From Hate to Hoax in Claremont

To many of the 700 Jewish students on the seven ClaremontColleges campuses, it was their first direct encounter with anti-Semitism, andthey reacted with rage, fear, confusion and a new sense of solidarity.

The car of visiting psychology professor Kerri Dunn, who wasgiving a lecture on racism, had been vandalized. The tires had been slashed,windows broken and the spray-painted letters spelled out “Kike Whore,” “NiggerLover,” “Bitch” and “Shut Up.” A fainter, half-finished swastika completed thetableau.

Reports were also circulating that Dunn, a 39-year-oldCaucasian woman, was converting from Catholicism to Judaism.

Reaction was immediate and forceful. The day after the March9 incident, all classes were dismissed, and students, staff and faculty stageddaylong sit-ins, teach-ins, forums and rallies. Speakers emotionally denouncedthe hate crime on the campus of Claremont McKenna College, one of seven privatecolleges and universities in the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains.

Education professor Jack Schuster and mathematician HenryKrieger, both faculty leaders on the Hillel Council, attended many of thedemonstrations and were puzzled by a noticeable omission. While speaker afterspeaker blasted the racism and sexism of the vandal’s graffiti, there waslittle or no mention of the anti-Semitic slur.

The reason for this omission was surprising. Most of thenon-Jewish students, and many of their Jewish classmates, didn’t know what”kike” meant and were unaware that it was a derogatory slang word for Jew.

“The day of the incident, I was working in the computer lab,and I told another guy about the ‘Kike Whore’ slander, and he asked, ‘What doyou mean by kike?'” said D’ror Chankin-Gould, 20, student president of theHillel Council.

To raise campus awareness in a rather drastic way, Hillelstudents posted fliers with the word “kike,” followed by an explanation of itsoffensive meaning.

After a full day of campus protests, Hillel convened ameeting of Jewish students, staff and faculty. It lasted from 10 p.m. tomidnight, with rabbis and community leaders from Claremont and Pomonaparticipating.

“For four years, I’ve been avoiding Hillel, but when mynon-Jewish friends didn’t get it how I felt about the anti-Semitic message, Ifelt marginalized,” one student said. “For the first time, I felt a differencebetween them and me.”

“In time of crisis, Jews come together,” said Rabbi LeslieBergson, Hillel Council director and a university chaplain.

Long indifferent Jewish students turned up at Hillel and thenear-dormant Jewish Student Union has gotten a new lease on life and isplanning various activities, Bergson said.

In smaller ways, Jewish students groped for mutual support.

“Just walking along the campus, a Jewish student would walkup to another, just to ask how he was doing,” Chankin-Gould said.

From Los Angeles, the regional chapter of theAnti-Defamation League contacted college officials and the Jewish campuscommunity to offer counsel and assistance.

After the intense emotions of the days following thevandalism, students and their professors left for a weeklong spring break. Thecampuses were largely deserted when another bombshell exploded.

Claremont police announced that according to twoeyewitnesses, Dunn had vandalized her own car and perpetrated a hoax on thecampus community. The FBI and the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Officeentered the case, and on Monday, a district attorney’s spokeswoman said adecision was likely within a week on whether charges would be filed againstDunn.

Dunn has maintained her innocence, and has refused requestsfor press interviews. Her lawyer criticized the police report as”irresponsible” and charged that it had “irreparably damaged her reputation andemotional health.”

At the same time, reports on Dunn’s conversion to Judaismbecame increasingly vague. Newspaper stories changed from “undergoingconversion” to “considering conversion” to “a possibility of conversion.”

“No one seems to have any firsthand knowledge about thismatter,” Schuster said.

Krieger, the mathematics professor, was at a tennistournament in Indian Wells when he first heard about the alleged hoax.

“I was very shocked,” he said. “How can you believesomething like that?”

Pamela Gann, Claremont McKenna College president, said in aphone interview Monday that Dunn had been placed on a paid leave of absence,and that college officials were meeting regularly with students to discuss theimplications of both hate crimes and the police report.

“In my five years here, I have never before seen a swastikaon campus,” Gann said.

As the students return after the spring break, most arereserving judgment until the final verdict is in, but others are worried aboutthe impact if Dunn is found responsible.

Warren Katzenstein, 21, student body president of HarveyMudd College, a sister institution of Claremont McKenna, told a reporter, “I’mjust afraid that all that community spirit is going to be lost and becomecynicism and anger.”

But Chankin-Gould, the Hillel student president, doesn’treally care whether the slur came from Dunn or another perpetrator. “It doesn’tmatter who did it,” he said. “It’s anti-Semitism and it’s unacceptable.”