An Open Letter to the University of Wisconsin-Madison Community:
We write as faculty, staff, and alumni/ae of the University of Wisconsin-Madison to express our outrage and horror at the racist violence displayed by two fans at the UW-Nebraska football game on Saturday, Oct. 29, 2016, and to call upon the campus community for a vigorous and immediate response.
At the Oct. 29 game, two people enacted a racist and misogynistic lynching of an individual wearing a mask that alternated between portraying President Barack Obama and presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. The second individual, holding a noose around the neck of the Obama/Clinton figure, wore a mask portraying presidential candidate Donald Trump. While athletic personnel asked the two perpetrators of this horrific and intolerable display to remove the noose, they were allowed to stay in the stadium and were seen and photographed later in the game, once again blatantly displaying the noose. These images have now been seen around the country and around the world, with a noose around the neck of our first African American president displayed in a sea of UW Badger red, and surrounded by football fans not visibly protesting or even taking much note of the horror taking place beside and in front of them.
As those of us who study history have observed, the seeming indifference of the crowd to the inhumanity and violence before them is the image that, even more than the noose, invokes the terrible history of lynching in the United States. Lynching, the torture and killing of African American men and women, often took place in public venues with white audiences gathered around to observe and even “enjoy” the spectacle of a human being mutilated and killed in cold blood, with no prospect that the perpetrators would ever be punished. African Americans today live in the awareness of this history—that their country and their compatriots stood silent while these horrors were visited upon their forebears.
This is the brutal history against which this “fan” display unfolded. This is the history with which all the UW fans in that picture, proudly wearing their Bucky hats and t-shirts, are now associated. This is the picture the UW just presented to the country, to the world and to our own students, of who we are.
We, the undersigned, come together as members of the UW community to say that this is not who WE are. We stand in solidarity with all black and brown students, staff, faculty, townspeople, and other community members who witnessed this hateful act and wondered if the UW would ever, could ever, be a place where their humanity was truly recognized. We commit ourselves to the work of making the UW a better and safer place for all of us, especially those who are targeted because of their race, ethnicity, gender or religion.
We reject the free speech argument with its false equivalencies between speech such as “Black Lives Matter” and the Insert Apparel clothing line and this appalling enactment of racist violence. This act went beyond merely holding a sign or wearing a t-shirt. This act was an incitement to violence that for obvious and compelling reasons made members of the UW community feel physically unsafe. Indeed, enacting the lynching of a black man in a crowded stadium puts all those present at risk.
We call on the UW administration, particularly Chancellor Rebecca Blank and Athletic Director Barry Alvarez, to move swiftly to create policies to ensure such a horrific display will never again be tolerated at a UW-sponsored athletic game or at any other campus-sponsored event. We insist that such policies create a no tolerance zone at UW-sponsored events for all racist speech. We support the administration’s recent move to review policies on hate speech and call on you to respond more strongly and justly to any future incidents.
But this is not only about the UW administration or official policies. We also and urgently call on all members of the UW community to speak up and to act. It is up to us to counter the image of all the people standing silently by in the bleachers in the face of a hateful, racist act.
We too have work to do. Those of us who are not personally targeted by racism or misogyny bear a great responsibility. We can no longer look away or be silent. Even if it is uncomfortable, or even frightening, we need to do more. We need to speak up. We need to get up and walk away, as the other football fans could have done last Saturday. Or, sometimes, we need to stay to make sure others are safe from racist and misogynistic violence. In every case, in every way we can, we need to lift our voices and say that racism will not be tolerated here at the UW. Not on our watch.
Stephen Kantrowitz is a professor of history. Christa Olson is an associate professor of English. Ellen Samuels is an associate professor of English and gender and women's studies. A total of 165 faculty and staff members have signed this open letter. Please send all comments, questions and concerns to opinion@dailycardinal.com.
