Update to this story.
Via Campus Reform:
Hofstra University students are fighting back against a coalition of activist groups agitating for the school to remove a statue of Thomas Jefferson from campus.
JaLoni Owens, a Hofstra student and Black Lives Matter activist, released a petition calling for the statue’s removal on March 17, proclaiming that Jefferson has been embraced as an “icon” by “white supremacist and neo-nazi organizations,” like the Ku Klux Klan.[…]
On March 27, Hofstra student Richard Caldwell released a counter-petition titled, “KEEP The Jefferson Statue at Hofstra University,” voicing support for keeping the statue on campus.
“The Thomas Jefferson statue that stands in front of the Hofstra student center has recently become a major point of controversy,” the petition states. “A petition was started and a protest planned to bring it down. However, with all due respect, this would be a mistake.”
“[F]or thousands of years, tyranny rained supreme as the most widely used form of government. Thomas Jefferson wrote the document that changed all that,” it adds. “The Declaration of Independence was written by Thomas Jefferson and put forth the idea that freedom and Democracy should ring loudest.”
The petition fully acknowledges Jefferson’s participation in slavery, but also recognizes his legislative efforts to “try and stymie slavery, even ending the Transatlantic slave trade.”
“We live in a world dominated by freedom and Democracy because Thomas Jefferson wrote the document that started it all,” the petition declares. “To take down this statue of him would be a sad removal of a figure influential in the annals of history.”
As of press time, the petition had more than 250 signatures, and student organizers have planned a counter-protest on December 30, at the same time and place of the original protest.
“I initially assumed it was a joke but when I found out it was real it was pretty annoying because it seems nothing is sacred to these people,” Hofstra College Republicans President Chris Kostulias told Campus Reform. “Many people in my club and outside it plan on counter protesting…the removal protest at around 12 this Friday.”