[Fdu] York U's CUPE 3903 condemns racist graffiti and bomb threats

[Cynthia Wright]

  CUPE 3903 Condemns Racist Graffiti and Bomb Threats

Posted on March 22, 2017 
<https://3903.cupe.ca/2017/03/22/cupe-3903-condemns-racist-graffiti-and-bomb-threats/>by 
CUPE 3903 Communications Officer 
<https://3903.cupe.ca/author/cupe-3903-communications-officer/>

Over the past three weeks, there have been several incidents at Glendon 
College where racist threats have been written on the walls, targeting 
Jewish and Black students. On at least two occasions, York Hall was 
evacuated due to a bomb threat. Such threats follow from the recent and 
alarming increase in far-right attacks on Muslim, Jewish, and other 
marginalized communities. As the union representing graduate student 
workers, contract faculty, and part-time librarians at York University, 
including Glendon College, CUPE 3903 stands against all forms of racism 
and hate and condemns these incidents. We wish to express our solidarity 
with students, staff, and faculty at the Glendon campus, and especially 
with the Jewish and Black members of our community that have been the 
targets of these threats.

We would also like to express disappointment with the response from 
York’s administration. While these threats have been made over the past 
three weeks, many of our members at Glendon, as well as the larger 
Glendon community, were left unaware until the last few days. They also 
ignored queries from the CUPE 3903 Chair of the Joint Health and Safety 
Committee. The York administration has an obligation to communicate 
these hateful incidents with the wider York community in a prompt and 
open way.

As students, librarians, and teachers at this university, our members 
can have a role in responding to this racism and generating the 
solidarity that is urgently needed on our campuses and in our wider 
community. One concrete way to help, which students at Glendon have 
requested, is to open the classroom to discussions around these 
incidents at Glendon and the wider context of racism, anti-Semitism, and 
Islamophobia. This is also an opportunity to inform students of the 
resources they have (including student government, organization and 
clubs, residence teams as well as the Wellness, Counselling and 
Accessibility Centre) should they wish further action or more support. 
There are also multiple city-wide organizations should members want to 
organize against racism and islamophobia in the wider community (see 
list below). In addition, Glendon is hosting a community meeting this 
Friday at 2:30 to discuss these incidents (more details to come). We 
encourage our members at Glendon to attend.

In solidarity,
The CUPE 3903 Executive Committee

_City-Wide Organizations and Groups*_

  * Coalition Against White Supremacy and Islamophobia (CAWI)
    <https://www.facebook.com/groups/1792848744374213/>
  * Organizing Committee Against Islamophobia (OCAI)
    <https://www.facebook.com/organizingcommitteeagainstislamophobia/>
  * Black Lives Matter – Toronto
    <https://www.facebook.com/blacklivesmatterTO/>
  * GTA Overt Bigotry Response
    <https://www.facebook.com/groups/352468731762658/>
  * Toronto Against Fascism
    <https://www.facebook.com/Toronto-Against-Fascism-1288185851260986/>
  * Independent Jewish Voices
    <https://yorku.collegiatelink.net/organization/ijvyork/about>

Are there more groups we should know about? Let us know! 
(cupe3903comms at gmail.com <mailto:cupe3903comms at gmail.com>)

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.physics.utoronto.ca/pipermail/fdu/attachments/20170322/75825c76/attachment.html>