Theater Students at Ithaca College Threaten to Out ‘White Supremacist’ Faculty
“set an October 1 deadline for the private college in New York to fulfill two of its ten demands”
As someone who studied theater in college, I really don’t understand this at all. It sounds like these students have been radicalized and have completely forgotten why they’re even in college.
The College Fix reports:
Ithaca College theatre students threaten to out ‘white supremacist’ faculty
A group of current and former theatre students at Ithaca College has set an October 1 deadline for the private college in New York to fulfill two of its ten demands.
If these demands are not met, the group has plans to publicly call for the resignation of theatre department administrators and faculty who “repeatedly exhibited racist behavior and white supremacist ideologies” while teaching in the theatre department, according to the initial July 30 letter published on Medium.
The activist group, which calls itself ICTA BIPOC for “Ithaca College Theatre Arts Black, Indigenous and People of Color,” reiterated its threat in a September 22 Instagram post.
“We are ten days away from October 1st,” the group wrote, tagging the theatre arts department’s Instagram account. The last post from the department’s Instagram account is a May 31 statement in support of Black Lives Matter.
The College Fix reached out to ICTA BIPOC twice in the past week over email and Instagram but did not receive a response.
One demand is for the university to create a committee of faculty, staff and students to investigate any complaint of racism by students.
The second demand is for mandatory diversity, “unconscious bias” and racism training for everyone in the theatre department.
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Imagine that. A bunch of theater students are grand standing.
Shut up and get back to class, or withdraw. Either of those, or, I will give you something substantial to complain about!
-signed- Dean T F Grizzly
The theatre department is the least likely of all the departments at Ithaca College to have white supremacists.
Given that one is automatically a white supremacist if one has “white” skin, I wonder how much faculty would be left if every non-bipoc faculty member quit in response to this insanity.
Okay, you legal types help me out here: Isn’t this extortion? If you don’t accede to my demands, we’re going to publicly defame people we don’t like, facts be damned. And we get to decide what the facts are.
I wonder if when the demands aren’t met we are going to hear “Moooooooooooooooom.”
Drama queens?
Based upon the Ithaca College website, IC is offering all instruction on-line. I do not understand what actions this group is threatening. They claim that if the college fails to address their demands, the next step will be to contact alumni and ask them to stop donations.
I question which is more effective in discouraging alumni donations:
1) a request from a radical BIPOC group that claims the Department was unresponsive during a campus lock-down or
2) a radical BIPOC group gaining negative publicity by proclaiming that IC is a worthless racist institution that fails to offer instruction of value (during a pandemic.)
Perhaps the students should stage a virtual sit in on Zoom?
IC has a $347 million endowment, which is very small for a school of its size. It is also suffering quite a loss due to the COVID pandemic. The BIPOC group is not making realistic demands.
My understanding is that if the college doesn’t cave and create a Star Chamber to rubber stamp student claims of racism and implement mandatory Critical Race Theory-like indoctrination, they’re going to publicly call administrators and faculty racists and white supremacists. Justification for the allegations, of course, is not required.
It’s gotta’ happen at I.C. on South Hill for how will they hold their own when they come up against East Hill “the big guys/gals” from Cornell when they all meet up downtown at the Bars to drink and the Commons to protest!
Having gone to school in upstate NY (albeit long ago), the one redeeming feature of I.C. was it was known area-wide for having the best looking co-eds in Upstate NY.
Since that department is mentioned specifically, without reference to other departments, the entire thing should be defunded. It’s the only way to be sure.