The demise of Chief Illiniwek was a long time coming, but one group that helped pressure the University of Illinois to drop the mascot was a coalition of students, faculty and community members that formed in the aftermath of a “Tacos and Tequilas” party that offended Mexican American students. The party, thrown by five White fraternities and sororities in October, was just one in a series of racially insensitive parties thrown by college students.
The party, the administration’s lackluster response and its support of the Chief Illiniwek mascot deemed racially offensive to American Indians compelled the student-led group Students Transforming Oppression and Privilege, or S.T.O.P., to urge administrators to do more to promote racial tolerance.
“It is important for us and young people in general to speak out, to make sure their campuses have anti-racism platforms and missions,” says Iara Peng, the director of Young People For, or YP4, a national network of young leaders on 65 campuses in 18 states.
Across the country, more students are speaking out against racial insensitivity, illustrated recently by the string of student-thrown theme parties that play up ethnic stereotypes. Recent incidents include:
· In January, at Texas’s Tarleton State University, White students dressed up in so-called “gangsta” apparel, drank malt liquor and ate fried chicken. Among the costumes was a female student dressed as Aunt Jemima.
· That same month, another White student dressed up in Blackface at a similar party at Clemson University.
· White students at the University of Texas at Austin in September also dressed up in Blackface, carried 40-ounce bottles of malt liquor, wore Afro wigs and huge necklaces and name tags with stereotypically Black and Hispanic names.
