The University Star student newspaper at Texas State University has fired opinion columnist Rudy Martinez after he authored a controversial piece that celebrated “white death.”
Texas State student columnist Rudy Martinez came under fire last week after a column he aimed at white people entitled “Your DNA is an Abomination” made the rounds in the national press.
“Whiteness will be over because we want it to be,” Martinez wrote in the since-deleted column. “And when it dies, there will be millions of cultural zombies aimlessly wandering across a vastly changed landscape. Ontologically speaking, white death will mean liberation for all… Until then, remember this: I hate you because you shouldn’t exist. You are both the dominant apparatus on the planet and the void in which all other cultures, upon meeting you, die.”
On November 30, the editor’s board at the University Star announced that had severed ties with Martinez. “The author of this column has jeopardized the atmosphere of inclusivity at this university and will no longer be published in The University Star,” stated the paper’s editors.
“Since the column’s publication, we have received hate mail and numerous death threats,” they wrote. “Additionally, there have been calls for several members of The University Star to resign with individuals threatening to defund the student publication if demands are not met. We have received a lot of constructive feedback that, as students, is invaluable to us.”
Denise M. Trauth, Texas State’s president, condemned the column in a statement last week, writing that she was “deeply troubled by the racist opinion column that was published in the November 28, 2017, issue of the University Star.” She added, “the column’s central theme was abhorrent and is contrary to the core values of inclusion and unity that our Bobcat students, faculty, and staff hold dear.”
Martinez’s dismissal comes after Texas State student body president Connor Clegg called for a disbanding of the paper’s editorial board and a divestment of student funds from the organization. Clegg received immediate blowback from the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) for suggesting that a public university’s student paper should lose funding over an offensive column.
Please, try to revoke funding from the student newspaper in retaliation for an op-ed you were offended by. I dare you. FIRE is watching. https://t.co/TeQCcCa5NB
— Ari Cohn (@AriCohn) November 30, 2017
Yet, a coalition of conservative students at Texas State still argued that mandatory student fees should not be put towards the publication of a paper that was willing to publish Martinez’s column.
“Though each and every individual is entitled to their opinion, they are not entitled to the money from our pockets. Our tuition dollars should not support the call for the annihilation of an entire group of people based upon something as arbitrary as skin color,” the petition read.
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