Students call for reprimand of The Imperialist

Anita Varma Senior Editor

Most Vassar Students Association (VSA) Council meetings include dorm presidents, class presidents, the executive board, and a few students applying for VSA funding. But the VSA Council meeting on Sunday, Sept. 11 was full, with approximately 15 students present to express their desire for The Imperialist to be formally reprimanded. These students said that the publication contains racist and sexist material, and contributes to a hostile environment on campus.

The Imperialist. is a publication by the Moderate, Independent and Conservative Alliance (MICA). Students present called for the publication to have VSA funding cut off, and for the council to require a public apology from MICA. They are requesting that the apology be read aloud and published in The Miscellany News.

No representatives from MICA were present at the council meeting. After more than half an hour of debate, the council voted to freeze MICA’s budget for one week (until the VSA meeting on Sunday, Sept. 18) and to postpone consideration of official censure for one week.

“The purpose of [freezing their account] was to put the situation on ice…so that we would have time to thoughtfully investigate the issue,” said VSA President Rick Rodems ’06.

Students who came to speak against The Imperialist were pleased with this result. “The Imperialist falls under the jurisdiction of the VSA, because the VSA allocates student funds that have unfortunately allowed for the dissemination of racist/homophobic doggerel,” said Victor Ray ’07 in an emailed statement. “Obviously, the VSA could not have realized that this is what the money would be used for. But, once they were given the chance to see that our money was being spent in order to attack and further marginalize racial and sexual minorities, reason prevailed. They made the right decision.”

A main point of contention was about a sentence in “Race and Freedom,” a piece in the most recent edition of The Imperialist. It reads: “how is diversity achieved when those students are voluntarily confining themselves to ghettos of the ALANA Center and Blegen House? I find the objective of diversity to be utterly meritless, suggesting that our colleges should become some zoological preserve in some paternalistic attempt [to] benefit our ‘non diverse’ students” (36). Many students at the meeting objected to the characterization of the ALANA Center and Blegen House as ghettos.

Another common complaint among students was about a cartoon that depicted “a Black student confronting a White Supremacist on Vassar’s campus.” Black Students’ Union President Adam Lee ’06 noted that the depiction of the woman contained disturbing disparaging elements in her body language and body type.

"Personally if I were putting together The Imperialist, I would not have put that in,” said MICA Treasurer Cara Grieco ’08. “But...I know they meant it sarcastically.”

“I’ve seen Matisse paintings that are similar to that representation,” added MICA President Matt Ambrose ’07. “It wasn’t [meant] to offend people...Art, generally speaking, is subjective.”
Several students who sit on VSA council were against freezing MICA’s budget because there were no representatives from MICA present to defend their work. Josselyn President Jane Packenham ’07 led the discussion from the other side, advocating the route of suspending judgment until MICA representatives were present.

“I think that on the Vassar campus, the greatest minority is that of the conservatively minded,” said Packenham after the meeting. “They are often immediately shut down or dismissed. How many people would feel upset at hearing ‘Shut up you stupid Republican’ in the college center, as opposed to ‘Shut up you stupid Asian’? To me, it's the same thing.”

During the meeting, Rebecca M. Fernandez ’07 noted that The Imperialist was at that moment currently causing discomfort to students of color, LGBTQ students, and members of the Vasasar community. Packenham replied that she is a student of color, and did not share Fernandez’s sentiments upon skimming the material passed around during the meeting.

After the meeting, students disagreed on whether the content of The Imperalist was a form of hate speech or not.

“There’s still clear violations of the law we operate on as a college,” said Lee. “It may fall into the category of hate speech.”

Imperialist Editor-in-Chief Graydon Gordian ’07 spoke vehemently against this characterization of the content of the publication. “As far as where there’s free speech and hate speech, there is a fine line,” he said. “Was there hate speech in the most recent issue? Absolutely not.”

The council meeting on Sunday was the second council meeting of the 2005-2006 year. Fernandez said that she was concerned by the fact that council members did not bring up the content of The Imperialist themselves, without non-council students having to appear at open discussion.
“I think the question is that why didn’t VSA [Council] members, having seen this already, not see this as pertinent?” said Fernandez.

“We can’t say factually that every person in VSA knew—but we know that one individual pulled out a copy at the meeting,” added Lee. “He could have shown it to the VSA president.”

Fernandez said, “You can say what you want to say, you can think what you want to think…but no group should have to feel under attack.”

Members of MICA and concerned students who brought the original complaint to the VSA all plan to go to the Sept. 18 council meeting.