A controversial mural that reads “Dismantle Whiteness and Misogyny on This Campus” outside the Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism building at the University of Southern California was challenged recently with a competing poster hung right next to it.
The upstart poster declared, "White Male Privilege Is a Myth."
An Annenberg professor saw the competing poster and took a photo, USC Annenberg Media reported, adding that the "White Male Privilege Is a Myth" poster was taken down shortly thereafter.
The outlet said it's unclear who hung the poster up and who took it down. The Daily Trojan said the competing poster was not removed by faculty.
The “Dismantle Whiteness" mural was installed last month in order to "spark dialogue,” one professor told the College Fix.
“The signage is meant to offer grounding of terms and ideas,” communications professor Alison Trope said in a statement to the outlet. “There is no expectation that everyone agree with the statement offered by the artists, but hopefully viewers can acknowledge the experience of peers on campus around these issues.”
The “Dismantle Whiteness” mural was installed with other pieces from the When Women Disrupt art collective in collaboration with students from the USC Annenberg class “Women: Designing Media for Social Change” to address issues surrounding “race, intersectionality and misogyny,” according to the Facebook page of When Women Disrupt.
The term “whiteness,” the group said, “refers to an organizing principle that shapes institutions, policies and social relations.”
An informational flyer near the display adds another “whiteness” definition, the College Fix said, noting that it is “distinct from being white” and “refers to an unmarked and unnamed place of advantage, privilege or domination; a lens through which white people tend to see themselves and others …”
It's curious that some mysterious individual took down the competing "White Male Privilege Is a Myth" poster given that the "Dismantle Whiteness" mural right next to it was part of an art installation intended to "spark dialogue."
Is not such a visual retort for everyone to see doing just that?
Or perhaps, sadly, it's simply that some mysterious individual couldn't bear the ideological challenge and believed that quashing dialogue was a better idea.
(H/T: The College Fix)
Dave Urbanski
Sr. Editor, News