Education

Mizzou Students Form A ‘No Media Safe Space’ To Block Reporters

Chuck Ross Investigative Reporter
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Students at the University of Missouri formed a “no media safe space” to prevent reporters from interviewing protesters on Monday after the school’s president announced his resignation in response to activist demands.

A group calling themselves Concerned Students 1950 had demanded that school president Tim Wolfe apologize, admit to white privilege, and resign because of his alleged failure to address a series of racially-tinged incidents at the school.

The school’s student body president wrote in a recent Facebook post that he was the target of racial epithets from fellow students. A graduate student named Jonathan Butler also embarked on a hunger strike after he says Wolfe failed to act after a swastika was found scrawled in feces on campus.

Butler’s strike prompted some members of the school’s mediocre football team to boycott future football games.

After Wolfe announced his resignation on Monday morning, students gathered on campus. But for reasons not yet known, reporters were blocked from entering the circle of protest. Missouri President Steps Down, Still Doesn’t Acknowledge His White Male Privilege

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch’s Benjamin Hochman captured some of the images from the rally. He also recorded a confrontation between protesters and at least one reporter.

Ellise Verheyen, a photographer for the school’s newspaper, the Columbia Missourian, recorded the students engaging in an anti-media chant.

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