Act of Intolerance

White supremacist stickers put up on campus during Intersession

Mikaela Foehr / News Editor / The USD Vista

On the morning of Jan. 15, during Intersession classes, stickers bearing the logo of a white supremacist group were found on campus. An email was sent out to students later that day by USD’s Department of Public Safety, deeming the incident an “act of intolerance.” The stickers were placed in the areas of the Shiley Center for Science & Technology, Manchester Hall, Saints Tekakwitha & Serra Hall, and Copley Library.

In the email, the office of Public Safety indicated that the stickers were taken down, and that “subjects were in the process of being identified by Public Safety and local law enforcement.”These subjects were seen on campus surveillance video putting up the stickers. USD Public Safety Chief James Miyashiro does not believe the subjects are USD students, considering they were seen on video entering and exiting campus directly before and after placing the stickers.

The stickers bore the logo of a group, The Patriot Front, a known white supremacist group which formed in 2017, breaking off from another known white supremacist group, Vanguard America, soon after the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, South Carolina.

According to the Anti-Defamation League, The Patriot Front is currently active in the U.S., and manifestos associated with the group make it clear that the group considers non-white citizens to be “non-American.”

Jesse Magaña, a senior and a senator in the Associated Student Government and the Co-Chair of Movimiento Estudiantil Chicanx de Aztlán (M.E.Ch.A), was present the morning these stickers were placed around campus.

“I walked out of Saints Hall, noticed that there were PSAFE officers all around campus, and instantly knew that something was going on,” Magaña said.

Magaña received the email alerting the campus community of the incident once he had gotten to his car, and was saddened, but not surprised by the news.

“When I saw them looking at and peeling off stickers, I figured it had something to do with a hate group,” Magaña said, adding, “Unfortunately this type of incident isn’t rare and is actually happening on college campuses across America, which is very unfortunate but true.”

Magaña sees this problem as going beyond the USD campus. While investigating this event, Chief Miyashiro reached out to San Diego State University to see if their campus had experienced anything similar. He discovered that the same type of stickers were found around their campus during the fall semester.

Considering the incident occurred over the Intersession break, some students are not aware that an act of intolerance even took place on campus. Senior Davis Luanava, a student worker in the United Front Multicultural Center learned of the incident during her interview with The USD Vista.

“I’m shocked,” Luanava said. “I’m shocked that this happened and I am also shocked that I didn’t know about it.”

Luanava also noted that hearing about the event made her feel unsafe, but what was more concerning was her lack of knowledge.

“I’m sad that this happened, but I wish it was a bigger deal because as a brown student on this campus it is triggering to hear about, and I wish I knew more,” Luanava said.

According to Chief Miyashiro, there has been no further progress in identifying and apprehending the people who did this. “Though we haven’t been able to make any identifications or arrests, we did put UCSD on alert so that if anything happens on their campus we could hopefully work together,” Miyashiro said.

Miyashiro also clarified that while he, and the rest of the Public Safety Department understood the severe social implications of the act, there are legal differences between an “act of intolerance” and a “hate crime” that they must abide by.

“If an act has discriminatory implications in terms of race, sexuality, gender, etc., but does not amount to a crime, then it is an act of intolerance,” explained Miyashiro. “Since these stickers peeled off with no lasting damage, it did not amount to vandalism.”

Cory Gooding, Ph.D., a professor in the political science and international relations department was also disheartened when he received the email notifying him of the incident during Intersession.

“Sadly, this is not the first time something like this has happened on this campus,” he said. Gooding also added, “What worries me is how this will affect students going forward, especially considering that some students on this campus are going to bear the brunt of this burden a lot more than others.”

Gooding’s concerns spoke to the fact that USD has historically had, and statistically does have, an overwhelmingly white student population. In the aftermath of events like the one on Jan. 15, students of color, like Magaña and Luanava who both noted feeling nervous after learning of the act, may feel the disproportionate racial make-up of this campus more than ever.

Although USD still has a majority white student body, with 50% of students in fall of 2019 identifying as white according to a mandated report by the Department of Education, this percentage has decreased in recent years. Just ten years ago in the fall of 2009, it was recorded that 60% of students at USD identified as white, suggesting that this campus is slowly becoming more diverse. Gooding also spoke to this trend, and how he believes it will be increasingly important for students to speak out for the type of campus community they want to have and perpetuate here at USD, saying, “As USD continues to grow and evolve, and become more diverse, we as a community, and especially students, are going to have to think about how we choose to be welcoming to all campus members.”

If campus community members see any lingering stickers on campus, they are encouraged to report them to USD Public Safety so that they can be taken down.