Weeks after a video of The Marching 110’s version of “Party Rock Anthem” went viral, Ohio University students are taking over the Web again — this time with Halloween-themed posters condemning racism.
The posters read: “We’re a culture, not a costume. This is not who I am, and this is not okay.”
Each one displays a student holding up a picture of a stereotypical Halloween costume based on his or her race — including a terrorist, a geisha and a sombrero-clad Hispanic man on a donkey.
Sarah Williams, a senior studying political science and president of Students Teaching About Racism in Society, first displayed the posters on her Tumblr blog last week.
“I always post little things on Tumblr about my life,” she said. “I had less than 60 followers, and now the posters have almost 50,000 notes.”
STARS has been at OU for 25 years. The organization seeks to spark discussion about racism and discrimination among students by creating campaigns every quarter.
The poster campaign began as one of STARS’ quarterly events, Williams said. The organization did not expect it to attract so much attention.
“We wanted just a cheap event, and we just did it because Halloween is a big part of Fall Quarter,” she said.
Junior Taylor See, the event coordinator for STARS, designed the posters last week. After Williams put them on her blog, the emails came flooding in. STARS members received more than 100 emails from colleges across the country, Williams said.
Among the slew of both negative and positive feedback, one of the emails stood out to Williams with a subject line requesting a phone interview with CNN.
“I’m excited; I’m beyond excited,” she said. “It’s totally overwhelming.”
Using funds from the Division of Student Affairs, STARS printed 600 posters. The organization plans to put two or three in every residence hall and post them around campus.
“I’m excited that this is creating a discussion,” Williams said. “The point is people are talking; they are challenging themselves and what they believe in. Our purpose was to facilitate a discussion and it succeeded, and on a national level.”
tl674710@ohiou.edu
