Participants unite over experiences

Though students are planning to observe National Day of Silence Wednesday, it was anything but quiet Monday night in Willkie Auditorium. \nIU students, faculty and community members convened for the Unite against Silence forum, a preliminary event for the Day of Silence. Participants met to discuss common effects of silencing and to develop methods of action to combat silence and discrimination. \n"A small bit of oppression is a lot of oppression," said Jonathan Rossing, diversity education specialist with the CUE program.\nRossing said the Day of Silence began in 1996 as a protest of silencing gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender voices at the University of Virginia. At IU, Wednesday's purpose is not only to acknowledge oppression of those in the GLBT community but to show other groups are silenced too, Rossing said.\nParticipants broke into small groups to intimately discuss their experiences with oppression, to hear the experiences of others and to share their ideas for fixing a long-lasting problem. \n"When we talk about oppression, it's a triple-edged sword," said graduate student Tahirah Akbar-Williams. "Education is the key. Reaching out to people is key."\nAkbar-Williams likened education to the domino effect, where one person can educate another about kinds of oppression, who can, in turn enlighten another. She said her initial response to oppression was to "educate as many people as I can."\n"Only if voices are heard do we reach that level of education," Rossing said.\nGraduate student Muzi Hadebe shared his experience with apartheid in South Africa. He said the oppression in that country was institutionalized by the state. Black women experienced double the injustice, due to silencing by the state, as well as their husbands.\nFellow South African and IU grad student Madeleine Gonin also shared her experience with oppression, although her position was different than Hadebe's. Gonin is from the Afrikaans community, people who she said were commonly viewed as the oppressors. Churches, schools and the media supported oppression and perpetuated the belief that anyone who isn't white is evil. Gonin said when she came to the United States, people asked if she was a racist because of her Afrikaans background. \nAs for the common lack of connection between different oppression of different groups, senior Carolyn Randolph said people like to set up boundaries against one another and think of ways to not like someone.\n"We operate on minimums, which keep us in competition," she said. \nRandolph's experience with oppression "started my consciousness about being African-American." She said it opened her mind to re-evaluating who she was after coming "face-to-face with humiliation."\nWhen the groups reconvened to share their discussions with everyone, they were asked to share their feelings from the encounters they had with oppression. Participants expressed they felt alone, sad, fearful and shocked, along with feeling motivated to make a change. \n"Feelings of isolation are similar," Rossing said. \nGroups also discussed ideas for ensuring no more voices are silenced. Randolph said she believes it starts at the personal level, where lots of things are internalized. She said people have "myths about others," which can be broken down by people understanding their own bias.\n"Validation makes words stronger," Akbar-Williams said. "If we stand up and say 'that was wrong,' we can do a lot more."\nParticipants also had thoughts on oppression at IU. Akbar-Williams said there are covert approaches to dealing with issues on campus. \n"People here are not used to facing issues," she said. "There's a very closeted approach to dealing with any kind of 'ism.'"\nAs for completely eradicating oppression, Hadebe believes people are making progress.\n"It will take ages for us to come together," he said. "On the other hand, we're getting there."\n-- Contact staff writer Laura Kruty at lkruty@indiana.edu.