UCLA Kids Demand That Student Body President Resign After Photo Comes Out Of Him Making The "Bloods" Gang Sign With His Hands In A Photo One Year Ago
Daily Mail – The undergraduate student body president at University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), is under fire after a leaked photo showed him making an offensive gang sign.
Danny Siegel, the Undergraduate Students Association Council president, made a hand sign of the Bloods – a primarily African American street gang – in a photo leaked to Facebook earlier this week.
The photo was shared in a GroupMe chat called ‘Protect the Crown’ by Brian Kohaya, Siegel’s appointments director.
‘When a white person throws up the gang sign, they’re basically making a mockery of the oppression that African Americans in hyper-segregated neighborhoods face,’ fourth-year Robert Gardner told the Daily Bruin of the incident said. ‘A lot of black Bruins are extremely upset at this appropriation of our culture … that’s derived out of anti-black racism.’
Gardner, whose cousin died as the result of gang violence, said many African Americans in segregated neighborhoods join gangs as a way to generate income or for protection.
Freshman Kosi Ogbuli told the Daily Bruin that the photo was inexcusable.
‘From where I grew up, it’s a sign that implies a lot of things and a lot of danger,’ Ogbuli said. ‘It’s like a name tag for what gang you’re in – that’s your set and you’re proud of being in it.’
Fun fact about me that not a lot of people know: I actually hate gangs. I think the way that they kill people and ruin communities with drugs and violence is horrible. I feel awful for anyone that has to grow up in an area plagued by them. I can’t even imagine being scared to walk home from school or leave your house in general because you live in fear of stray bullets from arguments over dime bags and turf disputes.
Another thought I hold concurrently in the same brain that thinks that: a college kid making a hand symbol to be funny and mess around with a group of his friends before a formal is not the end of the fucking world. It’s not something worth a social media firestorm and personal information witch-hunt and demanding his resignation and suspension and execution. Without knowing Danny Siegel at all and without ever having spoken to him I can say with 99.9% confidence that as he was twisting his fingers and bending his hands around he was not thinking in his head “oh my God I am about to culturally appropriate the fuck out of some people with this symbol derived out of anti-black racism, I cannot WAIT to mock African-Americans from hyper-segregated neighborhoods to my 134 Instagram followers.”
Motivation has to mean at least a little something. I mean if some white college kid drops an N bomb or expresses any sort of direct racism or expression that shows he is bigoted then by all means, blow him the fuck up. Shitting on racist assholes is one of my specialities. But this dude getting dragged through the mud for doing this fucking thing with his hands that every single one of us has done at some point just to show off we could do it? Give me a break.
