“Silence will not save you,” reads a sign in the EMU. In this sign, there is a swastika carved into a tree with a slash through it. If only stopping hate and hate crime were so easy. Meeting weekly on campus, Pacifica Forum has been carving hate speech indelibly into the University since 2003. The Forum’s presence alone should bring shame upon the administration, where former president Dave Frohnmayer’s strongest action was to write a letter condemning them.
The Pacifica Forum has brought in Holocaust deniers and bigoted speakers of many types of hate groups. In practice, they seem to hate everyone who is not a white, heterosexual, Christian male. Its presence and language is not benign; its presentations have called for “death to Jews” and insinuated that rape is both acceptable and humorous. Its presence is dangerous in Eugene’s racially charged recent history — in 2009, a Puerto Rican man outside Pegasus Pizza had his ear bitten off by a group saying, “We’re white supremacists and we’re going to fucking kill you.” This attack is one of many, both on and off campus.
Continuing to tolerate the Pacifica Forum tacitly says we are going to pretend these incidents aren’t happening. Allowing overt racism encourages subtle racism, for people to say “I am not as bad as that group!” I suggest we take the Student Handbook’s stance on page two: “Reject bigotry, discrimination, violence or intimidation of any kind.” Take this opportunity to protest the Pacifica Forum and encourage the student Senate and administration to actively seek the removal of the Pacifica Forum from campus.
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