URI protests on Quadrangle to 'Stop the Hate'
Lance San Souci
Issue date: 11/19/09 Section: News
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According to Knoll, she became motivated to organize the protest after speaking to a friend about the messages of bigotry expressed throughout the campus.
In recent months, URI has been home to multiple hate crimes, ranging from graffiti on bathroom walls to verbal abuse. Targeting specific groups of people, Knoll said these crimes have become the subject of much negative attention from the media.
In response, Knoll decided it was time to take a stand against the bigotry spreading across the URI community.
"We are a community representing the world in saying that we will not tolerate what is going on," Knoll said.
Two weeks after her initial idea, Knoll, along with a few hundred URI students, united in the common goal of conveying the message of intolerance to hate crimes.
Creating thousands of fliers and posters that were distributed throughout the campus and establishing a Facebook group for the event, as well as receiving monetary aid from the Housing and Residential Life, Greek system, and Athletic Center, the event received much awareness in the days leading up to the protest.
Knoll believes that an e-mail, sent by URI President David M. Dooley to students and faculty, urging them to go is what affected the "unexpected" turnout rate the most.
Among the groups that attended the event included sports teams, members from the GLBT community, the URI Center for Nonviolence and Peace Studies and members from the Electronic Music Association.
Donning anti-hate T-shirts and carrying signs that read "equality," students spent 15 minutes of silence reflecting on the implications hate crimes often have on the URI community.
"Hate crimes bring in a whole unnecessary uneasiness between people; they put up a barrier between them and others," freshman Alaina Ferreira said. "If these barriers are broken, it would end the 'us' and 'them' mentality that usually takes place on campus. There will be no more going against each other."
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