Racist signs hung on campus @AmericanU. This fear tactic will not stop antiracists on campus. We are strong and we are together #antiracism pic.twitter.com/EQRjDllcmp
— Michael T. Barry Jr. (@MTBarryJr) September 27, 2017
Ten posters of Confederate flags, with raw cotton attached, were found at several locations on American University’s campus last night.
Officials said they are “well aware” that the incident came on the same night that Ibram Kendi presented a talk introducing the new Antiracist Research and Policy Center.
“AU is committed to the vision of the Center and Dr. Kendi’s work and we will not be deterred by this cowardly attempt at intimidation,” Vice President of Campus Life Fanta Aw said in a statement.
In the wake of the incident, the university has announced a community gathering today at 1 p.m.
“I ask you to join me in standing together and show that we will not be intimidated. AU will respond strongly to attempts designed to harm and create fear,” said AU President Sylvia Burwell in a statement. “Instead, we will recommit to creating a community that does not stand by. When one of us is attacked, all of us are attacked.”
American University’s Department of Public Safety has released images and footage of a man who was seen on security cameras putting the posters up. The fliers—which read “Huzzah for Dixie”—were found hanging on message boards in at least three different campus buildings.
The suspect is described as a white male, about 5’10” tall and around 40 years old. He was wearing a construction hat and vest, and is seen carrying a case in the video.
It is the latest in a series of similar attempts at intimidation on area campuses. White nationalist flyers were found at the University of Maryland, Georgetown, and George Washington University in March. Later that month, on the night before International Women’s Day, misogynistic posters were found at American University.
In May, someone placed bananas is nooses at several locations around AU’s campus on the same day that Taylor Dumpson became the first black woman in the school’s history to be named president of the student government association.
In a statement today, Dumson and other student leaders signed a letter saying that “the significance of this occurring as our country continues to struggle with its history of white supremacy also cannot be ignored.”
Such incidents have not been restricted to university campuses, though. A series of bigoted posters were posted in Ward 4 last month, fake ICE flyers were posted in neighborhoods around the city in June, and a white nationalist hate group boasted of posting a spate of flyers in July.
“This is the latest attempt on this campus to frighten our community, as groups are trying to frighten other communities around the country,” Kendi said in a message that was addressed particularly to students of color and Jewish students. “You are a model of triumph—and when you triumph you become a threat to people who would rather you fail. The history of your successes is the history of racist terror. If they can’t keep you down by discrimination, they have attempted to keep you down by terror, by instilling fear in you, in me.”
Joe Palekas told the campus newspaper, The Eagle, that he saw the poster after leaving Kendi’s class.
“To come out immediately following a seminar discussing racism and its historical effects that last into today, it was a very surreal moment,” Palekas said. “All of us were speechless.”
Rachel Sadon