Hate crimes encouraged by indifference

By Ryan Masaaki Yokota

In a 1995 film called "Higher Learning," which ironically was
filmed at UCLA, a white supremacist on a college campus goes crazy,
and by the end of the film perches himself on the top of Haines
Hall and starts shooting people of color in Dickson Plaza. Yet far
from these Hollywood depictions of racism and hate, the recent hate
crimes perpetuated on people of color at UCLA are all too real.

The realities of the current rash of hate crimes are so blatant
that I feel compelled to write, despite the fact that I am no
longer a student. Part of the issue is that I feel that these
incidents are part of a larger problem of racism that exists at
UCLA. Also, in following the administration’s response to these
incidents, I feel that not much has changed since my time as a
student.

While an undergraduate at UCLA there were four specific
incidents that stick in my mind as examples of a continuing problem
with racism on campus.

To begin with, in 1990, at the Academic Advancement Program’s
Freshman Summer Program, one particular incident involved the
defacement of Vietnamese students’ dorm room doors with statements
such as "Viets Go Home!" and "I Love Dogs and Cats."

In a later incident, in 1993, a Japanese graduate student in the
sociology department was sent a hate letter through campus mail,
saying, among other things, "We do not want to hear your dirty
Japanese American type English. Try not to talk in class. OK?" In
1994, I remember full well when a student received a dollar bill
through the North Campus eatery that said, "Wetback Go Home."

And, in that same year, I still have a flyer that urged students
to vote against the African American Undergraduate Students
Association Council candidates with the statement "No-Mo Niggers"
and the admonition to "Keep White Hope Alive!" All of these
incidents demonstrated to me that racists at UCLA continued to
exist, and were consistent in maintaining an environment that was
hostile to students of color.

Yet when students attempted to raise these issues to the larger
UCLA community, they were continually met with indifference and
were told that such situations were "isolated incidents" by a "few
individuals," and that we should let the administration take care
of these matters. Usually this meant that administrators quietly
brushed the incidents under the rug.

In hearing about the current rash of hate crimes at UCLA, I
again see a slow response from the administration. And as usual, it
took students demonstrating to raise the issues to a level that was
even on the administration’s radar screen.

In reading Chancellor Albert Carnesale’s response, I see the
same rhetoric about the need for greater "campus dialogue," with
the only main action being to increase police patrols on campus by
some unspecified number ("Hatred at UCLA must be combatted,"
Viewpoint, March 16). As a person of color in a post-Rodney King,
post-Rampart division scandal world, the fact that there will be
more police patrolling the campus does not make me feel more at
ease.

I would like to offer two alternative means for dealing with
this situation – one directed at the students of color on campus
and one directed at the administration. First, I would like to
thank the student demonstrators for their courage in facing this
issue, and I encourage everyone to keep the heat on and continue to
elevate the problem before it becomes lost in the bureaucracy of
UCLA’s administration. On top of the organizing that is so
imperative at this point in time, we as people of color have to
realize that we need to "get each other’s back" and protect
ourselves at all times. This protection will come primarily through
collective unity among all people of color on campus on a daily
basis.

Additionally, just as victims of rape or domestic violence
should be encouraged to take self-defense classes, we should
encourage each other to do the same and prepare ourselves for
further attacks from white supremacists on campus. As Malcolm X
stated quite clearly, "we always maintain the right to defend
ourselves by any means necessary."

As for the administration, if Carnesale truly wants to "use the
influence of his office to promote greater understanding and
appreciation of our differences," he needs to push for the repeal
of SP-1 and SP-2, and make a contractual commitment with the
students to raise student of color admissions. And students should
hold him to that commitment.

Additionally, the administration needs to recognize that those
people who commit these racist acts will not engage in the
"thoughtful discussion about the root causes of this intolerant
behavior," that Carnesale is encouraging without a mandatory ethnic
and gender studies requirement for all incoming freshmen.

The administration should institute such a requirement for the
incoming year, and should also make serious moves toward providing
legitimacy to ethnic studies on campus by granting the African
American, Asian American, American Indian and Chicana/o Studies
Centers full departmental status, with enhanced budgetary
allocations, the right to tenure faculty and the right to confer
degrees.

Hate crimes are an ugly matter, as demonstrated recently in the
murder of Pilipino postal worker Joseph Ileto following the attack
on the Jewish Community Center in the San Fernando Valley. Yet the
recent incidents at UCLA represent a real opportunity for students
and administrators to reaffirm their commitment to a university
environment where students of color can develop their minds without
having to worry about being assaulted, and where students can learn
to accept and tolerate differences in culture and history.

It is only with a firm commitment to diversity, demonstrated in
actions and not only in words, that we can begin to fight against
hate on campus, and develop an institution of "Higher Learning"
that supports and welcomes our cultural diversity.