Monday, December 13, 2010

LGBT books vandalized with urine

Around 40 books about same sex marriage and gay and lesbian issues were found to be vandalized with what appears to be urine in Lamont Library at Harvard University. The incident is being investigated as a hate crime.
Marco Chan '11, co-chair of the Harvard College Queer frustrating" and "disconcerting," and said that it represents a Students and Allies, called the incident "extremely concern not only for the LGBT community, but for the Harvard community at large.


"I am very outraged. It is hard to conceive this as a coincidence when there are 40 books on the same subject," Chan said. "The message that this incident sent to me is that we need more resources not only for the LGBT community but also targeted towards other people."

Chan suggested workshops on homosexual, bisexual, and transsexual issues—similar to the mandatory freshman orientation event Sex Signals—as one possible way to respond to the bias evidenced by the incident.
(via Feministing)

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

When will feminists stop trying to mandate compulsory "workshops" and indoctrination sessions?

You cannot force your feminist views on people.

University is for learning a specific degree path, not feminist groupthink.

If you're going to support such a forced class, why not one on men's issues, too? Oh, wait, because you only care about feminist issues.

People don't pay to go to college for forced feminist indoctrination sessions.

Well, feminists and their "women's studies" do, but everyone else doesn't.

Amelia said...

As soon as you, Anonymous, can prove to me that men are systematically discriminated against (in the USA or elsewhere) and that men have to fear being open about the fact that they are men because they might be harassed or otherwise injured, then yeah, I'll support workshops that bring those issues to people's attention.

But in the world that I live in, men don't face those kinds of problems. So your argument is nonsensical.

AFare24Get said...

Damn, vandalizing knowledge & ideas. Apparently someone's too afraid of debate or confrontation.

Hopefully stupidity won't reign.

Amelia said...

Thanks, heavyarmor.

It makes me sad that 98% of the comments that come into moderation are derailing troll comments (I agree with your assessment of Anon's words as such). So I post them sometimes. Even when I know they're such. (Anon tried to follow up with more comments which I deleted before reading yours.)

So, to clarify, you're saying that my comment that you quoted had the effect of erasing the experiencing of GBTQ men/men of color?

I read your comment several times through. Maybe I'm just being a little slow to understand today. Either way, I was attempting, perhaps unsuccessfully so, to make a statement about men not being an oppressed group, but indeed, I should have clarified that heterosexual/white, etc. men are the real privileged group, and acknowledged that it seems like this could be Anon's view of what makes a "real man".

That was a lapse in care in my word choice, because I absolutely do acknowledge and understand the differences in experiences between white/hetero and other men. I need to be more careful when I get frustrated with annoying trolls.

Anonymous said...

Amelia,

Short answer, yes. But only because the men you referred to in your response would only be limited to White, Hetero, Cis, and (for the most part) Employed Middle Class to Idle Rich.

To show you how much Anonymous does not think things through, his "forced" class of the Issues Regarding Men would certainly include Gay Men, Trans Men, Bi-Men, and Queer Men. And yet he sees things like urinating on books about LGBTQ issues, like marriage (I try not to make distinctions about this), as an appropriate response to "being forced to acknowledge the existence of" people other than White Hetero Men. That's why I called his views Enforcement of Patriarchy. People like Anonymous here are what stand in the way of people at large being treated with respect and dignity. Thus, I have no problem living up to my username and bringing the proverbial tank to the discussion.

Amelia said...

Thanks heavyarmor. I appreciate your comments. Definitely learning my lesson. Just deleted 6 new troll comments.

Anonymous said...

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/2010/12/14/2010-12-14_harvard_books_found_doused_in_urine_was_not_a_hate_act_worker_accidentally_spill.html

Maybe you'll think twice before screaming "hate crime".

Turns out it wasn't any such thing.

Next time, wait for all the facts before trying to conduct a trial by media.

Anonymous said...

Oh, you aren't going to post the comment that proves you jumped to conclusions on this?

Amelia said...

Anonymous #2&3:

I am so glad that you have all the time in the world to hang around our blog and post comments/wait for comments to be approved. I applaud you on achieving a lifestyle that allows you such freedom.

I, however, as sole moderator for posts older than two weeks, am a senior in college who has a full class load, holds a job, and runs two campus student organizations. That being said, I think I do a pretty good job getting comments published (when warranted), especially considering the piles and piles of spam I have to wade through to get to the actual comments, most of which don't even meet commenting guidelines.

Have a nice day.

Anonymous said...

It's rather telling though, that you don't even publish a retraction.

Feminists are real bad about admitting they're wrong. For instance, the Duke "rape" case, wherein most every feminist site across the internet referred to the boys as "The Duke Rapists", (and still to this day tend to refer to them in similar ways), conducted a full trial by media, before any evidence was presented, already had them tried and convicted in their minds and blogs, did everything they could to turn as many people against them as possible. . .

And then when the news broke that the woman that accused them outright lied, did any feminist site issue a retraction? An apology? Nope. They quietly swept it under the rug, and moved on, rather than admit they were wrong, and attempt to make good on their vomitous diatribes of libel.

Amelia said...

We at Female Impersonator don't always hear updates on stories we've blogged on. This happens when you're not a paid blogger and you have class and work and run other organizations (in my case).

So, Anon, if you have an issue with the way we run this blog, write your own, kay? Thanks.