I never got the chance to talk with my advisor. We played phone tag for a little over a week before both of us stopped trying. I chalk it up to bad timing because I was in Phoenix at the NAE4-HA Conference. Since there had been no further response since my previous update on this situation, I was just going to drop it and let it go. However, my advisor, without having talked with me at all AND almost two weeks later, decided to post a response to the entire forum today.
The response from our advisor discussed how they were glad we were having this discussion. They suggested academic materials we could read to further our knowledge and understanding of the situation. They pointed out information from one of my courses on campus for me to think about, and suggested that the student who made the accusation think about how they are presenting the information in order to create the best atmosphere for conversation and dialog. He basically played the role he should play as an advisor and didn't take sides or (publicly) discuss the seriousness of the issue but tried to refocus it into a learning opportunity.
To be honest, I was slightly annoyed by this, but understood and even appreciated that our advisor was at least addressing the issue... even if it was a couple weeks late. Again, I thought the situation was dropped.
Wrong! Another student, who happens to be close to the student who originally made the accusations against me, was triggered by our advisor's email and decided to respond. This individual wrote a private email to our advisor and copied the other student and myself on the email. The email stated that adjusting the way someone presents accusations of racism to make it easier on the accused to hear is a form of White Supremacy (even though the accuser is also white), that my comments were racist no matter if they came from native/locals or not, that the comments were a form of liberal racism, that my advisor chewing the original student out but not chastising me at all was a form of racism as well (our advisor didn't chew out the other student, they did make pointers to me, and to top it of our advisor is not white, so accusing our advisor of supporting racism is a hefty accusation).
I appreciate that this message was distributed via private email. However, it irritates me that this student, who has had a problem with me since second semester last year, cannot talk to me directly, but has to slander me (while chewing out our advisor) to someone else and passively copies me on the email.
The original posting and accusation was a big deal, but now the situation has blown up! The second student has even made threats that they will leave the group if things are dealt with... and by things they mean me. All of this because I made one statement about organizational structure mentalities that was originally presented to me by people on our Foundation board. How did it get to here?!
I am pretty sure it's not going to die down now. I'll keep you posted on what comes next...
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