Activist students on the campus of Occidental College in Los Angeles, President Obama’s alma mater, are applauding the vandals who destroyed a 9/11 memorial over the weekend, claiming that the American flag is a “triggering … symbol of institutionalized violence (genocide, rape, slavery, colonialism, etc.) against people of color.”
In a Sunday post to their Facebook page, students from the Coalition Oxy for Diversity and Equity, or CODE, said they did not vandalize the memorial consisting of nearly 3,000 U.S. flags placed on the quad—but that they do sympathize with the students who did. CODE students said the destruction was necessary given the distress faced by students walking through the sea of red, white and blue.
“As students of color, this symbol of the American flag is particularly triggering for many different reasons,” the students wrote. “Historically, the American flag and subsequent American nationalist symbols have been polarizing and marginalizing to people of color living within the United States. This has been most recently exemplified in Colin Kaepernick’s protest of the American national anthem.
“When this institution allows thousands of American flags to be placed in the center of campus it speaks volumes to the students that have lived their lives under the oppression of this flag.”
The memorial was erected Saturday night by members of the Occidental College Conservatives Club. At some point overnight Saturday, the flags were stomped on, destroyed and then tossed in trash cans.
Students at the university told a reporter from the Los Angeles Daily News that the vandals and their actions are not, by and large, representative of the wider Occidental student body. Several students told the paper that the destruction of the memorial was disrespectful and inappropriate.
School officials said they are investigating the incident will take appropriate disciplinary action against those responsible.
Members of CODE applauded the fact that, in place of the flags, new signs and a poem about members of a hotel and restaurant workers union who died on 9/11 in the Windows of the World restaurant were posted in the same space. The signs memorialize the 1.4 million Iraqis that died in that country after 9/11 in addition to the 2,966 Americans who lost their lives.
“It is extremely important to note that Eid al-Adha begins on September 11 this year,” the statement concluded, referring to the Muslim holiday. “Placing these flags on this day shows a complete lack of thought, care or understanding of the students that are still living with the rising Islamophobia in the aftermath of 9/11.”