A late-night scuffle in a downhill dorm has led to allegations of racism and an orchestrated response on the part of dozens of members of culture houses and student groups on campus.
Members of the Korean Students Association (KSA) alleged that a drunken freshman started a fight with and shouted racial slurs at members of the KSA around 2 a.m. Thursday morning as the group practiced in Lewis Hall's main lounge for an upcoming culture show. The freshman said that the KSA members started the fight.
The administration has opened a judicial investigation into the incident. The Daily is withholding the freshman's name because the administration has not taken any action against him.
Over 50 students gathered at the Asian American Center Thursday afternoon to discuss a response to the incident. Meanwhile, the freshman and a friend of his who helped break up the fight said the freshman had been outnumbered by a group of KSA members who showed aggression toward him, punching and choking him.
Beginning early Friday morning, members of the KSA and students involved with different culture houses and student groups on campus helped to distribute an e-mail message from KSA members detailing the incident and alleging bias.
KSA members at the scene, some of whom were involved in the fight, told the Daily that the freshman refused to leave the 13 members of the group alone as five of them rehearsed a dance for Saturday's KSA Culture Show. A short scuffle ensued between the freshman and the dancers. KSA members said all five dancers were involved; the freshman said that those involved in the fight numbered six or seven.
Both the freshman and a KSA member sustained injuries.
The KSA members said the freshman started the fight, but the freshman said in a statement given to the Daily by two of his friends that one of the dancers first grabbed him. He said he shouted obscenities after the fight but did not mention uttering any racial slurs.
An emotional meeting at the Asian American Center convened Thursday afternoon to discuss the incident and figure out ways to move forward. Dozens of people packed into an overflowing room at the center, exchanging ideas about ways to inform the larger Tufts community about bias incidents that many said occur unsettlingly too often.
The incident occurred in the early-morning hours on Thursday when the freshman approached the KSA members and asked them to teach him the dance five of them were rehearsing. The students said the freshman was visibly drunk and distracting them; the group was running late and told him no.
The freshman proceeded to remain in the back of the room for a few minutes, watching them practice their dance. KSA Vice President Jennifer Kim, a sophomore who was at the scene, said that he mockingly imitated the dancers.
Tensions quickly rose. KSA members said that ongoing verbal exchanges between the freshman and those practicing came to a head after a couple minutes. The threats, KSA members said, bothered them.
"I heard him say, 'Oh, this dance is the gayest s--t ever,'" said freshman Doug Kim, one of the students -- all of whom were male -- rehearsing the dance.
One of the dancers approached the freshman and asked him to leave. At that point, according to the e-mail sent by members of the KSA, the freshman said, "F--k you. F--k you, I could take all of you. I'll kill you all." According to the e-mail, "He then threatened to get his fraternity brothers to help him retaliate."
The freshman said in his statement that the dancer who approached him grabbed him first; KSA members at the scene say the freshman pushed the dancer first.
Then, violence broke out.
The dancers and the freshman immediately started fighting. The freshman said that he tried to move toward the exit, but that a member of the group punched him in the face. KSA members attempted to pin the freshman to the floor, they said, putting him in a headlock.
The fight ended quickly when the freshman indicated to them that he was having trouble breathing.
"At a loss for air, I repeatedly pleaded to them, informing them that I was having trouble breathing," he said in the statement. "I was nearing asphyxiation and scared for my life."
The dancers immediately let go, KSA members said in the e-mail.
But at this point, the KSA members said, as the freshman's friend brought him away from the scene, the freshman began using racial slurs.
"'Go back to China. You guys are a bunch of chinks; you don't even belong here,'" Kim said the freshman shouted at the group. KSA Co-President Tom Moon, a senior who was in the lounge at the time, said that the freshman said, "'[F--king] chinks, go back to your country; you don't belong here.'"
The group members also allege that the freshman spat at them a number of times.
In his statement, the freshman said he shouted obscenities in the heat of the moment.
"Severely physically hurt, highly emotionally charged, scared for my life, I yelled obscenities at the group," he said. He said that the group tried to "attack" him again, but his friend stepped in to prevent violence from breaking out; KSA members said that the freshman's girlfriend also witnessed the incident.
At least one KSA member's shirt was ripped in the fight, and one member's face was cut. The freshman said in his statement that he received "bodily injuries."
The freshman then left the scene, and the KSA members reported the incident to a residential assistant (RA), who interviewed a number of students involved and submitted a report. The KSA members did not call the police, and the Tufts University Police Department on Thursday said that it was not aware of the incident.
"A lot of the KSA members ... who were part of this ... did not know how to react," Kim said during the gathering at the Asian American Center. Many KSA members were crying and in shock, she said. "I read about this all the time, and it's never been so personal."
Soon after the incident, another RA reported the occurrence over WebCenter as a bias incident.
Associate Dean of Students Marisel Perez forwarded the information on to other administrators upon receiving the report and on Friday planned to begin interviewing students involved; she intends to continue speaking with students today. Dean of Student Affairs Bruce Reitman on Friday sent an e-mail to all undergraduates, informing them that his office was looking into the matter.
Yesterday, both the freshman and his friend declined to comment further. His friend on Thursday provided a statement to the Daily via the same two students who passed on the freshman's statement; the friend's statement corroborated much of the freshman's account.
The freshman's girlfriend, who was also present at the time of the fight, also declined to comment when reached on Friday night.
Perez said the actions that allegedly occurred on Thursday morning, if true, have no place at Tufts.
"Name calling, slurs -- it's totally uncalled for," she told the Daily yesterday. "Insulting somebody because of who they are, what they look like -- it's just not something that coincides with our values and the university's values."
During Thursday's meeting at the Asian American Center, students expressed disbelief, frustration and anger at the incident. Many heard the details about the fight for the first time during the meeting, but some said that bias incidents happen at Tufts way too often.
"I think that when one person's hurt, all of us are hurt," senior Jen Bailey said. Bailey said she and other black students are often the victims of racism inside and outside the classroom at Tufts. "We've been through these same struggles. And it disheartens me as a senior that issues that have been happening since my freshman year are still happening here."
Asian American Center Director Linell Yugawa echoed Bailey's thoughts.
"The issue itself has happened before, and that's what I think is so sad," Yugawa said at the gathering.
Since the meeting, KSA members have started a campaign to get the word out about what happened; a Facebook.com group created to raise awareness of the incident had over 1,700 members by yesterday evening.
While KSA members largely avoided the topic of the incident during the group's show on Saturday night, Kim discussed the events and performed a spoken word piece about what happened and about being Asian-American in the United States.
A number of students -- KSA members and others -- are thinking of planning a rally to take place in the next couple of weeks in reaction to the incident.
