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Update: “An attack on one is an attack on all” was a common refrain at the well-attended Wednesday march and rally in support of the vandalized LGBTQA center, reports Oregon Daily Emerald. ”The tone of this movement is one of love,” said Kelsey Jarone, University freshman and LGBTQA outreach coordinator. “The change that we see coming out of this significantly outweighs that one petty act of vandalism.” The silver lining on the cloud of hate speech vandalism is that a community can become galvanized.
“I saw the swastika on the carpet and I felt like I had been kicked in the chest.” –Vashti, LGBTQ Alliance volunteer coordinator
H/T Marie. Last weekend the office of the Gay & Lesbian Alliance at U Oregon at Eugene was vandalizd with Nazi symbols.
The University of Oregon in Eugene is a pretty fantastic place to be gay; winning a consistent five-out-of-five stars on the Campus Pride Campus Climate Index and boasting a thriving queer student community and Queer Studies program.But this crazy-ass unacceptable shit happens, y’all, even in Eugene: over the weekend vandals attacked the University’s LGBTQ office with black spray paint, leaving a four-foot square swastika emblazoned on the carpet and spray paint all over the office’s TV and computer monitor. According to The Oregonian, there was no sign of forced entry and the office had last been used by Alex Esparza, co-director of the alliance, who locked the door when he left at 2:45 pm last Friday. The vandalism was discovered by a janitor at 1 A.M. on Monday morning.
The swastika painted on the carpet was four-foot square. The police removed the vandalized section of carpet. Students have temporarily covered the space with posters and messages of love and support. As yet the police have no suspects, but of course there is speculation.
(Alex Esparza, co-director of the alliance, speculates) that the vandalism might be linked to a recent discussion about the meaning of the swastika held by the Pacifica Forum, an outside group that meets regularly on the campus.Classified as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center, the Pacifica Forum has met on campus since 1994 under the affiliation of a retired professor. [University spokesperson Julie] Brown said it is long-standing policy for the university to allow groups associated with tenured professors to meet on campus.
“We support free speech,” she said, adding that there is no evidence pointing a finger at the group.
The university is reconsidering its policy of allowing outside groups to meet on campus, she said.
The university’s independent student news paper, Oregon Daily Emerald, quotes a Pacifica Forum member
Dawn Coslow, who condemned the act, but called its being linked to the Forum “ridiculous,” stating: “Any kind of hate crime is an absolutely disgraceful, despicable act, and I have sympathy for all the students in that office who have suffered this hideous act.”
The Gay & Lesbian Student Alliance has received great support from university administration and other student groups. A mid-day rally has been planned for today. No word yet on whether the Pacifica Forum members claiming sympathy for the LGBTQ center will join in solidarity with their LGBTQ brothers and sisters.
8 Comments
Freepers and teabaggers are the Brownshirtsof the coming rise of fascism in America. Already we are seeing rehersals for the LGBT targeted Kristallnacht…
The Pacifica Forum might not be involved…They’ve always just struck me as the generic obnoxious “just trying to be edgy by holding extremist seminars” crowd; then again, the same is probably true of the vandals. Either way, it may be less “people devoted to heterosexual-supremacist violence” than “people soaked in privilege who think it’s funny to terrify people”.
Never forget that Oregon is……Portland, Corvallis, Eugene and a couple thousand square miles of Alabama.
I don’t know much about hate groups but…There is a lot to be gained by discussing the origin of the swastika. I’m not familiar with this particular group, but as someone with a rather broad background in the study of world religions I can say with certainty that most groups who use the symbol in a derogatory manner would not be likely to first have a discussion about its background which is, for those who are curious, life, god, fire, etc. It is even used, to this day, by His Holiness the Dalai Lama as a symbol of both peace and goodwill.
While I am appalled at the sentiment in such a disgraceful act, I’m doubting that any group that would speak about the past of the swastika is also the perpetrator of this particular crime.
Slight variationThe version of the swastika used by Buddhists is a mirror image of the Nazi version. That is, the points go to the left instead of to the right.
The Teabagger “brownshirts” will be uhappily surprised……at the number of well-armed LGBTs and their equally well-armed straight allies, should they actually attempt their own Kristallnacht.
As much as Glenn Beck might object, WE really DO surround THEM.
you’re assumingthat they spoke of a true and fully history of the symbol, going back beyond the nazi era. according to the group’s website, they recent relevant event was described like this:
in a way it doesn’t matter whether members of the pacifica forum were directly responsible for the vandalism. what matters is that they’ve created an atmosphere of fear and suspicion that leads people to look their way first when an anti-lgbt hate crime is committed. if they don’t want to be always held under suspicion, they need to take action to show that they hold no malice towards lgbt people and the others they openly vilifiy. the choice is theirs.
I live in Eugeneand I couldn’t agree more. Yeh, except for the coast and the W. valley, it’s all Alabama/Georgia/Kentucky-ish.
I haven’t watched the local news in a week … this is the first I heard of this!