Threats scrawled across campus

It’s been a busy few months for Dalhousie. December’s now-infamous Dentistry scandal was followed up by last week’s news of sexual harassment that occurred at Howe Hall earlier this year, and now by a series of violent messages written around campus.

Yesterday, Jennifer Nowoselski, Dalhousie Student Union (DSU) Vice President (Internal), discovered a message scrawled on a property near the Student Union Building reading “Die DSU Bitches.” Next to this, the messages “Die DSU, Senate and BOG” and “Go Dan and Cody” were written.

A message written in the same style was also recently discovered outside of Risley Hall, stating “Die DSU, Senate and BOG. Go on Dan and Cody.” The latter half of the message likely refers to DSU president-elect Dan Nicholson and Cody Couture, a nominee for the Vice-President (Academic and External) position in last week’s DSU elections.

on the side of risley on the last tuesday pic.twitter.com/Q4B1gTZNv5

— Harry, Dirty (@haliqueer) March 31, 2015

“This was something very public, a very easy thing for us to snap an iPhone picture of and put on Facebook, but we didn’t expect this kind of reaction, honestly, because we get similar things all the time,” says Jacqueline Skiptunis, DSU Vice-President (Academic and External).

Hateful graffiti across campus has reached such an extent that Dal Libraries have issued a special request to “Help us make Dalhousie Libraries graffiti-free“.

“It’s important to note that this isn’t the first bit of hateful graffiti that’s popped up recently, there was also some in the Killam. It was written ‘#whitepower’, and said something along the lines of ‘no n*****s allowed’, so it’s not a one-off incident,” says Skiptunis.

Last year, Dal Libraries embarked on a clean-up campaign in the Killam Library after numerous appearances of racist and sexist graffiti were documented on desks and walls.

While Dal Libraries has made a specific request to rid their spaces of hateful graffiti, university administration has not commented on the recent instances of hateful messages across campus.

“I’ve never got a death threat before, that’s for sure, but any other assault or harm, that’s pretty typical. So it’s just important to recognize that this is just one example that was very public and very obviously hateful and apparent for anyone, but this happens all the time,” says Skiptunis.

Nicholson and Couture have taken to social media to respond to the graffiti.

@haliqueer @Emibumblebee I just erased this & the one on risley in alley between Risley and SUB. If you see any others, pls let me know

— Cody Couture (@Cody_AC) March 31, 2015

@haliqueer @Emibumblebee I’ll go out and erase them as soon as I have time. No idea who did it, but 100% unacceptable & not enviro I want — Cody Couture (@Cody_AC) March 31, 2015

@haliqueer @Emibumblebee I want all people to feel they can express their ideas without feeling threatened. Entire campus shuld b safe space — Cody Couture (@Cody_AC) March 31, 2015