Trump chalking: U of I fights back

As many of you may have heard, pro-Trump graffiti was found outside the Department of Latino Studies early last week. U of I was undoubtedly shocked by these offensive messages. The phrase “They have to go back #Trump” soon gave way to a series of pro-Trump chalking all over campus. It soon grew into an outlet for people to express racist, pro-hate sentiment. Campus administration responded swiftly to the issue, saying they did not endorse the messages the chalking was promoting.

I interviewed Sarah Khan, a freshman who was just one of the thousands of people on campus that was disconcerted by the messages. Even though the Department of Latino Studies were directly targeted, she felt it could apply to any person of color, including herself. She said the anti-hate chalking was a step in the right direction. “It shows that we’re not afraid,” she said. However, she went on to say that there’s so much more that needs to be done to solve this problem.

She feels that the response needs to be at an institutional level, and I can’t help but agree. So far, the university’s response has only been reactive. Condemning hateful rallies, shutting down social media pages, and sending out apologetic MASSMAILs is only attacking problems once they arise. It does nothing to weed out hatred at its core. The administration needs to be more proactive about the measures they take to ensure the safety of students. Forcing students to attend diversity workshops evidently hasn’t been effective. If individual students and organizations can respond to this issue through means as simple as chalking, one can only imagine what the administration could pull of if they tried to do more.

Many have claimed that the hateful chalking is only an exercise of free speech. There’s nothing inherently wrong or offensive about voicing your opinion, they say. However, as Sarah put it, “although everyone has the right to free speech, people also have the right to feel safe.” She mentioned that students choose to attend a college where they feel welcome and wanted. No one, she says, has the right to take that away. The term “free speech” can often be misconstrued. Free speech means that no one can be prosecuted by the government for expressing their opinion. It is not, however, a license which grants people unbounded power to be as hurtful as they like.

This begs the question: what could be considered inoffensive? This is doubtless a gray area. Sarah believes that if the messages had just said “Go Trump,” she wouldn’t have been offended. After all, there’s nothing inherently wrong with supporting a presidential candidate. However, using the presidential election to justify harmful sentiment is a step too far in the wrong direction.

This is only the start: there will be cases like this again. In the future, the university needs to put measures in place to prevent this from happening again. And we, as students, need to make it clear that we’re not going to let this pass by. We need to work to promote a sense of community on this campus that all of us call home.