Associate Professor Tommy Curry at Texas A&M (my alma mater) is the latest academic targeted by White Supremacists in their campaign to silence scholars of race and racism.
Four years ago, in a podcast conversation about the movie Django, he gave a brief summary of scholarly work about the role of anti-White violence in the path of Black liberation. White Supremacist groups have now taken quotes out of context from that interview and are claiming that he was inciting racial violence.
Texas A&M President, Michael K. Young, found these White Supremacists’ argument compelling and decried Mr. Curry’s words as “in stark contrast to Aggie core values.”
I’ve signed this petition and am writing this now because I disagree with that assessment in the strongest terms. The Aggie honor code calls for us to “not lie, cheat, or steal, or tolerate those who do,” and yet the history of racial violence in America has been one of theft of Black people’s lives and livelihoods. If we are to live in this country as honorable Aggies, we must reject that path a form a new one. Doing so requires the thoughtful academic scholarship and leadership of people like Tommy Curry.
Toward Health 