In continued solidarity,

The LGBTQIA+ Leadership Board
Kevin Bui '17
Pei-Yun Chu '18
Yejadai Dunn '16
Akash Kar '16
Justin G. Maffett '16
Katherine McAvoy '17
Gustavo Mercado Muniz '16
Nicolaas Moolenijzer '17
Justin Schlacks '17
Francis Slaughter '16


Dear Community,

Last Thursday, Student Assembly and the NAACP opened the #BlackLivesMatter exhibit in Collis Atrium representing the violence inflicted on black bodies by law enforcement. The exhibit displays 74 shirts hanging in Collis which represents the 74 unarmed individuals killed by police so far this year. The 28 black shirts represent the 28 unarmed black individuals who have lost their lives to police brutality this year alone.

Hours after the exhibit opened, students began to vandalize the display and rip shirts off the exhibit. Since then, the NAACP and Student Assembly have worked to repair the display, however, shirts continue to disappear from the display. Not only is this an act of disrespect to those who worked on the exhibit, but also to the individuals who have lost their lives and the #BlackLivesMatter Movement as a whole. This act of violence against people of color is a hate crime.

In response to this incident, we are organizing a Blackout all day on Thursday. We are asking you to wear all black to stand in solidarity with the #BlackLivesMatter Movement. At 8:00pm sharp, we will be meeting on the steps of Novack to publicly stand together in solidarity.

We will not be silenced by these acts of violence.
You can take the shirts off the board but you can't take the shirts off of us.

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