Fer shure! Like, it is SO totally bogus not to let the, like, end justify the, you know, means. Like, gag me with a spoon!
Well, then you shouldn't have done it. Anyway, this is not an uncommon event at today's universities. Her next defense will be that although she should not have done what she did, it is important to understand the institutional racsim, sexism, and homophobia at the campus that prompted her to do it.
Not wanting to pay up, now,?
Dunns actions not only overshadowed campus hate crimes, they discredited them. This is the lesson that wont be forgotten on the 6 campuses that were closed for a day.
Now see, normal people would react with "I didn't do it No-one saw me do it. You can't prove I did it"
This sounds remarkably similar to the Tawana Brawley case, which propelled Al Sharpton to national fame infamy in the late 1980s.
In the Brawley case, she was allegedly abducted by a group of white men who stripped her naked and scrawled racial epithets all over her body. The police knew immediately that it was a hoax, because -- get this -- the word "nigger" was spelled wrong.
You can't make this sh!t up. LOL.
Thank you so very much. Thank you, um, and thank you so much for being here. Um, I don't have anything prepared so what I say is probably (inaudible) I don't have anything prepared so what I, what I'll probably wind up saying will be sort of disconnected, although all of the thoughts that I have are true to my heart. I spoke today at the faculty meeting and, um, mentioned that I was scared, but that I felt very proud and somewhat empowered by knowing that the people at that meeting were standing beside me. And I can't tell you how it makes me feel to look out into the sea of you and know that you are here to support me and rather the larger issues of civil rights and equality for men, women, people of color, um, people of all sexual orientations, um, etc. Um.
(Applause)
There were, there are a couple things I wanted to touch on because I think that, um, this whole thing kind of started, and snowballed, and how I wound up in the midst of it is really just basically a lark. Um, I read about the cross burning, and I read about the, uh, word [racial epithet] being written on calendars and I was appalled. I just couldn't believe in 2004 this was happening. As a psychologist, I teach on a regular basis about the nature of prejudice. And we talk about how prejudice nowadays is supposed to be modern, and covert, and based on ignorance, and stereotyping. And I thought these acts aren't ignorant. This isn't the result of some covert thought. This was a well planned out act of terrorism.
(Applause)
And I don't believe for one second it was one person. I think that there's a group here, a small group, but I do believe that there is a group here that perpetuates this in all different kinds of ways. And I think if you confronted those people they would deny it because they're cowards.
(Applause)
They are not looking for open dialogue. They are not looking for discussing whether the word [racial epithet] is an appropriate word to use with people of color. They're sneaking around at nighttime writin' this [expletive] on walls.
(Applause)
So as I said at the faculty meeting and as I've said before I think that calling these acts acts of ignorance is a dangerous misnomer.
(Applause)
What I do think is that (inaudible) the espousal of a certain ideology and being in a free country I certainly believe these people have a right to their ideology, but we have a right to ours as well.
(Applause)
And what I did that pissed people off so much and made them ruin my beautiful 1992 beater Honda Civic was that I said let's get together and say our ideology is more popular than yours.
(Applause)
Diversity is more popular than segregation. Love is more popular than hate.
(Applause)
That's what I did to wind up in as much trouble as I wound up in. The other thing that I, I also wanted to address, um, was in my class when I talked to people about - what are you gonna do, I said, I kept saying what are you gonna do, these are your friends under attack, these are my friends under attack, these are your colleagues, these are your peers, you're my students who are being attacked. What are we gonna do? Many people responded with, well you know Professor Dunn, we've always been taught that we should be racially blind, and that by not paying attention to it and not calling attention to differences we would minimize them. You know, that's a beautiful, beautiful, explanation - or should I say, um, all right, piece of [expletive] -
(Applause)
It has absolutely no substance and no utility in society wherein we are founded on diversity. The Statue of Liberty stands every day of all of our lives theoretically welcoming people to this land to become part of us. So to say that we should act like we're colorblind I really believe is an excuse. I believe it's an excuse to remain lazy, it's an excuse to turn your head. And it's an excuse to allow these idiots to continue with their agenda.
(Applause)
Last thing and I'll shut up, for real, for a little while anyway -
(Crowd chants: "Don't shut up"; applause)
Thank you. Um, I want to address one last thing that I think it's really important for us to pay attention to. Um, it also has come to my attention, you guys know I'm an attorney, that many, many people don't understand that the initial acts that took place on campus were not legally hate crimes. Whether you agree with that or not that's something we deal with the Legislature about.
But I heard people bad-mouthing the administration for not taking a more harsh stance against these acts when in fact there was nothing more that the administration could do. And what I want to say is from my position, and from the position of me feeling like a victim, I can't say thank you enough to the administration. They have been there supportive of me. Um, Pam Gann is here at a rally, as president of CMC. Torry Sun is here as well, and many many other administrators are here, and I have to say they're doing not just what they have to do administratively, but they're doing what they should be doing as human beings. And I think the message -
(Applause)
I think that the message that we need to take from this is that social change comes about on different levels and through different means. Some ways social change takes place is in the box office, um, is in the voting office, when you vote. Other ways - maybe it takes place in the box office, um, it definitely changes our attitudes. Um, it takes place on individual levels, it takes place on group levels, but it's, for things like this, when these events that were going on were beyond the reach of the police, but they were offensive and terrorizing to our friends, us individually, um, our peers, our colleagues, the action that need to take place is exactly what you are doing right here. And I just, you know, I want to end this by saying as a group, we stand here, and we say we're pro-diversity and anti-hate -
(applause)
- and that the people who espouse these hateful ideologies, really, I said earlier today should go underground. What I meant is that they should go to hell.
Looks like a hate crime to me. The car, being owned by the perp is no excuse. The truth of each statement is not an issue either.
Drawn and quartered as a punishment comes to mind.
Kerri Dunn