Smith College "racism" farce - will we see more of this in the UK?

Caporegime
Joined
29 Jan 2008
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58,899
I wonder if woke types keep on pandering to this stuff whether it will become a bit "boy who cried wolf" in years to come - I mean it provokes quite the overreaction at the moment but in the long run will playing the race card over routine incidents mean that actual racism accusations are then diminished too?

tl;dr
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Black Student at an expensive, private liberal arts college decided to eat in some area of the university that was closed off - she was told by one staff member already.
A low level employee/janitor spots her and as per university instructions to not deal directly with incidents like this he calls campus security.
Campus security/police arrive and question her....
She kicks off and the race card gets played. Various low-level university employees get thrown under the bus by the administrations, everyone panders to the privileged student.
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Full article is well worth a read as it shows how far gone some places are thanks to being overly sensitive and pandering to anyone claiming "racism".

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/24/us/smith-college-race.html
NORTHAMPTON, Mass. — In midsummer of 2018, Oumou Kanoute, a Black student at Smith College, recounted a distressing American tale: She was eating lunch in a dorm lounge when a janitor and a campus police officer walked over and asked her what she was doing there.

The officer, who could have been carrying a “lethal weapon,” left her near “meltdown,” Ms. Kanoute wrote on Facebook, saying that this encounter continued a yearlong pattern of harassment at Smith.

“All I did was be Black,” Ms. Kanoute wrote. “It’s outrageous that some people question my being at Smith College, and my existence overall as a woman of color.”

The college’s president, Kathleen McCartney, offered profuse apologies and put the janitor on paid leave. “This painful incident reminds us of the ongoing legacy of racism and bias,” the president wrote, “in which people of color are targeted while simply going about the business of their ordinary lives.”

Less attention was paid three months later when a law firm hired by Smith College to investigate the episode found no persuasive evidence of bias. Ms. Kanoute was determined to have eaten in a deserted dorm that had been closed for the summer; the janitor had been encouraged to notify security if he saw unauthorized people there. The officer, like all campus police, was unarmed.

[...]

Student workers were not supposed to use the Tyler cafeteria, which was reserved for a summer camp program for young children. Jackie Blair, a veteran cafeteria employee, mentioned that to Ms. Kanoute when she saw her getting lunch there and then decided to drop it. Staff members dance carefully around rule enforcement for fear students will lodge complaints.

“We used to joke, don’t let a rich student report you, because if you do, you’re gone,” said Mark Patenaude, a janitor.

Ms. Kanoute took her food and then walked through a set of French doors, crossed a foyer and reclined in the shadowed lounge of a dormitory closed for the summer, where she scrolled the web as she ate. A large stuffed bear obscured the view of her from the cafeteria.

A janitor, who was in his 60s and poor of sight, was emptying garbage cans when he noticed someone in that closed lounge. All involved with the summer camp were required to have state background checks and campus police had advised staff it was wisest to call security rather than confront strangers on their own.

The janitor, who had worked at Smith for 35 years, dialed security.

“We have a person sitting there laying down in the living room,” the janitor told a dispatcher according to a transcript. “I didn’t approach her or anything but he seems out of place.”

The janitor had noticed Ms. Kanoute’s Black skin but made no mention of that to the dispatcher. Ms. Kanoute was in the shadows; he was not sure if he was looking at a man or woman. She would later accuse the janitor of “misgendering” her.

A well-known older campus security officer drove over to the dorm. He recognized Ms. Kanoute as a student and they had a brief and polite conversation, which she recorded. He apologized for bothering her and she spoke to him of her discomfort: “Stuff like this happens way too often, where people just feel, like, threatened.”

That night Ms. Kanoute wrote a Facebook post: “It’s outrageous that some people question my being at Smith, and my existence overall as a woman of color.”

Her two-paragraph post hit Smith College like an electric charge. President McCartney weighed in a day later. “I begin by offering the student involved my deepest apology that this incident occurred,” she wrote. “And to assure her that she belongs in all Smith places.”

Ms. McCartney did not speak to the accused employees and put the janitor on paid leave that day.

[...]

The repercussions spread. Three weeks after the incident at Tyler House, Ms. Blair, the cafeteria worker, received an email from a reporter at The Boston Globe asking her to comment on why she called security on Ms. Kanoute for “eating while Black.” That puzzled her; what did she have to do with this?

The food services director called the next morning. “Jackie,” he said, “you’re on Facebook.” She found that Ms. Kanoute had posted her photograph, name and email, along with that of Mr. Patenaude, a 21-year Smith employee and janitor.

“This is the racist person,” Ms. Kanoute wrote of Ms. Blair, adding that Mr. Patenaude too was guilty. (He in fact worked an early shift that day and had already gone home at the time of the incident.) Ms. Kanoute also lashed the Smith administration. “They’re essentially enabling racist, cowardly acts.”

Smith College put out a short statement noting that Ms. Blair had not placed the phone call to security but did not absolve her of broader responsibility. Ms. McCartney called her and briefly apologized. That apology was not made public.

By September, a chill had settled on the campus. Students walked out of autumn convocation in solidarity with Ms. Kanoute. The Black Student Association wrote to the president saying they “do not feel heard or understood. We feel betrayed and tokenized.”

Smith officials pressured Ms. Blair to go into mediation with Ms. Kanoute. “A core tenet of restorative justice,” Ms. McCartney wrote, “is to provide people with the opportunity for willing apology, forgiveness and reconciliation.”

Ms. Blair declined. “Why would I do this? This student called me a racist and I did nothing,” she said.
 
Associate
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I don't think I can handle another one of these threads for a while. Probably lots of unconscious bias going on is the only conclusion I can draw right now.
 
Associate
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Not clear what you even mean here tbh...?

It was just a silly reference to the thinking that anything bad that happens to black people is a result of white people's unconscious bias, as per the Coca Cola thread. But I haven't got any useful points to make here - I only skim read your quote and as I said, I haven't got the energy for another 'is this racist?' thread right now.
 
Soldato
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I don’t know how UK tertiary education is now but even 20 years ago the direction of travel where faculties bent over to the misplaced views of students was common. I can’t imagine anything has improved.


When I found out my former Uni has gone from 14 bars on campus to 4 in the last 20 years tells me a lot about the misplaced priorities of modern students :rolleyes:
 
Capodecina
Soldato
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There's an acronym for this - DARVO - "Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim-Offender". She is the one at fault and now she is playing the victim and blaming someone who was just doing his job and acting on instruction. Institutions need to stop being scared and playing games like these, it only creates more problems in the long run.
 
Caporegime
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The problem is the woke left have created a massive climate of fear, everybody is so terrified of being called some kind of 'ism' and 'cancelled' that they will throw anyone under the bus at the first sign of any accusation. We need to get back to a belief in the presumption of innocence until proven guilty rather than the modern equivalent of medieval witch trials and tarring and feathering those who are simply accused of something.
 
Associate
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I don’t know how UK tertiary education is now but even 20 years ago the direction of travel where faculties bent over to the misplaced views of students was common. I can’t imagine anything has improved.


When I found out my former Uni has gone from 14 bars on campus to 4 in the last 20 years tells me a lot about the misplaced priorities of modern students :rolleyes:

I completed a degree last year. Even though it an engineering degree there was still quite a lot of woke nonsense, calling things out for being racist that weren't, discrimination everywhere, only white people can be racist etc etc.

I'd dread to think what some of the other schools are like.
 
Permabanned
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Such a far cry from my old form master, who, on the start of the school year, and going through his new class members said of a new boy of colour, "Wilson, at lunch time see if he knows how to use cutlery correctly and knows what to do at Grace". It turned out he was the son of some high ranking diplomat and knew more about behaviour at formal dinners than probably the whole staff combined, was fluent in four languages and regularly rubbed shoulders with the minor Royals and could probably quote most of Debretts... :) And no, no one complained, he was probably the most cultured young person I ever met, and his general demeanour shouted future achievement and the half hidden arrogance only a very privileged background and great self confidence gives.
 
Soldato
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I'm sure a certain Tony will be along any minute.....

And others. They are somewhat silent in threads like these that challenge their ideology..
Funnily enough I had to unignore the OP and can only see this thread when not logged in. So maybe thats the problem as well as this being just a story rather that certain people getting outraged at their own victimhood status like the Coca Cola thread..

Anyway thats my last post in this thread. Maybe dowie should start all these types of threads then a lot of people wont partake.
 
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