Everyone has heard about the noose placed on the statue of James Meredith at Ole Miss. The feds are a'comin', the students are thrown out of school, and the frat was suspended. Check out how Ole Miss treated a similar incident 12 years ago. The Clarion-Ledger reported in 2002:
Black Students Allegedly Behind Racist GraffitiIs the Kingfish engaging in some binary thinking? Not really. The Kingfish is demanding some consistency. The Kingfish has no problem throwing out the three students. who performed that little act on the statue. He just wishes the school had treated the students in the 2002 incident in the same manner. If nothing else, Dan Jones owes an apology for the school's lax treatment of those students 12 years ago.
By Andy Kanengiser
akanengiser@clarionledger.com
Three African-American students at the University of Mississippi have been accused of writing racist graffiti on doors outside rooms of two other black students in the Kincannon residence hall on the Oxford campus.
The students, all freshmen, wrote vulgar and obscene messages at three other locations in the dorm.
They will face a University Judicial Council hearing when classes resume in January, Ole Miss officials said Wednesday.
If they are found guilty, their punishments could be reprimands, community service, suspension or expulsion. They can appeal.
A fourth African-American student also is being investigated in connection with the incident, Ole Miss Communications Director Jeff Alford said.
Ole Miss officials refused to release names of the students, citing privacy laws.
Each freshman was charged with five violations of the student code of conduct in connection with the Nov. 6 incident, Ole Miss officials said.
The students told school officials they were playing a prank on acquaintances.
“It was thoughtless on their part,” Ole Miss Chancellor Robert Khayat said. “We don’t condone abusive behavior of any kind. They should apologize.” (KF note: I can hear it now: Ole Bob singing "just a couple of boys, just a meanin' no harm....")
The fact that the students are African Americans “doesn’t excuse their behavior,” Khayat said.
The incident received statewide and national publicity and came at a time when the university was commemorating the admittance of its first black student, James Meredith, in 1962.
Ole Miss received “a lot of unjust criticism,” said student body President Drew Snyder, 21, of Madison.
Snyder said he hopes the Judicial Council will “punish the students to the fullest extent, regardless of race.”
“It is harassment, plain and simple.”
The students were charged with flagrant disrespect of a member of the university community, harassment/disorderly conduct, vandalism, disregard for university authority and abuse of the university judicial system.
The last two charges were related to the students allegedly making false and misleading statements to investigators.
Ole Miss will not pursue criminal charges, Khayat said. The students caused $600 damage to the dorm, including cleaning costs and repair of doors.
29 comments:
The same Khayat who said Scruggs should do no time.
Not sure what the big deal is here.
OM has said it won't press charges in the Meredith incident, same as the 2002 incident.
If the Feds press charges, that's on them.
The treatment looks nearly identical to me, other than the $25,000 reward.
do your homework. this ended up being a black student writing graffiti on another black student's dorm room door. I would know, I lived on that floor of KinCompton.
At 9:52
Homework was done by the CL in 2002 as the referenced article clearly states "Three African-American students at the University of Mississippi have been accused of writing racist graffiti on doors outside rooms of two other black students in the Kincannon residence hall on the Oxford campus."
So what's your point?
The 3 students should be executed by the feds. This would quell the black hate against whites in this state. Also, as an Ole Miss graduate this horrible unspeakable act tarnishes my degree and prospects for a good job. You know what I mean Vern?
The larger question is why does Kingfish 'have no problem with' the school expelling three students who exercised their rights of free speech? Is it because he finds them in disagreement with his behavioral standards or because he wants to appear politically correct?
Most fair, honest, thoughtful, lawful people would 'have no problem' with everybody simply allowing the boys to express themselves while doing no harm to others.
Has the school expelled these students? To my knowledge, the fraternity expelled them as members and the students will go before the judicial council, but the school hasn't expelled them yet.
Please return to planet Earth, 11:57. The school has to expel these kids. I'm sorry for that - I don't believe it was more than a drunken prank - but that's our politically correct world. The university, which already has unfair crap heaped upon them from deeds of students 50 years ago, has to take decisive action to keep from looking like they're coddling racists. If these kids wanted to express themselves they should have taken a pottery class. Their retention would do far more harm to the university and state than their expulsion will do to them. We don't even know their names, for crying out loud. I predict that they'll be enrolled in Athens in time for summer school and this will be a distant memory by the time they graduate.
Burning a cross in the Grove would be self-expression, too.
Agree with almost everything you said 11:57, but they are more than likely at OM because they couldn't get into UGa in the first place.
Hopefully this isn't the first of many such incidents, racial or other, that OM shoulders for enrolling kids from all over the Southeast that lack the grades/test scores to compete for admission to their respective in-state universities. MS ILH's low entrance requirements create that situation, but something about OM's marketing has been drawing a huge number of out-of-staters and it may not be worth the risk.
Planet Earth, at least the USA part, Bill, is a place of due process and laws. The question has been asked over and over. What law was broken? What crime was committed. No trespass was committed. Nothing was vandalized or trashed or altered in any way. No harm was done to property or person. No threat was made.
It seems as though you're in the same skiff with Kingfish. The one with 'PC' written across the stern.
Aren't you intelligent enough to know they would already have been arrested and/or expelled had a law been broken? They scoured every inch of that statue for days looking for a scintilla of damage and found nothing.
The authorities failed in their suggestion that computers should be seized since there was no evidence to support a subpoena for search and seizure. Even on the campus at Oxford, this is a country of laws.
It matters not what YOU think these kids 'should have done to express themselves'. It doesn't matter what your opinion is of their retention and what that might do to embarrass the chancellor the next time he meets his peers in Destin or San Francisco.
It matters not what you or I think is already on the race-relations plate of Ole Miss. Don't you see? Those things are irrelevant when you start messing with people's constitutional rights.
You just don't violate someone's rights because 'it seems like the expedient thing to do'.
The reason the university is not "pressing charges" concerning the meredith statue is because it apparently can't. No law was broken. There was no damage, no trespassing, and nothing to charge the guys with. On the other hand, the students who repeatedly went around Kincannon marking on doors and walls did $600 worth of damage.
The students did supposedly yell a bunch of racial slurs at a black guy. I don't see why that doesn't qualify as disturbing the peace if nothing else.
I don't care whether they are prosecuted for a crime, but I want these frickers out of my school. An example needs to be made that there is zero tolerance for this kind of "mischief" going both ways on the political spectrum, and then let's move on to other things that are productive for the university.
You crackers sure do get worked up about nothing. The students haven't been expelled from Ole Miss. No charges were brought. The University isn't even releasing their names in order to protect them. Essentially, nothing has been done.
Ole Miss will most likely go through an internal disciplinary process (which includes student representatives) to determine what, if any, sanctions to impose. This is called due process.
BTW, you don't have to commit a crime to get expelled from college. All students must adhere to a code of conduct to remain a student.
This is the dumbest comment section on the internet.
CRACKERS?? Isn't that the word that blacks use as the white equivalent for the N-word?
Using that word says a great deal about your mindset. Go away!
Shame on you!
I have two degrees from Ole Miss from seven years spent there, 1973 through 1979. I was born there. I truly love Ole Miss. Ole Miss recruited, academically, my daughter quite earnestly for the honors college. I talked her into attending a private college with probably better academics. Why? Because of crap like this. I've stayed in Mississippi as an adult; she may not. I don't want her carrying the history of the school when she goes to professional school out of state. No matter what school leaders do, one or two idiot undergrads WILL do something as stupid as these three have and undo any progress that gets made image-wise. So, yes, they have damaged an intangible: reputation. And it can't be repaired, repainted, or sanded smooth.
4:28; You're no different from the Southerners who feel white guilt over slavery and muddle around in a fog of shame and impotence.
Your notion of imaginary image loss or repair is just that...your imagination. If you feel you and your darling daughter should move out of state in order to escape your pangs of white guilt, please know that the Greyhound station is in the same building as Amtrak.
3:04.
I personally love being called a cracker. Look up where the term came from. I can trace my ancestory line to that profession. I love the irony.
The apologists on here attempting to defend the racist and deplorable acts of the three Ole Miss students make 4:28 p.m.'s point better than he/she ever could. I could care less if a crime was committed or not. These three miscreants need to be expelled, not coddled, though the fact is no disciplinary action will be taken against them by the University.
And save the lectures about the First Amendment. Let the young men file suit and see how far it gets.
White fraternities and sororities will not ever accept black people. (Token advancements excluded)
White people at Ole Miss will not date or have casual sex with black people.
White people at Ole Miss who use dating apps totally exclude or block black people to avoid seeing them.
Until real normal relationships exist among the races...stupid shit like this will occur.
@ 11:12 PM, It is my belief people can date whom they DESIRE racially and it does not have to mean they are racist. For me, an AA woman, it's cultural, not that I hate white men, I've always preferred AA men! Just because someone chooses to exclusively date others of their own race, that's their business as long as it doesn't infringe upon MY RIGHTS as a human being. Yes, there are racist people on this planet and guess what, there will always be. Unless they try to physically harm me, I ignore them, life moves on! Placing a noose on JMs statue could be deemed a poor prank or even something more sinister. I think OM officials should monitor the "climate" on campus, as this COULD, does not mean it did, but COULD signal issues between the races and that this is the catalyst to rile these things up. We don't need extremes on EITHER side of this. We don't need people acting like this is the 16th Street church bombing, but we also don't need people acting like nothing happened. People just need to relax and just be mindful.
Overreaction. Punish the 3 with suspension and go on.
We used to do similar things to opponents' mascots (hang the Razorback, cage the Tiger, steal a statue) and nothing was really done.
Oh yeah, bring back Colonel Reb, too.
Love it when someone says, "I don't care if a law was broken, don't care if any harm was done, don't care what the law is, don't care what their intent was.....punish them anyway". Damn good thing those types are not sitting on juries or making decisions that affect me.
The problem is, however, THEY ARE sitting on juries and slip through the voir dire process, grinning through buck-teeth, ready to cast a 'hang em high' vote. Those are the types who ought to be *suspended*. From society at large.
"We used to do similar things to opponents' mascots (hang the Razorback, cage the Tiger, steal a statue) and nothing was really done."
If you really don't see the difference between that kind of prank, and sending a message to black students that they risk lynching if they attend Ole Miss, then I'm not sure anyone can explain it to you, even with pictures and crayons.
What a hasty conclusion, 8:51. Please share with us the analysis which led to your conclusion?
If that were true, then the Black Panthers who appeared at the voting precinct in camo with batons a few years back were 'sending a message' to white folk that they enter the area at their own risk. And that couldn't be so since Holder said it was harmless.
And do you also conclude that Sons of Confederate Veterans recognition on MS tags is intended to send a message that blacks are in danger of being reintroduced to slavery?
You're an odd one, you are.
@8:37 - funny how the people you describe are only around to cast the 'hang em high' vote when it's an issue of this nature. When the offender sticks a gun in someone's face and steals their belongings, all we hear is "he was such a good boy", "the system failed him", on and on....
Issues of race aside, 4:28 brings up a very good point about damage to one's reputation and how hard it can be to get away from or repair it. Young people: take note.
And I'm not sure "white guilt" had anything to do with his comment. I took his comment to mean that, given the choice between two really good academic institutions, he would chose the one whose degree was less likely to raise eyebrows if his daughter decided to apply for jobs outside of Mississippi. If you have two equally good degrees that cost you the same amount of money, and one is good in MS and the other is good everywhere, the one that's good everywhere has a higher economic value.
That's a big part of what pisses me off about these incidents. Every time Ole Miss's reputation takes a hit, the dollar value of my degree from there goes down a little.
"If you really don't see the difference between that kind of prank, and sending a message to black students that they risk lynching if they attend Ole Miss, then I'm not sure anyone can explain it to you, even with pictures and crayons. "
Do you tour the region with your mindreading ability? You know good and well that wasn't the message. Go back to your ACLU meeting.
7:47 AM
Re read the post about race and dating.
Think for one hour about it before you vomit in this little box.
The races do not pray together, stay together or lay together.
As a result there are 2 separate societies.
No trust will ever exist if we continue on this path.
This is an observation only and if you wish to date black men, fine. But that's not really the point. Kids are growing up separated along racial lines is the point.
Is that a good thing? Think about it.
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