(Alex) It's Thursday, September 28. And this is the 1909, the state news weekly podcast featuring state news reporters talking about the news. I'm your host, Alex Walters. This week I'm joined by three of my talented colleagues to talk about three fascinating stories. First to hear from PJ Pfeiffer, he talked to members of MSU Black Student Alliance who are asking for more University support as they grapple with racial slurs that were written on a campus building this summer. Then I'm joined by Emilio present Baron, who watched a group of MSU students swim a literal marathon last week in support of efforts to bring back the MSU swim and dive team. And finally, Daniel Shona will tell us about a group of students who found an unorthodox way to counter protest campus preachers. With that, let's start the show. All right, we've got our first guest here. Peter, do you want to introduce yourself?
(PJ) Yeah, so my name is PJ. I'm a junior, and this is my second semester at the state news. I am the social justice reporter in the culture desk. And last semester, I was the love and sex reporter.
(Alex) Nice. So you know, before we get into you know your story, specifically, what's happened the last couple of weeks? Do you want to tell people kind of unacquainted with it? What happened back in June?
(PJ) Yeah, so pretty much on June 8, there was an incident outside of the Student Services Building where a slur was posted, will actually written multiple times with chalk outside the Student Services Building. And pretty much the BSA or the black students Alliance advisor. He was actually walking with a student outside when he saw and then he saw the slur. And then he texted the whole BSA group chat, as well as the president and the VP separately, a picture of it and then also just kind of President and VP of the of the PSA. Yeah. Yeah. Terry, Jana, Lesley and Jordan Wesson.
(Alex) I see. And then what was, you know, sort of the initial reaction from students and then from the university itself?
(PJ) Yes. So, um, BSA, they actually released a statement initially, kind of just calling for some action, you know, describing what happened, their opinions on it. And then also, you know, also what it's like to be a black student at MSU predominantly white institution, and you know, why change needs to happen. And it actually took a while, like months for MSU to actually say something back to actually respond. And what did they what did they finally say? So eventually, they had they had a town hall meeting, actually, it was, it was with MSU, public safety and chief of police, Marlon Lynch, they had a town meeting together, and they just kind of talked about what needs to be taken, what action needs to be taken.
(Alex) And I guess, what was what was asked at the town hall of Lynch.
(PJ) Yeah, so pretty much. There were a few things that they want to happen. The BSA wants to happen. They want security cameras posted up on outside of the Student Services Building. And they also want possibly facial recognition within the security cameras, just to increase your safety.
(Alex) And so to be clear, there were no no cameras, no way to know who it was who wrote these slurs.
(PJ) From what I've heard, no, they're really, from what I from what I heard from BSA, they could not figure out who it was.
(Alex) Yeah. And what did you know, what did Lynch say at the town hall? Is that something that he thinks is a practical request? Are they going to act on that?
(PJ) Yeah, no, he, he definitely thinks that it's a practical request request. And he actually said that he that there's a really big possibility that the security cameras will be put up outside by the end of the month, so and the September, so then the next week or so.
(Alex) So then what about, you know, the and the more recent statement, the BSA had released sort of, I think, calling for more action from the university. Can you talk about that sort of the more recent stance?
(PJ) Yes. So actually, since June 8, they've released I believe, four statements. The first one, as I kind of mentioned already, it was kind of an open letter to MSU. Administration. And also sorry, I forgot to say this before. But BSA also met with Teresa Woodruff. Yeah. Just a little meeting just to honestly talk about similar solutions that they did with Lynch. But yeah, but they've released four statements total, kind of just calling to action, you know, solutions, what they think would, you know, could be possible. So like cameras, facial recognition, and then I believe they're also talking about possible trainings. I don't know if you're familiar, but like, usually at the beginning of the year, throughout the year, we have to do like alcohol and sexual assault training. Yeah. So I believe it would also be like with that same course, but it would just be about, you know, racial discrimination.
(Alex) I see like a similar so for people who aren't seeing Wouldn't you know every MSU student you're required? Every fall, you have to do these summer video trainings, some of them aren't in person kind of seminar you go to, and you learn about alcohol or you learn about RVSM issue. So it's a similar training to kind of combat some of the discrimination that they feel like they're feeling on campus. Yeah. And what has MSU? You know, respond to that if they talk to them about it as a practical, are they in open communication with the university about these things?
(PJ) I think they're more for the MSU is more focused on the security cameras and facial recognition at this point. And I will say BSA, especially the president of and vice president of BSA, they are actively in communication with Woodruff and Lynch about the progression for the security cameras and facial recognition. And they also will be meeting with them, I think, either weekly or bi weekly. Just to talk about any other instances, or problems, or you know, just about the cameras and safety.
(Alex) Yeah, but has the university been receptive to some of the I mean, outside of the individual camera system for this building, but some of the broader cultural concerns they've been bringing up?
(PJ) Well, I will say I met with, I met with Lesley who's the Tiana Leslie, who's the president of BSA. And when talking to her about, you know, racial discrimination on campus, she also brought up the fact that since June 8, and actually, actually not even since June, since late August, since school started. She has been reported a for for discrimination acts, people have four different women on campus in the BSA have brought up different acts that happened to them, both racial and homophobic kind of discrimination, really? And is a date, you know, kind of brought it to her attention. And I don't know if they fully acted on it or told the school yet, but, yeah.
(Alex) And so has there been talk of, you know, MSU, being able to investigate some of these issues, put resources like the Office of Institutional Equity or other things to look into this? Is that been considered?
(PJ) I'm not sure I, I didn't talk to Tyrion or Jordan about it at all. But I'm sure that's that's probably what they're going to talk about with is that these meetings sort of right, yeah, with these bi weekly meetings, I bet they're gonna talk to lunch. And what about this?
(Alex) What about this distinction that the university had made between sort of hate speech and a hate crime? And what would sort of raise the level where they were able to take sort of more action than they have been able to take over these slurs? You talk about that?
(PJ) Yeah. So when the racial slurs were posted outside of the Student Services Building MSU regarded it as hate speech and not hate crime, hate crime. Just because I guess it wasn't like a, like a voluntary act that like, affected like, I don't want to say affected, but I guess, like physically affected someone. So it's just it was, I know, Tirana, Leslie, and Jordan West. And they were kind of like, they didn't really know the distinction between the two. And they thought it was more of a hate crime. So I think they're both as well as the whole BSA. They're kind of trying to learn the distinction between hate crime and hate speech. And
(Alex) Yeah. And I assume you know, that that was frustrating for it to be not something that university could take action over despite it effectively, members.
(PJ) 100% Yeah, yeah, I think I think they were a little disappointed that the only action or solution that they have right now is the security cameras, although that is a solution. And that is some sort of progression. I think they want to see more action being taken.
(Alex) Yeah. All right. Well, thank you for coming on the show PJ excited, you know, I'm sure it'll be sticking with us throughout the semester, as this sort of evolves and develops, people can follow that state. news.com Yeah. Cool. Yeah. Thanks for coming on.
(PJ) Yeah. Thanks for having me.
(Alex All right. So our next guest is here in the studio. Do you want to introduce yourself?
(Emilio) Yeah. My name is Emilio. I work with the campus desk here at the State News. And I've been here for I want to say four weeks now. It's been a good time.
(Alex) Nice. Well, we're glad to have you. So yeah. So before we get into your story, for those unacquainted with the saga, and 2020 MSU, cut it swim and dive team saying that financial troubles brought about by the COVID 19 pandemic caused them to make some cuts, that we've actually reported that the decision to cut the team was made in fall 2019, before COVID Was everything and all but anyway, regardless of the dubious timeline, since the cut, there's been a lot of advocacy and organizing from former swimmers and parents and alumni who are trying to you know, bring the team back. And in June, they got this deal from MSU. Basically, if they raised $26.5 million by October 1, they're gonna have their team back. And so you know, there's been a lot of donor meetings and fundraising and whatnot. But last week, you got to see something kind of unorthodox they're doing so you want to tell us about that?
(Emilio) Yeah. So on Tuesday, I hear about this event that they're doing over at I am west where they hold their Tuesday practices. And I show up and they're doing Something called marathon for MSU, where the team collectively swims about 26.2 miles or the distance of a marathon. And they just they, they swim laps until eventually reach that and they were doing this to raise awareness and fundraise for those, that $26.5 million fundraising goal are trying to reach.
(Alex) Wow. And you know, since your story have been kind of looking at, and this has become, I wouldn't say like a trend that they've had. I've seen other, you know, local swim groups and alumni are swimming this marathon for MSU. To raise awareness. It's kind of incredible. I mean, you you saw it, you talk to these swimmers? I mean, what's it like the level of passion about this to be literally swimming a marathon?
(Emilio) I mean, they're, they're so into it, you know, this is for them. This team means everything. And so many of the people swimming don't even they never swim on the team themselves. But they've heard they've had friends, they've had family who have swam, and they just want their team back. Right. I had the opportunity to speak with the club president Sam Stefanik, who just said, you know, swimmers are so passionate about this. You know, over the past couple of years, a lot of schools have had their programs cut. And it's clearly this is something that affects all swimmers. And so it really motivates a lot of swimmers to show up for this.
(Alex) Yeah. And well, in that vein, I think, you know, maybe my favorite part of their story is that it wasn't just MSU swimmers who were swimming, but they had an unlikely ally. You want to talk about that?
(Emilio) Right- Yeah. So the original idea for marathon for MSU was actually this guy, Matthew Kroll, who actually owns the University of Michigan. Well, and I know, right, crazy. And so he came up with the idea over the summer, and he was looking originally for a cause of support. And he decided to throw his weight for bringing back the MSU swim and dive team.
(Alex) Yeah, that's putting down the rivalry. I know, that's not something you see often.
(Emilio) And club, President Stefanik was also really grateful. Again, he said, swimming, regardless of what team you're on, everyone is on the same side of supporting the sport and making sure it survives. And at whatever level.
(Alex) Yeah, that's really cool to see. Even just at the last board meeting, there are a couple of speakers, the U of M head coach was there telling the MSU board, you know, I'm Wolverine, I never thought I'd be here, you got to bring back the swim team. And that was crazy to see because that's, you know, with the rivalry culture, not something to see all too often. But you know, anyway, if it's Thursday, and you're listening to the 1909, there's, you know, just a couple days left before the deadline for them to raise the funds, they give you an indication of where they're at, are we going to get to October 1, and the team's coming back? Or is it you know, you tell us about that?
(Emilio) You know, they couldn't give me any specifics. The president said something akin to, they were halfway there. And he was pretty explicit, saying we're not going to get there by the deadline. However, he also added on that, you know, maybe they would have enough funds to bring back the team in some capacity.
(Alex) Yeah, that's interesting. Cuz you know, MSU has been has been staunch about, you know, you raised the 26 point 5 million, or the team not coming back. And it was sort of a last deal, but I'll be curious to see it on Sunday. And next week, if there's room to renegotiate to put something else on the table, it'll be left to follow it. Yeah. But thank you for coming on the show. Thanks for covering this. What an interesting story
(Emilio) Of course. Thanks for having me on.
(Alex) Yeah. Appreciate it. All right. Our last guest is here in the studio. Dana, you want to introduce yourself?
(Daniel) Yeah, of course. My name is Daniel. I am a reporter for the state news. I am currently on the pop culture beat and I've got a run any history in journalism I was just we were just talking before mics went on but I was actually a radio station DJ for like four years in high school. So yeah,
(Alex) look at that back in your back in your element. Yeah, so let me ask you you know, you were you wrote a story this week about one of these you know, wells Hall preachers that's outside normally people kind of walk by ignore but you said something really interesting with some students actually reacting to it. So you want to tell us you know what your story was? What you saw that day?
(Daniel) Yeah, of course. So I was biking through I'm coming to my class I have class planetarium is awesome. But I ended up skipping it that day because I was going through the wells courtyard and just saw this huge crowd around this preacher and it's not the first time I've seen it. I've seen it last year. And it kind of clicked for me you know now that I've been doing more state new stuff that this is a story because people are very very strongly against this man and for good reason. And it wasn't it wasn't just him because I you know, start talking to people assess the scene and explore it but um, it was this group team Jesus preachers, and they go from campus to campus, not only in Michigan, but across the country. Kind of not I don't even want to say preaching because it's, it's a ton of incredibly hurtful messages that suggest, you know, people aren't, you know, worthy of what they they use words like love and salvation, and they never use the word hate but it comes across this hate to many of the students when I was talking to them. The lead guy who was talking which I believe he has some audio of this stir. Adam Lacroix was actually an MSU alum. But he was coming there from down from Florida to kind of preach preach His Word. And His word was whole army horrible, in my opinion,
(Alex) As well, right about, you know, the MSU shooting and different recent events.
(Daniel) Yes, yes, multiple students I didn't hear personally. But multiple students said that he was saying things such as you know, Muslims and homosexuals were the ones who caused the MSU shooting, which is absolutely horrible. I didn't include it in my article because I don't want to I don't want to trigger people. I also, you know, don't want to offend anybody out there. Because again, what this man is saying was, it was it was awful, but a lot of students were actually you know, rallying around him in a very positive way.
(Alex) Positive way you say, supporting him or sort of making fun of him.
(Daniel) Oh, absolutely. not supporting it. It was making fun of him. And it was a very it was it was very entertaining, entertaining and intriguing to watch the interaction Go Go forth, because I get out there and see. It was again this huge crowd, they're all against him. He he yells heels, his stuff. I remember at one point, he's saying something along the lines of You know, God is who gives smokers cancer. And this one kid, first thing I see he goes up his name was Cole Bennett goes up and writes down on this giant dry erase board. It says smoking plus God equals cancer, flips it around, and it's just standing in front of this guy with a smirk on his face. You know, like, This man does not know what he's talking about. And it's just making up some random crap to, you know, get people to Excuse Excuse, you know, hate hateful, hateful speech, but
(Alex) They're almost satirizing sort of what he's saying in real time for people walking by.
(Daniel) Yes, yes, it was. It was a lot of again, yes, satire, because he would talk about homosexuality, and people would go back and say, you know, you're the homosexual, right, you know, God is gay. I walked by, you know, a couple days ago, you know, week after this, and still in chalk on the sidewalk where this happened. There's big, big block words, God is gay. Because he again that what they were saying was very homophobic it was it was Islamophobic, xenophobic everything. And they justify it with religion. But some other things that these groups were doing, this group was doing. I saw, I get in and I got a great picture that was the this same guy Cole Bennett, with these tiny little pride flags going around in a circle around Adam Lacroix as he's, as he's as he's screaming at these kids, and Colas putting little pride flags around him in this big circle, and it looks almost like I thought of it as like, you know, like a little ritual circle almost to, like banish him. And that's, that's kind of what people people were saying about it's like, you know, we're gonna banish you with you know, with, with the power LGBT, you know, again to satirize what he's saying,
(Alex) Really, and this is, you know, I've got a classroom walls three times a week, I think I see the preacher that are pretty much every other time I've never seen anything like this. Is this an organized group of students, they get together and say, we're going to do this this random people that I mean, how did this come together that they decided to do this?
(Daniel) Yes, these kids come prepared. It's insane. It's called MSU movement, I was talking to a couple of them. And it's this, it's this little little student group, little over 30 people. And they, they contact each other through messaging, to let one another know if they see these preachers on campus. Again, they don't they don't target like the, you know, the nice old ladies with like, the Bible education books, but they, they do, you know, target these, these these demonstrators who will, who will yell who do not have, you know, really like authorization from the university to be there. And people will come out with little little pride flags, they'll come out with signs. So they, they really go all out. It was it was it was wonderful to see. But another thing that I did get in the article was that two people came with signs after you know, a message was posted MSU movement, you know, look like, you know, one of the crazy people are here. And they come with big science has a picture of the man. You know who's talking right now. And above it, it says this man peed his pants on campus. Really? Yes, yes. With a big arrow pointing and they were standing there two kids two signs put on each side of him. And they both had opposite er arrows pointing directly at the guy and they stood there for about a solid hour as this man yelled. And every all the kids were yelling back there ridiculing him. And you know what to a lot of people said they're putting putting him in this place.
(Alex) Wow, that's fascinating. It's not something I've ever seen before. And what about but you actually talk to the preacher too a little bit too about sort of his perspective on this his history. You want to tell us a little bit about that?
(Daniel) Yeah, yeah, I actually got a word in with the Yeah, with the demonstrator without him, because I just kind of waited asked, Hey, you know, can I talk with you after he was after he's done yelling, I, I, you know, kick came up and asked him just about his experience. And he talked a lot about what, what motivates him and you know, I could I could kind of talk about it, but really, it comes down to, you know, just, he found he found religion, and it sounds like he, he just, you know, got a bit radicalized. He, you know, he throws a lot of words out there, you know, like, you know, I have to when I do this, like, I have to have patience, you know, God gives me patience, you know, I find my answers and prayer, all that kind of stuff that really doesn't come down to much substance wise, but he did talk about, you know, the struggles he faced doing this in for for good reason. And it kind of reflected on something one of the crowd members said, and they wanted me to know, because I was a reporter, they said, people like him and Tim Jesus preachers go around and try to purposely collect harassment lawsuits in order to make money.
(Alex) This has been successful for him in the past.
(Daniel) It's It's not his goal, but he said that he he's gotten sued four times, and he's won $1,500. He said, approximately, from each of the four cases. And he Yeah, he says he is not as intention. But he gets us money. And it goes right back into Team Jesus preachers. I see. But yeah, it's and and so these these people, really, they he repeated multiple times that he knows his rights, and he believes what he's doing is right. He, after after speaking to him in his voice, I genuinely believe he thinks he's doing a good thing. But it clearly does. It does cause harm and causes hurt because I did talk to some of those students who on campus 111 guy, Lucas trainer, he, he he was talking about his experience. He identifies as transgender. And when he was transitioning the year before he he was walking around campus, and he was he was hearing the things that these these demonstrators said, I believe he said, it was the same man Adam Lacroix yelling about how, you know, like, members of the LGBT community, you know, need to repent and that they have sinned. And that, you know, they're going to help, but that made them really insecure. He ends up joining the the student group MSU movement, and kind of being able to like start almost this counter protest against them with things like he organized a picnic one time, and, you know, got people to kind of come around and combat it. And you know, China kind of try to turn this, this demonstrator who believes you know, he's, you know, being like a professional preacher, which he's not into a clown show, you know, a circus act. And that's kind of what they did. They turned into a circus act and stopped anyone from feeling hurt by what he was saying.
(Alex) Wow. Well, thank you for coming on the show. Daniel. It's a fascinating story.
(Daniel) Thank you so much.
(Alex) That's all for this week. We'll be back next Thursday with more. Until then the stories we discussed and plenty more available at state news.com. Thank you to our incredible podcast director Anthony Brinson, our guests PJ, Emilio and Daniel and you for listening for the 1909 I'm Alex Walters.