Content Warning: Mental health and traumatic discrimination against black individuals

We recognise that the recent statement by the Christ Church JCR Executive Committee is an attempt to make reparations, yet we are alarmed at its contents and believe it only begins to scratch the surface of the issues this college faces on several counts.

The JCR Executive rightfully condemned the events of our hustings on 31/05/2020, where, in our opinion, a racist speech was delivered by a member of our college. Yet, the Executive has thus far failed to condemn the wider student response to this event. We refuse to let this issue be swept under the carpet. Following the hustings, black members of our JCR were subject to, what we feel was, abhorrent abuse and apparent gaslighting after speaking out about the systemic failings that we feel had occurred during and after the hustings took place. In the immediate aftermath of the hustings, Melanie Onovo, a black member of our JCR, spoke out against the failings of members of the JCR Committee to properly mediate the hustings and condemn the speech that had been made. Melanie had attempted to speak out during the meeting, but was prevented from doing so, when her microphone was muted by the Returning Officer. In seeking apologies from those involved, for their complicity in allowing the speech to go unchallenged, Melanie began to receive accusations of bullying and harassment. We refuse to call these accusations anything other than what we believe them to be - gaslighting. While some of the individuals involved have publicly apologised, this event and subsequent discourse in the JCR highlights a grave need for active steps towards anti-racism education in Christ Church.

Melanie displayed immense bravery in speaking up against her accusers, some of whom suggested on the JCR’s Facebook group that she was trying to reinforce a “harmful and horribly archaic racial dialectic of division” and conduct a “witch-hunt”. They displayed more concern for the framing of a discourse about racism than actually listening to a black person's expression of racial oppression; at the extreme, Melanie was told that what she was experiencing was not “horrific racial abuse”. These damaging words from white JCR members, which received substantial support in the form of ‘likes’, signal a clear systemic issue that we feel pervades the JCR community. The posts were crafted in a way that claimed support for the BLM movement as a veil for hurtful comments aimed at black members of the community - one JCR member described Melanie as “alienating”. The performative nature of these statements seems clear given the authors have not, at time of writing, joined the newly formed advocacy group, ‘Christ Church Voices for Change’. We echo the Oxford ACS, who have called on the University to “consider what is going wrong” rather than criticising black students who have spoken up against their treatment. We call for the JCR Executive to condemn this reprehensible rhetoric within the college community.

We are incredibly disappointed in our JCR Executive’s failure to criticise the actions of our Censors. In a JCR-wide email, our JCR President stated that through the criticisms they had received, the Censors had been “abused” and treated unfairly. On the contrary, we believe that the Censors have often been rightly criticised for their handling of the situation. We would like to remind the JCR President that his first duty is “to administer and promote the interests of JCR members,” not to protect the Censors. In correspondence with Melanie, now published online, the Censors sought her approval for a statement to be made by the college. Melanie publicly criticised them for treating her like a “PR manager” instead of first supporting her welfare. We share the concerns raised by ACS about the conduct of the Censors with regards to employing accusatory lines of questioning. Her experience of alienation, which continued as a result of certain members of the JCR’s public responses, seriously endangered her own welfare. We believe that these alleged actions were not only wholly inappropriate, but that they showed a clear lack of regard for student wellbeing as well as an inherent failure to properly engage the wider black community in Christ Church. In affirming that the Censors are “people of integrity, decency, competence, and honesty”, we hold that the JCR President fails to acknowledge our view that none of these attributes make one immune from perpetuating systemic racism. Racism does not present itself solely through intentional and conscious behaviours, but also within often unintentional actions that serve to delegitimise black voices and to prioritise white comfort. As stated by the ACS, the college’s response “demonstrates a profound lack of understanding and devaluing of the black female experience”.

We were also troubled by the sentiments of the JCR President, who alongside the JCR Executive’s letter to JCR members via email, stated “This for me is an issue beyond student politics, it is now one of my own personal morality.” This appeared to dismiss the struggles of black students as mere student politics, and to imply that this only became an issue of personal morality for him when the Censors were criticised. We believe his personal sentiments seem to undermine the integrity of his commitment to be a voice for students, as he appears entirely unwilling to criticise the Censors in any capacity. Furthermore, the JCR President’s statement that he is “crystal clear” with regards to his opinion shows a disingenuous commitment to listening to the concerns of the student body, including black students. This is just one example of rigid and unsympathetic language expressed by some JCR members with regards to this issue, with others professing they “don’t really care” if they are challenged on their views, or that their message is directed to anyone “who is open-minded enough to listen”, seemingly disregarding genuine concerns raised as irrelevant to their personal agenda.

Without a thorough and faithful analysis of the multiple failings we believe to have occurred, our college will not be able to rid itself of what we feel is institutional racism. As highlighted throughout this letter, through the statements made by members of the JCR, the Censors, and the JCR President, the narrative has repeatedly been centred away from black voices. Many white students have self-professedly attempted to “explain” racism to their black peers, or have emphasised how hurt they have been by students who have attempted to highlight the implicit biases that their narratives have displayed. Likewise, we maintain language used by the Censors and the JCR President have displayed a failure to listen to black student voices, and a failure to understand the problem this college faces. Until the college recognises the extent to which systemic racism pervades throughout this institution, it will not be able to enact meaningful change. We call on the JCR Executive and the Censors to acknowledge their failings. It is simply not enough to be nice people. They must acknowledge the voices of black members and actively consider their welfare before protecting the reputation of the college.

We call on both the JCR Executive and the Censors to issue a thorough apology addressing the issues we have raised in this letter.

Finally, we call on them to work with and take seriously student groups such as Christ Church Voices for Change to enact lasting solutions and structural change. We propose the following as a pressing starting point:
  - To be more open and transparent in Censorial and Executive courses of action taken to address issues such
    as this.
  - To establish more clearly and to widely circulate a welfare procedure for incidents of this kind, as well as to
     actively reach out to the Christ Church community when a college-wide incident is reported.
  - To give black Members of the Christ Church community clear and open opportunities to be heard in measures
    such as the Equality and Diversity Subcommittee.

Sincerely,
               Christ Church Voices for Change with the support of Oxford ACS

Christ Church Voices for Change is a student advocacy group composed of BAME members of the Christ Church JCR and allies. It seeks to work with the JCR to raise the issues of, and seek solutions to, systemic racism within the college.