Community unites to condemn intolerance

The opening of fall semester was marred by at least seven incidents of harassment aimed at African-American students, and the University community quickly rallied with a wave of concern and support for the students and condemnation of the harassers.

President John T. Casteen III called the attacks “vicious, deliberate and secretive efforts to insult and abuse members of this community.”

He added, “the writer of spiteful words and the passing motorist who shouts an insult have no place in a community built on mutual trust and respect.” Casteen also issued a videotaped statement on the importance of diversity at U.Va. 

Gatherings at the Rotunda, black t-shirts worn to the opening football game, “I will not tolerate intolerance” statements on Lawn room doors, protolerance messages attached to columns along the Lawn and the distribution and donning of more than 62,000 black lapel ribbons were among the many ways the community united to raise awareness.

Arts & Sciences Dean Edward L. Ayers issued this statement: “Racism and intolerance have no place at U.Va., and in Arts & Sciences we choose to fight them with our core strengths — teaching and knowledge. One vital way our faculty respond is to teach our students, through our curriculum, about the deep political, cultural, and historical forces that created and continue to feed racism and other forms of intolerance. ... It’s fitting and natural that our responses to acts of intolerance continue to be a product of our curriculum, of all its many disciplines, and of all its faculty.”

Read more at Virginia.edu/uvadiversity/