Another Racist College in Claremont California: “White Girl, Take Off Those Hoop Earrings.”

Two more hateful racist students, this time at Pitzer College in Claremont, California have demanded white women stop wearing hoop earrings, hatefully and divisively claiming that they “belong to the black and brown folks who created the culture.” In other words, white women are not allowed to use anything created by black or brown people because, you know—racism. Apparently, Claremont, California is a hot bed of hateful, racist “people of color.” Scripps College was called out for their hateful racist behavior against white women just last week.

The student newspaper, the Claremont Independent, reported yesterday that a racist hate message spray-painted on the college’s free-speech wall said, “White Girl, take off your hoops!!!”

When a white student was confused by the message, the paper reported that the hateful latino, racist Alegria Martinez of the Latinx Student Union at the college — jumped into an email thread to the entire student body and explained that the wall message stems from frustration over cultural appropriation:

“[T]he art was created by myself and a few other WOC [women of color] after being tired and annoyed with the reoccuring [sic] theme of white women appropriating styles … that belong to the black and brown folks who created the culture. The culture actually comes from a historical background of oppression and exclusion. The black and brown bodies who typically wear hooped earrings, (and other accessories like winged eyeliner, gold name plate necklaces, etc) are typically viewed as ghetto, and are not taken seriously by others in their daily lives. Because of this, I see our winged eyeliner, lined lips, and big hoop earrings serving as symbols [and] as an everyday act of resistance, especially here at the Claremont Colleges. Meanwhile we wonder, why should white girls be able to take part in this culture (wearing hoop earrings just being one case of it) and be seen as cute/aesthetic/ethnic? White people have actually exploited the culture and made it into fashion.”

Jacquelyn Aguilera, a racist hispanic student who will not graduate for another two years, also hatefully presumes that she has the right to say who can and cannot wear hoop earrings.

“If you didn’t create the culture as a coping mechanism for marginalization, take off those hoops,” Aguilera wrote in an email to her fellow students. “If your feminism isn’t intersectional take off those hoops, if you try to wear mi cultura when the creators can no longer afford it, take off those hoops, if you are incapable of using a search engine and expect other people to educate you, take off those hoops, if you can’t pronounce my name or spell it … take off those hoops/ I use ‘those’ instead of ‘your’ because hoops were never ‘yours’ to begin with.”

As for their historical claims, Martinez and Aguilera are wrong: Hoop earrings have spanned diverse cultures. The New York Metropolitan Museum’s collection alone includes Sumerian hoops created between 2500-2600 B.C., Egyptian hoops possibly as old as 1981 B.C., Frankish hoops that date between 675-725 A.D., 6th or 7th century Byzantine or Langobardic hoops likely made in Italy, 8th century Indonesian hoops, 11th century Iranian hoops, and dozens more.

In other words, the earrings have been worn across eras and cultures, by oppressors and the oppressed alike. No culture has a monopoly on hoops. In fact, to claim such a monopoly may be closer to cultural appropriation.

Both Martinez and Aguilera declined requests to elaborate on their comments, the Independent said. But a number of folks did so in the article’s comment section — and many weren’t kind to the two hateful racist students.

“Alegria Martinez and Jacquelyn Aguilera can’t use computers, can’t drive automobiles, can’t watch television, can’t ride trains, can’t use electricity, no electric lights, no airplane travel, no internet — discovered/invented by Americans and Europeans,” one commenter wrote. “If they use them it’s ‘cultural appropriation.’ ”

Another commenter said: “Please don’t dye your hair blonde or straighten it. BTW in America hoops are for anyone that desire to wear them. Telling people what they can’t do will make them all do it. I can’t stop laughing.”

“I guess being a kook is part of Pitzer’s admissions criteria,” another commenter wrote. “Will take this college off my list.”

Yet another commenter declared the following: “If I was a white girl at this school, I’d wear my hoops to every class.”



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