Not defending these kids…but keep in mind this is CMU <g>: In 2007, four nooses were discovered hanging in a CMU chem lab. The nooses were formed from medical tubing, not rope, and might have been hanging for a week before anyone called attention to them.
When the story broke, I made a disgusted noise in front of two CMU grads. “What’s the big deal?” We went online, where they encountered – for the first time – the horrors of lynching. They were both shocked and sickened, but firmly believed that whoever had done this was ignorant of the historical legacy of the nooses. (“Let’s face it,” said one. “Central’s good for a party, but not all that great for an education.”)
After an 8-month investigation (local and state police, FBI, local and state prosecutors, etc.), the self-reporting perp was not charged – he had simply been reacting to a course’s “excessive” workload (“Let’s just hang ourselves”), and genuinely had no idea there was a broader context to his actions.
Wouldn’t surprise me at all if these YR jamokes share the same inherited ignorance of what lies beyond their white middle-class fishbowl existence.
What would surprise me is Central actually responding to this latest wakeup call with a day or two of U.S. history teach-ins or a 2-credit required freshman seminar on Michigan’s tricky relationship with racism… Our smaller communities tend to be populated by hobbits, with Ted Sandymans far outnumbering the Merrys and Pippins. (F’r’instance in Betsy DeVos’ home town – a city the local Chamber of Commerce used to boast had more churches than gas stations – 1,500 turned out for an ad hoc protest against her nomination; about 5% of the population.)
[edit: weird, couldn’t make a less-than sign html entity stick]
