Posted on 07/14/2016 11:28:17 AM PDT by massmike
A Yale University employee is out of a job, and the school is out a window, after he used a broomstick to smash a stained-glass window he complained was racist.
Until recently, Thomas Menafee worked as a dishwasher for Yale. But he says he grew enraged that, while working at Yale’s Calhoun College, he had to see a stained glass window which shows black laborers harvesting cotton. The window, he said, was an offensive portrayal of slavery, and so on June 13 he impulsively decided to eliminate it by force.
“I took a broomstick, and it was kind of high, and I climbed up and reached up and broke it,” he told the New Haven Independent. “It’s 2016, I shouldn’t have to come to work and see things like that.”
Menafee’s stunt was quickly discovered, and he responded by resigning his post with the college. In return, the college is not seeking compensation for the destruction and has requested that Menafee not be prosecuted.
Nevertheless, Menafee appeared in court Tuesday on a felony charge of criminal mischief along with a misdemeanor charge of reckless endangerment, stemming from the fact that the window nearly injured a passing pedestrian when it came tumbling out
Menafee’s destructive act is the latest incident in the saga over Calhoun College, one of Yale’s residential colleges. The college is named for John C. Calhoun, an alumnus and South Carolina senator who was a major slavery advocate in the decades before the Civil War. Recently, activists have pushed for Yale to rename the college, while others have said renaming the college would be rewriting history for political reasons.
In April, the school announced Calhoun’s name would stay, but that it would attempt to censor any images of Calhoun so that they will not be triggering to black students. Notably, several stained glass windows portraying Calhoun himself are scheduled to be removed before the fall semester.
Because Menafee says his destruction was motivated by anti-racism, he has won the support of New Haven racial activists.
“What is more valuable to Yale: a stained-glass window of enslaved people picking cotton, or the humanity of the African-American people who work at Yale?” said John Jairo Lugo of the group Unidad Latina en Accion.
You know folks, this is an example of why we need to maintain real physical books, not just electronic systems like Kindle.
The day is coming when the government will simply press a button to get rid of all literary or artistic expression it disagrees with.
A physical book is forever. An electronic book can always simply be deleted by those who retain control over it.
American ISIS -— smash and destroy anything that doesn’t fit 100% with your own perspective, no matter the value or antiquity!!!
It’s very nice - well, it was. Why not look at this piece of art as showing the stoic nature of these people - hardworking, long-suffering and noble??
BLMers seem to have a difficult time with ...impulse control. If he complained about it they'd have probably taken it down, given the PC sensitivities these days.
the college is not seeking compensation for the destruction and has requested that Menafee not be prosecuted.
If a straight white conservative destroyed campus property you can bet they'd prosecute to the fullest extent of the law.
That window was so much more valuable than his life
There is one other group of people who destroy all artworks they do not like.
From the picture it doesn’t look like a Tiffany.
BTW - Yale dropped all charges against the angry vandal who stood on a dining table with a broom and smashed the window.
Yale said it was unacceptable to expose their workers to racist images.
Maybe Yale will be destroying all books and pictures in their library that show images they don’t like.
hmm...what other cultures destroy images and and upsetting reminders?
(Now that we’re in chat - maybe we are supposed to chat about that?)
Menafee then dashed to the campus library where he pulled to the floor the entire 30-volume set of Encyclopedia Britannia, doused the pile with lighter fluid, and set it on fire.
He was heard to say...”History is racist and shouldn’t exist.”
Yankees need to know that most slave-traders were from the North, and the proceeds of slave-trading, slave-harvested cotton, and New England mills that depended on this cotton helped fund the building of Harvard, Yale, Brown, etc.!!!!
They also need to know about such figures as John C Calhoun—both the good and the bad aspects of their lives!
Then they could stop hating on Southrons and Southwesterners. We’re all Americans—even if some of us identify with the Confederacy!
Millennials need to lose the concepts of “triggering” and “microaggression”,look their true history in the eye, and prepare to graduate from university as ADULTS-
-which they in fact are!!!!
The fact they said they wouldn’t press charges tells you all you need to know...
Nice to see you encourage vandalism.
You’re right!!!!
Slavery romanticization should be vandalized.
Not holding him to account . . . that'll show him!
There are days on FR, when I’m not sure where I am.
This is one of those days.
Corey (Thomas) Menafee, 38.
Big time BLM Vandalagitator.
Yep.
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