Abilene Christian University Expels 2 Students for Wearing Blackface Mocking 'Strong Black Woman'
Abilene Christian University in Texas announced Monday that it has expelled two students for wearing blackface while mocking a "strong black woman."
The expulsions come after a video captioned, "this is why black lives matter exists," surfaced on social media showing a white female student at Abilene Christian University wearing black makeup on her face and declaring, "I'm a strong black woman." The student then put on a set of bright red over-sized lips as people giggled in the background.
As the video circulated online, students who viewed it were enraged and demanded action by the university's administration.
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ACU President Phil Schubert responded swiftly on Monday, saying in a public statement to students and faculty that harassment will not be tolerated on campus.
"This morning some disturbing content appeared on various social media channels showing a short video of a white ACU student in blackface. Harassment of any kind is not tolerated at our university, and action is being taken to minimize the spread of this senseless attempt to make fun of others," Schubert said in the statement.
"Our deputy anti-harassment coordinator and dean of students have met with those involved in the video, and they are no longer students at ACU. I cannot emphasize strongly enough that this kind of hurtful behavior has no place on our campus or on behalf of ACU. Whether on social media or in person, we must hold ourselves to high standards of accountability for what we publish or say," he added.
"This has offended me and I am deeply sorry for how it has offended others, and left an inaccurate representation of who we are and what we believe as a Christian university. We must and can do better as we work together to build an inclusive, diverse campus community in which each person is respected and loved."
This isn't the first time ACU has made headlines due to a racial incident.
In 2014 several students at the Christian school were outraged after a fake parking ticket with racially offensive language was left on a black student's car, according to KTXS.
J Sheppard, who found one version of the fake parking ticket on his car, said: "The offense says, 'black people don't drive nice cars' and that's really a very close minded and, to me, a racist thing to say."
It implies "you can't do anything nice. We can't have nice things. I don't know. It's just disheartening is what it is," said Sheppard.
Sheppard reported the incident to campus police who said racial discrimination on campus was not typical but several students disagreed.
"I'm a senior here at ACU. And over the last four years that I've been here, I've seen multiple incidents of racism or discrimination," T'Neise Ragland, president of the Black Students' Association said.
She explained that while the parking ticket was the first physical act of racism she encountered on campus, racism occurred in other ways more often, but did not elaborate.
"We take it in stride," Ragland said, "and we know that we chose to come to a school that's predominantly white, but we also thought we were coming to a Christian school."
