The University of Wisconsin removed the ‘racist’ Chamberlin rock because the administrators are cowards and the people who see it as racist are bonkers.
The University of Wisconsin removed a large boulder from its Madison campus at the request of minority students who view the rock as a symbol of racism.
Chamberlin Rock, on the top of Observatory Hill, is named after Thomas Crowder Chamberlin, a geologist, and former university president. Students of color on campus say the rock represents a history of discrimination. It was referred to as a derogatory name in a Wisconsin State Journal story in the 1920s, at a time when the Ku Klux Klan was active on campus. The boulder was removed Friday morning.
How is the rock racist exactly?
In recent years, someone found a nearly century-old Wisconsin State Journal article that referred to the large boulder found on the UW-Madison campus as a “n—–head rock.” That is what led to the removal of the glacial erratic from Observatory Hill on Aug. 6, 2021.
That’s a bit of a stretch, don’t you think? These people are nuts.
And they are proud of this:
Juliana Bennett, a UW-Madison senior who serves as the campus representative on the Madison City Council, said removing the rock signaled a small step toward a more inclusive campus.
“This moment is about the students, past and present, that relentlessly advocated for the removal of this racist monument,” she said. “Now is a moment for all of us BIPOC students to breathe a sigh of relief, to be proud of our endurance, and to begin healing.”
Seriously? This is just stupid.
“Removing the rock as a monument in a prominent location prevents further harm to our community while preserving the rock’s educational research value for our current and future students,” said Gary Brown, the university’s director of campus planning and landscape architecture.
The rock is historical, really historical:
The boulder was carried by glaciers from as far north as Canada and dumped on Observatory Hill along with billions of tons of other debris when ice receded from the state about 12,000 years ago.
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