‘White supremacist’ stickers spark campus concerns

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This article was published 06/12/2017 (2855 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A series of stickers many students describe as “racist’ and “white supremacist” have been discovered at Brandon University.

Purchased through a company called “European Brotherhood” and featuring statements like “time to fight” and “join the resistance,” the stickers have some students concerned for their safety.

“I am a person of colour. I am an immigrant. I don’t feel safe walking around campus knowing there are people around who are against my identity. These are things about me I didn’t choose,” said Lisa Mizan, 20.

The third-year history major said the stickers have been found on five or six occasions. She personally discovered them plastered over a bus stop outside the school, but other students have found them at crosswalks and on campus.

The company that makes the stickers has been operating since 2014, selling merchandise stamped with “pro-Europe” branding. Slogans include “supremacy” and “identity, tradition, revolution.”

The company’s logo appears to be a stylized version of the “sun cross,” which is described by the Anti-Defamation League as “one of the most important and commonly used white supremacist symbols.”

Mizan said she and other students have spoken to the university’s human rights and diversity adviser to ask the school to take a public stance against the stickers. So far, she feels their concerns haven’t been addressed.

“I think the worry students have is for our safety. We’re seeing more and more of this and the university refuses to take a stance. This should not be tolerated,” she said.

In a statement provided to the Free Press, a BU spokesman said the school was “committed to being a campus and a community that is welcoming and supportive of all.”

According to Helmut-Harry Loewen, a retired University of Winnipeg professor with a specialization in neo-fascism, the usual university response to incidents like this don’t cut it.

“What we see with posters like these is simply the thin edge of the wedge. The usual boilerplate responses from universities about how they support diversity and an inclusive campus aren’t enough. We need academics to up their game,” Loewen said.

He went on to say the stickers at BU — as well as similar posters found at Winnipeg universities — stem from efforts by white supremacists to recruit.

White supremacist propaganda increasingly relies on “coded language” and “veiled symbols,” he said, before adding there’s “no way” the person distributing the stickers at BU is unaware of their symbolism and meaning.

“The far-right is disaffected by the identity politics on university campuses common among academics and student union politics. The argument could be made they’ve taken the language of diversity and transformed it to push a white supremacist agenda,” he said. “It is the mirror image — in a perverted way, in a distorted way — of the identity politics dominant in left-liberal circles in Canada. I think we need to follow much more closely attempts by these people to make inroads on university campuses.”

Mizan said a university official she’s spoken to about the issue told her it was a matter of “free speech.” But for the 20-year-old, “free speech ends where hate speech begins.”

“How can I feel safe as a person of colour who walks this campus, knowing there are people here who don’t appreciate me because of the colour of my skin or where my parents are from?” she said. “They say BU is a safe space, but it feels like we’ve been told our voices aren’t important and our safety isn’t important. We need to take an official stance and say white supremacy isn’t allowed on our campus.”

The company that produces the stickers found at BU did not respond to a request for comment by the time of publication.

ryan.thorpe@freepress.mb.ca