We, the members of Asian/American Students for Action, stand in solidarity with
the First-Year Trips Director, Assistant Director, and Trips Directorate in response to a recent op-ed published in
The Dartmouth.
In the very first sentence,
the article calls out by name and class year the two female directors of First-Year Trips. The article then goes on to mention their names not one but nine more times. In doing so, the intention of the article is clear -- to attack the Trips Directors’ abilities
to make fair decisions as women in positions of authority.
This was a failed attempt to publicly shame and humiliate two women of color who
dared to try to make Dartmouth more inclusive. This is a specific kind of violence that seeks to put women who have attained power back in their “place” for choosing to center marginalized people rather than appease privileged persons.
The article goes on to describe the Trips Directorate as “unrecognizable
as representatives of Dartmouth’s student body.” This description invisibilizes people of color, women and trans folk, queer women of color, and other marginalized peoples on this campus. The article’s assertion that male students need male role models relies
on the sexist and binary assumption that women and gender non-conforming people cannot serve as role models for men.
A community that erases and silences the voices of its most vulnerable members is no community at all, but instead a space of violence that forces
marginalized peoples to forge creative methods of survival.
We condemn
The Dartmouth’s
decision to publish this article, given the author’s clear intent to harm. The editors must have known how widely this article would be circulated, yet they chose to not only publish this article, but also include the identities of the women being targeted
without their consent. By giving hate speech a platform, they actively harm these women’s mental health and future prospects. We see this violence as an example of the additional emotional burden and labor demanded of women of color. On a campus where women
of color have been targets of death threats and hate crimes for choosing to speak against injustice, the actions of
The Dartmouth
are yet another example of this institution’s systematic disregard for the safety and material well-being of women of color.
We urge
The Dartmouth
to issue an apology and retract the names of the directors from the article.
Redistribution is not injustice.
You cannot co-opt the language of oppression to stand with the oppressors.
White male tears will not stop women of color from thriving. We will continue to
create communities of survival and resistance.
In solidarity,
Asian/American Students for Action (4A)