Inside job.
Three effigies of African-Americans hanging from a noose were found on the UC Berkeley campus Saturday morning ahead of a noontime “#blacklivesmatter” protest in Sproul Plaza, a UC Berkeley spokeswoman confirmed.
Amy Hamaoui, interim executive director of UC Berkeley’s communications and public affairs, confirmed the effigies and also said that university officials are looking to see if there are more effigies.
The cardboard cutouts had the names of historical lynching victims and the date. It’s unclear if the effigies were placed by people supporting the protests as a political statement or from a group opposing the protests.[…]
Over the past week, the campus has been a starting point for demonstrators protesting grand jury decisions not to indict two officers who killed unarmed black men in New York and Ferguson, Missouri. A “#blacklivesmatter” rally was scheduled at noon Saturday in Sproul Plaza, and will continue as scheduled, Abioye said.
Update: Surprise!
Sunday, Dec. 14, 5 p.m. An anonymous artists’ collective has taken responsibility for the effigies strung up in nooses at UC Berkeley on Saturday.
The statement from the collective:
“We are a collective of queer and POC artists responsible for the images of historical lynchings posted to several locations in Berkeley and Oakland,” reads a notice the group distributed. “These images connect past events to present ones – referencing endemic faultlines of hatred and persecution that are and should be deeply unsettling to the American consciousness. We choose to remain anonymous because this is not about us as artists, but about the growing movement to address these pervasive wrongs.”
“For those who think these images are no longer relevant to the social framework in which black Americans exist everyday – we respectfully disagree. Garner, Brown, and others are victims of systemic racism. For those who think these images depict crimes and attitudes too distasteful to be seen .. we respectfully disagree. Our society must never forget. For those under the mistaken assumption that the images themselves were intended as an act of racism – we vehemently disagree and intended only the confrontation of historical context.”