{"id":17002,"date":"2023-04-01T12:37:57","date_gmt":"2023-04-01T19:37:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/?p=17002"},"modified":"2023-04-01T12:58:58","modified_gmt":"2023-04-01T19:58:58","slug":"racism-shakes-saratoga-schools","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/en\/racism-shakes-saratoga-schools\/","title":{"rendered":"Colored Dolls on Ropes: Racism Rocks Saratoga Schools"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Redwood Middle School, January 16, 2023 in Saratoga, California. Photo: Sree Sripathy for India Currents\/CatchLight Local.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

By Ritu Marwah. Indian Currents<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The noose, a symbol of racism and hatred, with deep roots in segregation, sends a deliberate message of exclusion.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Symbols of racism in the schoolyard<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

On November 15, 2022, the Saratoga-Campbell community was shocked to learn that colored dolls were discovered hanging on nooses around the neck in the schoolyards of three public schools: Redwood Middle, Prospect High, and Saratoga High.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhen we returned to school on Monday, we didn\u2019t see anything. We learned about the incident through a memo sent by the administration,\u201d Arshi Chawla, a member of Saratoga High\u2019s Anti-Racism Task Force, told India Currents. The incident occurred on a Friday night \u2014 November 11 \u2014 and schools informed students after the weekend.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Anti-Racism Task Force, Saratoga High School.
(Image courtesy of: Ritu Marwah)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

\u201cWe know where it happened. I saw a group of people gathered around a ladder leaning outside Ms. Kramer\u2019s classroom,\u201d said Raghav, a student at Redwood High School, describing the scene in which a dark-skinned doll was hanging, its head on a noose.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

racism is not a joke<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

At his school, Raghav said, students had cowered in their classrooms with awkward smiles and an air of indifference. They tried to play it off as a rude joke. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

"Just like when a student is rude to a teacher and you know it's not funny, but you still laugh at it like it's a joke," he said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t talk about it.\u201d Raghav seemed embarrassed when asked about the reaction of the only black student in his grade. \u201cWe\u2019re not going to ask him about it. It\u2019s too personal.\u201d He shrugged off the incident. \u201cI\u2019ve never experienced hate. This is SARATOGA! We have a mixed culture here.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At Redwood Middle, another student, Allison, said her parents were worried, wondering, "How far will they go?"<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The school administration was quick to react. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cA noose is a reprehensible symbol of hate and violence,\u201d Saratoga Union School District Superintendent Ken Geisick said in a statement released immediately on Nov. 16. Authorities have launched a hate crime investigation. The sheriff\u2019s office described the incidents as \u201cheinous acts\u201d and that they are taking these cases seriously.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A diverse school district<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the diverse South Bay community of Saratoga, where the median income is $200,000 and the median home price is $2 million, 43 percent of the population is foreign-born. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Residences located in Saratoga feed into two high schools: Saratoga High and Los Gatos High. Saratoga High is over 60 percent Asian and Los Gatos High is over 60 percent white. Redwood Middle feeds into Saratoga High. Los Gatos-Saratoga Joint Union High School District is ranked among the top three school districts in California by Niche.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Student enrollment in the Saratoga Unified School District (Image courtesy of Ritu Marwah)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Why parents remained silent<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

While staff, students and school authorities openly condemned the incident, Saratoga parents were unexpectedly silent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAt Redwood Middle School, a pre-planned parents\u2019 meeting \u2013 before the noose doll incident \u2013 suddenly saw parents not attending after the incident. The issue was not discussed,\u201d Chani Modi, president of PTA Redwood Middle School, told India Currents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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SRedwood Middle School PTA President Chani Modi at her home in Saratoga, California on December 21, 2022. Photo: Sree Sripathy for India Currents\/CatchLight Local.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMaybe they think there is little they can do about the incident,\u201d Modi surmised. Though several Asian parents had called Modi to discuss another issue \u2014 the resignation of music teachers \u2014 when it came to racism on campus, parents at the school were strangely reticent. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMy mother saw the school email about the incident. She asked me about it and then raised her eyebrows with a disappointed look,\u201d said Raunak, a seventh-grader at Redwood Middle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kaasha Minocha, a former news\/entertainment editor for Saratoga\u2019s school news magazine Falcon, explained that parental apathy may stem from a lack of understanding of the symbolism of a noose. Perhaps many immigrant parents cannot fully comprehend the pain associated with the \u201cn\u201d word, a homophobic slur or threat of lynching. In their newly adopted nation, they may be dissociated from the history of pain that generations of Americans have internalized.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIn most cases, students understand the symbolism of a noose better than our parents do because we have read about it and our curriculum exposes us to Black history, including slavery, Jim Crow laws and segregation in the 1950s and 1960s,\u201d said Minocha, who graduates in 2022.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

lack of understanding<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMy mom doesn\u2019t understand the issue. I mean she knows it\u2019s bad, but she doesn\u2019t understand the problem,\u201d said a high school student who speaks Mandarin at home. \u201cShe\u2019s not from here. She didn\u2019t grow up in the United States.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMy parents? Oh, my parents didn\u2019t understand the gravity of the whole incident. My parents grew up in India. They\u2019re not exposed to everything that we\u2019re exposed to in school in regards to black history,\u201d said Shreya Rallabandi, a member of Saratoga High\u2019s Anti-Racism Task Force. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Immigrant families on their way to achieving the American dream may perceive and interpret racist acts differently than their own children, who learn about racism and segregation in school. Among Indian families, racism is often a taboo topic. So for them, acknowledging a racist incident may mean admitting the shame that their first-generation children remain outsiders in their new homeland, despite their parents\u2019 economic success.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Who are the culprits?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The perpetrators were caught on the school\u2019s closed-circuit television, NBC reported. \u201cSurveillance photos show what the district is calling two persons of interest.\u201d Photographs of the suspects were shared by the school and in an article on Nextdoor, a community news app.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHanging a dark-skinned doll from a noose does not equate to \u2018nasty.\u2019 That equates to a hate crime,\u201d Rebecca Andreasen told her neighbors on Nextdoor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis is shocking and terrible,\u201d responded Carmen Tan Miller, another resident.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNo one has come forward to identify the suspects. I don\u2019t know why these schools were targeted or if it was an inappropriate prank, but it really shocked our community as any form of racism and hate has no place in our schools or in our community,\u201d said Tanya De la Cruz, the district\u2019s first public information officer (PIO), a position created this year by the school district to improve communication with the community.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Photos of possible suspects were taken around 9:15 p.m. Friday. Photos purportedly showing suspects in a hate crime incident on the Saratoga High School campus, Nov. 11, 2022. (Image courtesy: Ritu Marwah)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Racism spits on social media<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Students at Bay Area schools took action in response to the racist venom that exploded online in the wake of George Floyd's death and the BLM movement that followed.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Saratoga High School Anti-Racist Task Force (Image courtesy\/ Ritu Marwah). <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Four Saratoga High students formed the school's first anti-racism task force to raise awareness and address hate speech flooding social media.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At Los Gatos High, El Gato News reported on the appearance of the KKK \u201cLos Gatos chapter\u201d on Instagram promoting \u201cStop White Genocide!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAn account with the username @lghskoolkidsklub \u2012Los Gatos High School KKK\u2012 appeared on Instagram,\u201d El Gato News warned. The report identified actively circulating links to other schools, such as @whskoolkidsklub \u2012Wilcox High School KKK\u2012, @harkerkoolkidsklub \u2012Harker KKK\u2012, and @shskoolkidsklub \u2012Saratoga High School KKK\u2012.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Image of hate messages on Instagram directed at schools in El Gato Noticias (Image courtesy\/ Ritu Marwah).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The Instagram post invited students \u201cto attend a \u201cKKK Rally,\u201d El Gato News reported. It included a threat that read: \u201cThis is not a joke. If those animals want a race war, the side with guns will obviously win[,] and you can guess which side they\u2019re on haha. It\u2019s starting soon\u2026 be prepared.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The private account, which has since been deleted, was one of several other \u201cKKK\u201d pages targeting Bay Area students.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Image of a KKK rally invitation addressed to schools in El Gato News (Image courtesy\/ Ritu Marwah)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

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encounters with racism<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hate crimes continue to occur in the Saratoga School District.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On November 1, 2021, EL Gato News reported that surveillance cameras caught three different groups painting hateful, racist, anti-Semitic, and homophobic slurs on the walls of Los Gatos High, smashing pumpkins, and then filming their work with their cell phones.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Los Gatos High chemistry teacher Ken Porush was one of the victims of the hate crime. He told the Saratoga Falcon that he believes these incidents reflect a larger problem that transcends the campus grounds into the community at large.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to Mercury News, Los Gatos Mayor Marico Sayoc, a woman of color, faced aggressive verbal attacks from an anti-vaccine and anti-LGBTQ group that identified themselves as supporters of former President Donald Trump. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a cellphone video, the mayor was told: \u201cWe don\u2019t want you here. You need to get out of this town.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Racism has no place in the community<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n

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Source: Tweet from Assemblyman Evan Low<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

In a statement to the California Legislature, Assemblyman Evan Low condemned the attacks and said hate has no place in the community.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHarassment, bullying, and intimidation at public meetings are absolutely unacceptable on their own, but we were horrified to learn that the Mayor, the only person of color on the City Council, and her family have also been targeted outside of Town property. This is especially alarming in light of the rise in hate crimes against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders during the pandemic.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A symbol of exclusion<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dana Henderson, who was born and raised in Saratoga, said on Nextdoor that she saw it coming.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

"I saw the demographic changes over the last few decades and thought it was going to happen sooner or later as the right unleashes the worst part of society."<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But that malevolence, Rallabandi said, reveals itself in more complex and quiet ways at his school.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

"You won't find explicit hate crimes or physical violence. The reality is that the way racism manifests itself in the community is very quiet."<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The noose, a symbol of racial hatred with deep roots in segregation, sends a deliberate message of exclusion, Wendell Stemley, director emeritus of the National Minority Contractors Association, told the Post after nooses were found at construction sites.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

"The rope's mission is not to say 'I'm going to hang you at mealtime.'"<\/p>\n\n\n\n

"The rope's mission is to exclude you."<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You can read the original note by clicking here<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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This publication was supported in whole or part by funding provided by the State of California, administered by the\u00a0California State Library.<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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You may be interested in: Science fiction: a way of making visible the social problems of ethnic groups<\/a><\/em><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Por Ritu Marwah. India Currents La soga, s\u00edmbolo del racismo y el odio, con profundas ra\u00edces en la segregaci\u00f3n, env\u00eda un mensaje deliberado de exclusi\u00f3n. S\u00edmbolos del racismo en el patio de la escuela El 15 de noviembre de 2022, la comunidad de Saratoga-Campbell se conmocion\u00f3 con la informaci\u00f3n de que se descubrieron mu\u00f1ecas de […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":17004,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,14],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-17002","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-community","8":"category-cover"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17002","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17002"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17002\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17017,"href":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17002\/revisions\/17017"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17004"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17002"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17002"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17002"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}