Local social justice activists blasted the felony arrest of a black Yale dishwasher who smashed a racist stained-glass window inside a cauldron of campus unrest, Calhoun residential college.
The group Unidad Latina en Accion is planning a demonstration outside the Elm Street courthouse Tuesday on behalf of the worker, Corey Menafee, who is no longer working at Yale since the incident. He is facing a second-degree misdemeanor charge of reckless endangerment and a first-degree felony charge of criminal mischief in connection with the incident. He has yet to enter a plea. (This previous story has more details about the incident.)
He no longer works at Yale.
“Yale: Put Corey Menafee back to work. Give him a hearing. Listen to him. Change the oppressive environment in which he works. Change the name of Calhoun College,” ULA’s John Jairo Lugo stated in a release issued hours after the Independent first reported the story about Menafee. “What is more valuable to Yale: a stained glassed window of enslaved people picking cotton, or the humanity of the African American people who work at Yale?”
Kica Matos of Fair Haven, national director of immigrant rights and racial justice at the Center for Community Change, said while her group doesn’t condone destruction of property, “we are concerned that an African American man is facing felony charges for removing a racist image that Yale should have never forced its employees to view on a daily basis. Images of slaves picking cotton, like images of nooses and burning crosses have no place in the workplaces of the twenty first century.”
“Mr. Menafee has been an employee of Yale University for nine years. Until he was fired by the University, he was assigned to Calhoun College — a college named after one of the most ardent champions of slavery and states rights during his time — a man who saw slavery as a ‘positive good’ instead of a necessary evil, as others of his time described it. Despite repeated and vigorous efforts by students, faculty and alumni to rename the college, the Yale University President decided recently that the name Calhoun College would remain. To add insult to injury, workers of color like Mr. Menafee have been forced to confront racist images in their workplace, including the stained glass window depicting slaves picking cotton. Yale’s stained glass slaves serve to dehumanize African Americans while honoring a white supremacist, John C. Calhoun.”
Unfortunately Yale is the only employer here except for the city gov. One of these entities should employ this man who only did what many of us would like to do. This is no felon. I only wish there were more angry black men like me.