Tuesday, February 04, 2014



University of Minnesota Proposes Banning Mention of Race in Campus Crime Alerts

One guess why

The University of Minnesota is considering a proposal that would ban descriptions of a suspect's race or ethnicity in campus crime alerts.

From Campus Reform:

In a December 6, 2013 letter to UM President Eric Kaler and the Vice President of University Services Pamela Wheelock, several black student, faculty, and staff groups wrote that they "unanimously agree that campus safety should be of the UMPD's utmost importance; however, efforts to reduce crime should never be at the expense of our Black men, or any specific group of people likely to be targeted."

The letter included a list of 12 recommendations to give to UMPD Chief Gregory Hestness, such as requiring the school’s officers to attend diversity training and linking back to the school’s no-tolerance policy on racial profiling with each crime alert.

There is some sanity on campus, however. Wheelock has stated that she does not agree with the proposal to remove racial descriptions from crime alerts.

 “I firmly believe that a well-informed community is an asset to public safety…I believe that sharing more information in our Crime Alerts, not less, is most beneficial in terms of public safety, especially when that information is available.

This proposal is ridiculous. Student safety is more important than students getting their feelings hurt. The administrators behind the letter have mixed up "racial profiling"--thinking someone committed a crime because of their skin tone--with another process generally accepted as "being able to identify a suspect." A crime alert is useless without a full description of a subject. I have a hard time believing that students on campus are overly concerned with the race of a person committing a crime on campus when they are far likely more concerned with avoiding being a victim of a crime.

SOURCE



6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Bulletin: Suspect last seen heading West. Description follows. Lookie like man. Anyone seeing a subject matching this description is warned not to engage. Contact the appropriate authorities. Your safety is our top concern.

Dean said...

No, no, no. That is sexist. You specified gender. You also gave the direction of travel. That would implicate anyone going West. The bulletin should be, "Crime committed. Suspect seen. Be wary of it."

stinky said...


No, no, no! Suspect "seen" implies that visually challenged are unable to contribute to the report, you optical-sensitive bigots, you!

"Crime my or may not have occurred in an indeterminate location. See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil. That is all.


Anonymous said...

You forget that the stigment of crimiality also must not dismay anyone for fear of upsetting and malign them. It should read,
"Incident occured...."
However if a gun was used, a full discription of colour, size, and age will be required since the gun perpatrated the crime.

Anonymous said...

Soon it will be an offence to report a crime not committed by a white male. It is still open season on them.

Anonymous said...

There will always be coded language to give some indication of the ethnic or social background of the alleged criminals.