University officials and members of the Jewish Stars are speaking out against hate speech following racist acts of vandalism.
On March 28, the Oklahoma Democratic Party Headquarters and the Chickasaw Nation Headquarters were found spray-painted with racial slurs on the doors and pathways leading to the buildings. On April 3, McKinley Elementary School, the Firehouse Arts Center and the Cleveland County Democratic Headquarters in Norman were also vandalized.
Imam Imad Enchassi, associate professor of Islamic studies, was one of the first people to arrive at the Oklahoma Democratic Headquarters.
“I was in class when the images started coming out,” Enchassi said. “Luckily, I had a guest speaker. I couldn’t really sit still, so I left my class with the guest speaker.”
Enchassi said he got his power-washer and started washing the graffiti to try and blur the messages.
“We told the interfaith community that we were going to start working at 12:30,” he said. “There were swastikas, there was the n-word there, was the c-word, pretty much every minority was targeted at that building.”
On April 5, President Martha Burger sent out an email denouncing these acts of vandalism and praising Enchassi’s response.
“I was saddened and outraged to see this hatred on display in our community,” the email read. “A couple of minutes later, something remarkable struck me. I saw a photo of OCU’s beloved Imam Imad Enchassi using a power washer to clean the graffiti. That’s when I was reminded of how wonderful and giving our OCU family is.”
Madeline Statter, music theater sophomore and vice president of the Jewish Stars, said seeing these hateful acts nowadays is saddening.
“What a lot of people don’t realize is that those symbols are extremely powerful, and it wasn’t that long ago when people were spray-painting swastikas on windows and rounding up Jews and killing them,” she said. “It’s overwhelming because that’s the stuff we see in textbooks and what our grandparents told us how they grew up.”
Statter said she appreciated Burger’s email.
“I really appreciate every email she sends after everything that happens,” she said. “It really makes me smile whenever she sends something out like that and to know that someone cares.”
Lisi Levy, acting sophomore and president of Jewish Stars, said the best way to combat this sort of hate is through education.
“Show up and embrace your local minority groups and be willing and open to learn,” Levy said. “We see an event like Passover and it’s like, ‘well, I’m not Jewish, I’m not going to go,’ and that’s not the point. Why would I be holding an event to teach other Jewish people about Passover? They know about Passover. I want people who don’t know about Passover to come over and eat food and have fun.”
Enchassi said the hateful acts only brought people together.
“When it comes to hatred in all its forms–against immigrants, our brothers and sisters from the southern borders, Muslims, African-Americans, Latinos, you name it–it is something that brought all of us together to combat hate in a more positive way,” he said.
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