By Ashley Obrey
Staff Writer
Students known only by their written words made their voices heard Thursday night in a radio show debate about the controversial Rock and Freedom Wall issues permeating campus the last couple of weeks.
Pepperdine radio station 101.5 KWVS aired a half-hour informal discussion on “The Weekly Show” to touch on the recent controversy regarding the Black Student Union’s use of the Rock to send messages to the Pepperdine community.
Junior Bryceson Tenold, the show’s host (co-host Sean O’Neil was absent) mediated the opinionated participants, which included freshman Savannah Overton, and sophomores Jonathan Stevens, James Kang and Gordon Sumioka.
KWVS station manager and junior Luke Simpson got the idea for the project after reading the posted responses on the Freedom Wall soon after BSU painted the Rock for the first time since Black History Month began.
The show’s staff chose participants based on their involvement with the issue. Stevens and Kang, who maintained the written “argument” on the Freedom Wall over this issue, were obvious selections, as was Overton, the representative from the Black Student Union, to allow for a fair debate. Sumioka, who also posted his opinion on the Freedom Wall as a “response to their responses,” accepted an invitation to take the neutral position in the on-air discussion.
After Tenold’s quick introduction he summarized the issue as it has spanned the past couple of weeks: the BSU Rock which displayed the words, “In the beginning, the chains were laid. Slavery 1619-2004,” among silver chains as well as the arguments posted on Pepperdine’s First Amendment-abiding Freedom Wall.
The discussion immediately opened to Overton, who began by reiterating BSU’s purpose in painting the Rock with that specific message.
“We wanted to put the truth out there, get people’s responses,” Overton said. “We wanted what’s happening here today, a discussion of real issues taking place across the world, in the U.S. and on Pepperdine’s campus.”
Overton went on to explain that this is not just an issue of black and white but instead is “a human rights issue, an understanding of institutional racism.” She maintained that slavery still is very real and is still a very uncomfortable issue for many, citing a January issue of Forbes magazine as she gave statistics which said that there are approximately 27 million slaves in the world and that the CIA estimates that 900,000 slaves are sold across international borders each year with approximately 20,000 of those workers sold into the United States.
Stevens, who was among the first to post an opinion on the Freedom Wall in response to the Rock, made the general point that BSU’s Rock caused separation, which is not a good thing. He also used his airtime by saying that BSU didn’t clarify their stance enough on the Rock
“If it’s about civil rights, OK, but if you are talking about international slave trade, then I don’t know where 1619 came from,” he said. “Slavery has been around since the beginning of time.”
Stevens’ primary problem with BSU’s argument was that the key word used was slavery, which, to him, connotes the idea of being in chains, under the direct rule of somebody else. He said he does not agree that such a type of slavery exists.
“I don’t think it’s valid to say that there’s some white man sitting at the top of some corporation profiting, laughing at the fact that he’s got minorities working for him down below,” he said. “I think the fact of the matter is that people in third world countries profit from their own people being enslaved to themselves.”
A supporter of BSU’s actions as a medium by which to bring out issues buried on campus, Kang clarified the semantics of the issue.
“Slavery is institutional racism,” he said, explaining and giving statistics of how such racism manifests itself in many various ways including the fact that Black youths in California are eight times more likely to be incarcerated than white youths charged with the same crime.
Kang’s main argument was the Rock did not cause a controversy but that such a controversy was always there.
“Nobody talked about (these types of issues),” Kang said. “It takes something like this (BSU’s Rock and responses on the Freedom Wall) to talk about it.”
Sumioka disagreed. He argued that Stevens and Kang were debating the wrong issues and that BSU’s Rock does not promote unity but instead brings out differences, which causes problems.
“You’ve made a lot of good points, but are you making any progress?” Sumioka asked.
He went on to say that, though all he sees is division, the real solution is to work toward racial unity, suggesting that individual ethnic organizations combine to create a multicultural group that will reach everyone’s goal of racial equality.
“How can we look past these things and say that we’ve made mistakes, everyone makes mistakes, and stop looking at the color so much as the person,” Sumioka said. “Racism is all how we look at people. We need to stop judging people and start learning about them.”
A mixture of rebuttals, agreements and summaries brought the 30-minute show to a quick end, a disappointment to Simpson and his on-air guests who definitely had more to say.
Despite the time factor, Stevens said he was grateful for the opportunity to share his opinion on the radio.
“What went well,” he said positively of the debate, “was the fact that no parties, to my knowledge, lost their cool on the air or otherwise, and we all had respect for one another’s opinion.”
Simpson agreed and said he was hopeful the group made some progress in the discussion of such a “hot topic issue.”
“Our intent was not to fuel a racial fire or anger more people, but to address something that students were obviously passionate about,” Simpson said. “It would be tremendous if further understanding of the different sides derived from this. It would also be great if we created more of an interest in the Pepperdine radio station.”
Sophomore Matthew Davis said after tuning in and observing what he called “the different and well-represented arguments” each guest presented that he was interested in the station.
“If there were more debates of discussions like that, I’d be more inclined to listen to the radio station,” Davis said.
Sumioka said he hopes that Pepperdine can hold more events like this that can involve the whole school. He saw the radio show as a good first step, though it wasn’t a real solution to the problem on campus.
It is an issue that still lurks at Pepperdine, as the debate continued even in a post-show interview with Stevens, who still questions the true intentions of the BSU.
“BSU is gonna keep representing,” Overton said. “We’ll bring the truth whether it hurts you or not.”
Submitted February 26, 2004
