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from the anything-you-say-will-be-used-against-you dept.
The Facebook messaging group was at one point titled "Harvard memes for horny bourgeois teens."
It began when about 100 members of Harvard College's incoming freshman class contacted each other through the university's official Class of 2021 Facebook group. They created a messaging group where students could share memes about popular culture — a growing trend on the Internet among students at elite colleges.
But then, the exchanges took a dark turn, according to an article published in the Harvard Crimson on Sunday. Some of the group's members decided to form an offshoot group in which students could share obscene, "R-rated" memes, a student told the Crimson. The founders of the messaging group demanded that students post provocative memes in the main group chat to gain admittance to the smaller group.
The students in the spinoff group exchanged memes and images "mocking sexual assault, the Holocaust and the deaths of children," sometimes directing jokes at specific ethnic or racial groups, the Crimson reported. One message "called the hypothetical hanging of a Mexican child 'piñata time'" while other messages quipped that "abusing children was sexually arousing," according to images of the chat described by the Crimson.
Then, university officials caught on. And in mid-April, after administrators discovered the offensive, racially charged meme exchanges, at least 10 incoming students who participated in the chat received letters informing them that their offers of admission had been revoked.
-- submitted from IRC
(Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Wednesday June 07 2017, @06:42PM (3 children)
I can certainly agree that speech shouldn't be used to brand someone a terrible person or be cause for expulsion from a uni. If someone randomly posts something offensive on some random board to let off some steam, I personally can understand that (it's an anger release).
But, the thing is you now have a concentration of people feeding off each others anger which begins to foster and normalize those feelings. Perhaps a few posts in bad taste are fine and most of the people will downvote/complain/report/etc. But create an environment where that kind of behaviour flourishes and before you know it, it's now normal. That joke about Obama living in the *white* house and planting watermelon gardens goes from a groaner you share over beer with a few friends to let off some steam is now your daily routine. It degrades into a swamp of hate and anger.
I have a pretty diverse group of friends, most aren't white or are mixed. But we can all have a good laugh at a really offensive joke. And of course, it's every once in awhile. That's fine. Every day and you have a problem.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Wednesday June 07 2017, @07:01PM (2 children)
That joke about Obama living in the *white* house and planting watermelon gardens goes from a groaner you share over beer with a few friends to let off some steam is now your daily routine. It degrades into a swamp of hate and anger.
While I agree about this, I have to make a tangential comment about this bit of racism: WTF is the deal with the racist stereotype about watermelon? I know, I know, black slaves brought watermelons from Africa and they planted them in the Southern plantations and enjoyed them since they came over with them. But what kind of moron doesn't like watermelon? Seriously. It would be like some stupid racist stereotype about Latin Americans (or more precisely, ones from Central America) liking chocolate (because cacao plants originate from Central America). Everyone likes chocolate! Both chocolate and watermelon were discovered outside of Europe, brought to Europe, and then became very popular foods there, though watermelon came long, long before chocolate. And watermelon became very popular every place it was brought; it reached China in the 10th century and now China is the world's largest producer of it. I guess the racists' fixation on watermelon is just another sign of how stupid they are.
(Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Wednesday June 07 2017, @08:58PM
Pretty much. It's one of the best fruits so why not love it?
There is a little background info here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watermelon_stereotype#History [wikipedia.org]
What stands out is this line:
If true, then what better way to stymie their progress than to destroy their symbol?
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Saturday June 10 2017, @02:49AM
I dunno about all of that - but most jokes are rather stupid. Think about it. Even the very best joke you've ever heard, starts to sound stupid on the fourth or twentieth telling.
Also, jokes aren't required to make sense, to be funny. No logic required, no facts required, nothing. The very stupidest of observations can be funny, for a moment, in the proper context.
Having read the post above about the history of watermelons, I can imagine good white slaveowners refusing to sample watermelons. "The darkies grow those things in their gardens, I'm not touching them!" Stupid shit is stupid, of course, but some stupid shit survives for generations.
A comparison might be made to various superstitions. How many generations of people avoided crossing paths with a black cat, etc?