Scott Tibbs
blog post
April 27th, 2005
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In a Letter to the editor, IU sophomore Stormie Foust whines that the Benton mural should be covered up. With no regard to her own hypocrisy, Foust whines:
Are you kidding me? How do we get from priding ourselves on diversity and welcoming free and intellectual debate to covering up something that hurts our feeeeeeeeeeeeeeelings?
We pride ourselves on diversity and a campus that welcomes free and intellectual debate. Let's prove it. None of us think the KKK is anything to glorify and celebrate, but many IU students feel personally assaulted when they enter the classroom.
Can opponents of the mural at least be honest? Can they admit that the mural also features an image of racial harmony? Note to Foust: an argument based on lies is not convincing. You discredit yourself when you lie.
Furthermore, the mural also prominently features Hoosier journalists, who played a huge role in driving the Ku Klux Klan from power in Indiana. Is it so difficult to put forth a tiny bit of effort into research to discover this fact?
We have a bunch of crybaby "students" at Indiana University who are offended by a painting in a lecture hall. Some are actually whining that the painting inhibits their ability to do well academically. Yet they are not willing to look at the big picture (bad pun intended) and see an image of racial reconciliation. Those who have seen it refuse to acknowledge it is there in their public whining bout the mural, instead choosing to lie about the painting in the media.
The crybabies are also not willing to be "students" and research the history of the mural, the artist, and the parts of Indiana history that the mural represents. Instead, the crybabies want to cover up or remove a mural because one image on the mural is "offensive". If these crybabies cannot handle looking at a painting in a lecture hall, they should drop out of IU, because they clearly aren't mature enough to attend a major university.
I repeat what I said in my column: "I don't care if your feelings are hurt!" When your feeeeeeeeeeeeeeelings have no basis in truth, I care even less. We should not censor history because a bunch of crybabies cannot handle representations of things they find "offensive". The mural must stay.