Alecia Smith
Guest Writer



I am a Black doctoral student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, home of Silent Sam. When Silent Sam, a Confederate statue erected on UNC’s campus more than 100 years ago, was pulled from its pedestal by student protesters on the night before classes began this fall, I was proud.

I have been a UNC student since I began undergraduate study in 2011, and in these years, I have walked past the statue more times than I can recall. The statue is a reminder of the White supremacist history of this campus. But beyond that, its permitted survival and prominent display despite decades of protest and scholarship have served as a constant reminder of the tremendous extent to which university administration values certain interests (and donors) more than it values students, faculty and staff of color.

So when finally, finally, this statue found its face on the ground, I allowed myself to feel joy for a few minutes. Then I logged onto Facebook. And against my better judgment, I read strangers’ comments on the issue. For every person proud and elated over the statue’s fall, there was another equally furious. Some veiled their frustrations behind an alleged simple affinity for law and order, but others were upset for reasons that were clearly far more personal. The passion of these people — few of whom live in town and far fewer of whom have ever attended the university — seemed like such lunacy to me. I read these comments and watched footage of pro-Sam groups as they arrived on campus, and I wondered, in unsophisticated terms, why are you like this?

I wanted to know, so I asked. If I learned nothing else from the election of Donald Trump, I learned that there exists a mass of people in this country who very passionately adhere to and behave according to very harmful beliefs rooted in very irrational fears. And as much as I’d like to write these people off as hopelessly ignorant, I — as a researcher, a Black woman and a human who wants to help create a better and safer country for all people – have to try to understand where these people are coming from. So I asked. But as a Black woman, I couldn’t expect honest answers from White advocates for Silent Sam. So I pretended to be a White woman.

I created a Facebook profile appearing as a conservative White female student. Then I scrolled the comments of local news articles on Silent Sam, seeking comments from people angry over the fall of the statue. I ignored comments strictly discussing the legality of the issue, factual or otherwise. I looked for comments from people demanding the return of the statue to UNC’s campus because of what it represented. Then I sent each of those people a message.

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/silent-sam-black-woman-pretends-to-be-white_us_5bbb7019e4b01470d05394e3