Upwards of 400 students marched in the #NotProudToBe blackout event during Colorado State University President Joyce McConnell’s first Fall Address Sept. 19 at The Oval.
Carrying signs and donned in all black, students marched in the silent demonstration as part of a call for institutional change at the University when it comes to addressing and minimizing bias-related incidents.
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This follows the viral photo of four CSU students in blackface, yet another incident of hate speech or bias to occur at the University over the last few years.
We are organized, we are powerful and we will be heard.” -Marcela Riddick
Despite it being a silent protest, organizing students — including Marcela Riddick, Janaye Matthews and Micaela Parker — emphasized that the demonstration was, at its core, about making sure student voices are listened to.
“They’re expecting us to be loud, they’re expecting us to be mad, they’re expecting us to do so much, and we’re about to prove them wrong, and we’re about to show them how powerful silence can be,” Riddick said to demonstrators before the event. “Because silence in a space where we’re not welcome can be just as powerful, and like I promise, we will make sure all of your voices will be heard.”
The numbers and racial diversity of the group made a statement in itself, Matthews said. Video imagery and organizer estimates suggest between 360 to 500 students marched in the event.
Linked arm in arm, the length of the #NOTproudtobe marchers last nearly 2 minutes worth of filming which Twitter won’t let me post pic.twitter.com/o4nm60WZF6
— Samantha Ye (@samxye4) September 19, 2019
Staying silent was crucial to the demonstration, as hundreds of students, linked arm-in-arm in rows of five, filed into The Oval, deliberate not to impede on McConnell’s right to give her speech.
At the end of the demonstration, the leading students placed their statement of purpose flyer on the stage where McConnell was giving her speech.
McConnell acknowledged the students then by saying she was “very proud of our students who are marching right now and exercising their First Amendment rights.”
McConnell says she is proud of the students marching right now. Audience applauds the group as they walk past the stage pic.twitter.com/SGpnP25kSS
— Samantha Ye (@samxye4) September 19, 2019
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Students, however, were not there for McConnell’s speech.
“We’re here for us; we weren’t here for her,” demonstrator Vee Martinez said after the march. “We’re here to make our point clear and let them know that we’re visible, and we create space, and we are important.”
Martinez said they made that point clear and will continue to make that point and “love and support what each and every one of us does for one another.”
“It will not stop here; it will not stop today,” Riddick said. “#NotProudToBe is about continuously showing up and showing out in spaces that they weren’t asking for us. … We are organized, we are powerful and we will be heard.”
We all deserve to be students and humans, and at the end of the day, I’m tired of being a dollar sign, and I’m ready to be a person again.” -Janaye Matthews
A similarly large crowd of students spoke at the Associated Students of CSU the night before, where a hate speech resolution was passed. Students spoke out against the blackface photo as well as the University’s response to it and previous bias-related incidents.
The University sent out two emails about the blackface photo. The first one denounced the image but said the First Amendment prevents the University from punishing students in blackface.
Matthews said at first, she laughed at the initial email, but really, she was mostly frustrated.
“This was the exact same message we got two years ago when we made a bit of a scene after a noose was found in Newsom,” Matthews said in an interview with CTV 11. “For me, the conversations that I’ve been having for the last two years, I feel like they have fallen on people who weren’t listening or didn’t care enough.”
But students will no longer go ignored as they demand institutional policy change and work to hold the University accountable, the event organizers said.
“I made the decision to come to this university, and I will no longer allow them to exhaust me while I explore my education,” Matthews said. “I deserve to be here; we all deserve to be here. We all deserve to be students and humans, and at the end of the day, I’m tired of being a dollar sign, and I’m ready to be a person again.”
