Something profoundly racist happened on our campus last week: The most recent issue of Gravity Magazine was published. And while much of the focus has centered on a fake advertisement, the other pages of the magazine are equally disturbing. They are profoundly sexist, xenophobic, ignorant and offensive on so many other levels. Since the magazine was printed, a lot of discussion has occurred about what was said, who said it and what should be done about it. A lot of cries of free speech have also been made regarding the same issue.

A forum Sunday night hosted by the Brandeis Black Student Organization addressed the issues brought up by Gravity's publication. At that meeting, among other things, a lot of very strong, very hurt emotions were expressed that came from very real pain. Soon after, the Student Union Senate passed a resolution that speaks to the problems here.

Aside from noting that the magazine violated Rights and Responsibilities-the University's code of conduct-the resolution highlighted how the ad brought "a significant number of members of our community to feel 'unsafe,' 'powerless,' 'unsupported,' 'harassed,' and 'threatened.'"

It further elaborated:

"This issue of Gravity Magazine shows a complete disregard for Brandeis's regrettable history of race-relations and bigotry in campus media including the WBRS Incident (2002), the Justice Incident (Dusty Baker, October 2003), the Lies [magazine] Incident (2005), I Hate You Thugs (The Hoot, March 2006) and countless other experiences of individual students who have been victims of prejudice and hate in campus media and in one-on-one interactions with peers, faculty and staff.

All incidents of ignorance and disrespect affect all members of the community and actively misrepresent our community values and standards."

Something needs to be made abundantly clear here: What was published last week in Gravity has nothing to do with free speech. It was hate speech. The "BlackJerry" advertisement, in particular, involved the layered, dehumanizing use of racial stereotypes and historical references to slavery that were, from the first word to the last, explicitly racist. The supposedly benign intentions of the authors do not negate that fact.

True, the publication explicitly sets out to publish "offensive comedy." However, what was published last week was not funny, and it was beyond offensive. It was hurtful and it was threatening. The jokes intentionally targeted several disadvantaged and minority groups of our campus population. Example: On at least two occasions, the idea of rape was turned into a joke.

Hate speech and hateful acts in any and all their forms are unacceptable. This is only compounded by two deeper problems: the history of bigotry that has been expressed by our on-campus media outlets and the sense of entitlement that the editors of Gravity clearly felt when they chose to publish this issue. (Why did they think that was OK?)

First, the historical piece. It is well documented that our campus media has a history of bigoted statements regarding disadvantaged groups. What happened last week was not an isolated incident. It is part of a pattern, and it is unacceptable.

Second, there is the entitlement component. Imagine for a minute what would happen if somebody felt entitled to make a Holocaust joke in a campus publication, with specific references to the tattoos from the death camps and the "hook-nose" caricatures common to classic anti-Semitic diatribes. The reaction, you might imagine, would not be a small one.

The publishers of Gravity felt entitled to make similar references to slavery and racism in the American context. The authors write from a status of privilege that enables them to feel entitled in their positions. As a result, the authors expected the campus community to accept the trivialization of the oppression that some groups feel for the sake of entertainment. This expectation was explicitly bigoted and threatening.

In the short term, it is beyond clear that Gravity needs to be dechartered to show that as a campus community, we do not tolerate hate speech in any of its forms. This is not a discussion about anyone's constitutional rights. This is a discussion about privilege, the sense of entitlement that accompanies that privilege and the fact that our campus environment has allowed incidents of this sort to occur repetedly. When someone's actions and words result in the alienation of an entire community on our campus, when they produce real human hurt, those words cannot be ignored, and they cannot be hidden behind the banner of "free speech."

Taking punitive, retaliatory actions against Gravity and its editors, however, is not the point of all this. It's more important to work toward a positive resolution that prevents the recurrence of this sort of incident. A very important discussion has been opened up here about the sense of entitlement that certain people feel to hurt and to be willfully bigoted and discriminatory toward others. These actions require correction, and they require action. We, as a Brandeis community, have a responsibility to take that action and ensure that our peers feel safe and valued in our community.



Jerome Frierson '07 is the co-president of the Brandeis Black Students Organization. Blake Hyatt '08 is the co-president of the PossePlus club.