Earlier this year, undergraduate student Mastaani Qureshi and graduate student Sarra Tekola were made infamous by a video of them harassing two male ASU students for studying in a building they claimed was a multicultural center what was off limits to them. In fact, the building was open to every ASU student.
While little to nothing was known about what sort of discipline the university handed down, it is clear from the video, described by some viewers as “extremely bizarre,” that the university found them both guilty of the harassment, and their punishment included both a warning and instructions to write a 3-page paper on how to better speak to white people about issues like race, oppression, etc.
— Libs of Tik Tok (@libsoftiktok) December 29, 2021
The women claimed the building was a multicultural center, However, at the time of the attack it was not designated as such.
.@ASU_CRU > .@ASUCollegeGOP pic.twitter.com/RlFzYF4gdN
— Libs of Tik Tok (@libsoftiktok) September 26, 2021
https://twitter.com/libsoftiktok/status/1441534569853841409
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It appears from the video that both students have learned nothing from the incident and intend to be more militant instead of less. The new video begins with Tekola stating that “ASU’s investigation found us guilty of interfering with university activities.” The two women then say together, “Dear white people, aka ASU, you openly discriminated against us on November 16, when you handed down your decision from your racially biased investigation. We are being persecuted for defending our multicultural center from racism and sexism. You gave us two punishments, the first one was a warning and the second one was to write a three-page paper on how next time when we talk to white people about race and society, we will be civil. This video is the fulfillment of our education intervention. We are going to give ASU an educational intervention on why telling students of color at ASU to be more civil in the face of white supremacy and neo-Nazism on this campus is actually violent. ASI is a violent place.”
There has never been any evidence suggesting either victim was a white supremacist or a neo-Nazi. In fact, other than being white men, their victims’ only other offense appeared to be a Police Matter sticker on a laptop and a soda cup from Chik-Fil-A. A statement from one of the victims shortly after the incident revealed him to be a generally decent person who opposes racism and social injustice. In other words, if Qureshi and Tekola had just had a regular conversation with him, they would have likely made a friend. Instead, they prejudged him based on his gender and race and ended up in well-deserved hot water.
Of course ASU being ASU, their dangerously aggressive tactics has earned them support from a dozen or so ASU professors who wanted the University to ignore their attack.
Campus Reform obtained an email from Leah Sarat, an ASU professor, asking colleagues to sign a letter against the school’s decision to pursue charges against the female attackers, claiming that the accusations against them embodied “the systematic racism that needs to be overcome in our pursuit of the fair treatment of inclusion of students.”
Observers note that the accusations were the result of video footage of their attack on fellow students because of their victims’ race and gender, and that defending racist and/or sexist violent conduct in the name of fighting racism and sexism was both illogical and would only serve to make on campus divisions worse.
Based on the University’s decision, it appears the administration agrees with virtually everyone who saw the videos, instead of Professor Sarat and her small group.