyone explain what our current conception of race is. I understand the historical definitions (as they changed over time) but I always thought we wanted to move beyond them.
Eh, whatever. I guess it’s always cool when someone is protesting. But I guess my life’s never been disrupted by it.
@Demands of who? Who the hell do ‘they’ think they are?
@To the bigot who has posted 2/3rds of the comments here: Just what are you trying to get at? That an act of racism wasn’t committed? That an act of hate, implicitly targeting an entire race, should just be ignored or sucked up quietly? I’m not even Black or Hispanic and your bullshit pisses me off. What are you trying to argue anyway? That she’s faking it for the attention? That the protesters aren’t right to be pissed off? That they enjoy this?
Shut the fuck up and go away. You’re probably a misfit for this school, and I wouldn’t be surprised if one of your friends or someone like you was behind the noose. It’s people like you we need to weed out, because it’s people like you are the root cause of the protests you despise so much, prick.
@... A list of demands/issues will be disseminated tomorrow. This was before the TC students had come up with a common list of what they hope to achieve.
@#33 “This” being the interview.
@Protests are understandable in this case as an outcry of anger and hurt.
however lumping an entire organization like say columbia as ‘racist’ will quickly negate any of the potential support such a movement would have
so far we don’t know who hung the noose—they’re either despicably racist or enormously stupid—but its probably a good idea to not drag the name of entire institutions into this
@Anonymous Track Commenter #1
11 out of 29 comments are from the same person/computer.
Track Comments and Don’t let them get to you. It looks like 20something people have commented. But it’s actually just a few and the as$hole commenting different things is the same person.
Track comments, Track comments Track comments Track comments Track comments Track comments Track comments Track comments Track comments Track comments Track comments Track comments Track comments Track comments Track comments Track comments
@So what? I was responding to another person. Fuck off, although I guess most of your conversations tend to be one-sided
@Racist Racist against Asians and middle-class caucasians, perhaps. At least the admissions
@wtf “racist organization”?
what are you accomplishing? what are you getting at? That Columbia is some sort of racist oppressive monolith? Well, I guess that explains that last 4 years of misguided protests…
I’m all for demonstrating against intolerance. I fail to understand where power politics and “organization” come into this at all.
@racist This shit’s why I’m racist in the first place. Just not against any race. More like against fucking idiots like these protesters. Now I’m just waiting for ten more nooses to be hung so that we can have an even bigger protest.
@Tomorrow noonish His p.r. staff are drafting it, expect it around tomorrow. They want to make sure it wasn’t a mistake first, then his team have to draft it, pass it through three people and get his okay
@Like the You mean like the one the TC President sent out immediately after the incident to her entire school? You mean like that?
@no.. like one from perhaps bollinger to the whole community?
@well why don’t you just stop being so self-important.
@NOT ISOLATED for those of who you think this is an isolated incident…wake up! between the racist graffiti at SIPA, this, and God knows what else with David Horowtiz’s Islamofascism awareness week coming up…the administration needs to grow some balls and tell the student body that this shit will not be tolerated. perpetrators of hate crimes are cowards who need to be put in their place.
and yea, so this protest won’t eradicate racism. but u can’t say the solidarity doesn’t feel good.
@#19 is a moron 1) Acknowledging the existence of Islamofascism is NOT racism.
2) If these idiot protesters are truly against fighting racism, then they should all rally against affirmative action. Their childish reaction only gives the perpetrator the attention that he craves.
@i was just out on 120th and amsterdam to go buy cigarettes. i didn’t see anything, it was like 120th always is… silent with tumbleweeds blowing around.
my guess it it’s either someone she knows or has dealt with that has truly evil motives… or it’s some snarky student who really doesn’t care about her at all and saw an opportunity to incite some ridiculousness. (columbia’
s propensity to protest)
i really haven’t been at columbia long enough to detect any real racism, and during my short time here i haven’t encountered any hints… a fair share of snarky jackasses and self important schmucks, but no real racists yet. i’d be surprised if i saw it…
@I will grant I will grant that this is the more likely scenario, but a noose is a little beyond the pale for a prank.
Grad students go completely buckwild at times, so I’m staking my money on a former student of hers
@i tend to agree yeah, it’s true we did just have midterms…
also of note, the spectator article made drudgereport! head on over to the comments for some true pearls of wisdom from the brightest minds in america!
@WTF! what are they striking FOR? What the fuck is anyone supposed to do beyond condemn the noose bullshit and try to find out who’s behind it?
“We will wear all black tomorrow and we are going to walk out of classes. We’re trying to change this racist organization. We’re going to the Town Hall meeting tomorrow.”
That really implies that this is some kind of racist organization behind this….walking out of classes? This isn’t an administration thing. This is one lone retard. Let’s continue to give him/her the attention they desperately crave!
The racist douche who hung the noose is a moron. So are all these people all up in arms about an isolated case with no official component.
@wtf indeed why is CU all if a sudden a “racist organization”. I think a show of solidarity is more in line than a protest. Protest=politics of divisiveness. I agree with WTF. For anyone who has actually been discriminated against(and yes, I have), I find it especially disheartening when people bring out the firebrands and fabricate divisions within the community rather than display their display their solidarity. But then again, these people believe that Columbia is racist, so I guess that precludes any form of dialogue.
@haha we should show solidarity, not be divisive! ok. which means, apparently, don’t protest against racism, just accuse the professor of faking the hate crime against her for her own benefit? genius.
@uhh maybe we’re going to force the administration to actually acknowledge this incident. Or is that just protesting and being whiny to you?
@They've They’ve released statements, called the police; what else would you have them do? Distribute cookies and blankies?
@how about a mass email to the community acknowledging that something went down?
@meh “we’re going to force the administration to actually acknowledge this incident. Or is that just protesting and being whiny to you?”
I just do not understand this attitude, and it comes out every time an incident like this happens.
The admins “reported [the incident] to the New York City Police Department’s Hate Crimes Task Force”. An email was sent to the TC students tonight, one will be sent to the rest of the student body tomorrow. If you know who did this, tell the administration, I guarantee you they would happily expel the little snot, and press charges to boot. #19 says “the administration needs to grow some balls and tell the student body that this shit will not be tolerated”…I’d love to know how they could do this without knowing who the culprit is. Should they just start fingerprinting us all as suspects? I guarantee you half the students protesting this incident would be up in arms protesting that invasion of their privacy. So what could the CU admin do to make anyone happy?
I’m not saying this incident is okay, it’s not. It makes me physically ill to think that one of my schoolmates is that awful a human being. But you can’t honestly say that the majority of CU students are racist, or that the admin is ignoring this incident, because it’s just not true.
@Yes Holy hell, I was wondering how long it would take somebody to say this. The protest doesn’t even seem to have any specific demands…
@Face value Taking it at face value means picketing as soon as possible and making a national disgrace out of your alma mater?
Think about this as a transaction, who is going to come out worse from all of this, you or her? Do you really think a student or anyone sane would really put a noose in front of a Columbia professor’s office? It’s such a weird anomaly, so different from the other pseudo-incidents that you have to be suspicious
@Yeah Real quiet, that’s why her name’s all over the news. Tomorrow will be the big speech where she’ll be like don’t hate the oppressor
@Umm Did you see the first articles? And the TC president’s statement? She wasn’t identified. It looks like someone leaked her name, though she was trying to keep quiet.
Now I suppose if you assume she’s a nefarious faker – because of course there’s no real hate in our society, no history at Columbia – she could have cleverly pretended to be modest, to throw clever detectives like you off the track. Or we could be sane, and take this at face value until we have, y’know, some *reason* besides denial to do otherwise. douchebag.
@How about How about we slam all the doors behind all of the protesting students and never, ever let them back in?
@note #1 and #3 are the same troll. i wonder if its the asshole who made half the posts on the earlier thread?
(yes, i’m #4…)
@Disagreeing Disagreeing =/= trolling, and don’t forget that after Duke you should be worrying more about your civil rights as a student than some tenured professor’s.
Just because she claims to be a victimized minority doesn’t mean you and me won’t be oppressed by her actions. It’s worth considering, agree or disagree…
@"You and me" Interesting that you assume *I* couldn’t be a “victimized minority” myself. I guess you don’t usually have dialogues with such people?
(For the record, I’m a white male. But fortunately not quite as dumb as some. I know that doesn’t make me “oppressed” by the evil PC oligarchy, in a society where there are more Black men in prison than in college.)
@I don't Stop thinking of this as black/white, you are a relatively powerless college student being taken advantage of, whether it’s by a professor like Kerri Dunn (also clinical psych etc) or by some jerk-off anti-Iranian group is the same result –> you and me, as students, lose
@now what it’s heartening that people mobilized so quickly tonight. now group leaders need to let the ENTIRE student body know what we can do to protest this shit. decide on one, symbolic protest, then let everyone know how they can participate.
@REMEMBER REMEMBER KERRI DUNN!!!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kerri_Dunn
@nice 1st comment, an implicit accusation that the professor (who has kept her name private, kind of stupid for a publicity seeker) faked the crime.
you attract the classiest commenters, bwog! nice job!
@As Reasonable as any While I agree it might be a bit crass to accuse this prof of faking the crime, at this point, its as reasonable as any. Columbia is not the Jim Crow era-south. If a Columbia Affiliate did this, it was a direct threat against that prof. using a clearly evil symbol. This is not part of a widespread, casual racism among Columbia students and faculty. For that reason, these protests are pointless and stupid. Just like last years protests, and every one of these silly “SHOCC”-style protests. If you are against racism, go fight it where it is still the prevailing belief rather than the ridiculous exception to the norm. Seriously, go to class and stop protesting non-issues. Damn near everyone agrees that racism is terrible, you don’t need to shout it, wear specific colors or any other such malarkey.