UW-Madison freshman Karie Le reported to university officials and took to social media Sunday to detail a Saturday night incident of discrimination, which is now the third incident of bias to be reported in the last week.
Le, who is Vietnamese, said she was spat on by a middle-aged white man outside of the Student Activity Center at around 7 p.m. Saturday night. The man then told her to return to China, and the roughly five other men he was with laughed at Le.
The incident was initially posted on Facebook, under #theRealUW, which is a hashtag where other students have been reporting instances of bias and discrimination on UW campuses. Le said she was initially wary of reporting the incident to university officials.
“I was hesitant to email the dean just because I feel like a lot of these incidents, even if you do report them, they just go unnoticed and get brushed aside,” Le said.
Le said she eventually decided to report the incident to the university to help raise awareness for all the other students who have been affected by bias and discrimination. She stressed that she wanted more accountability both from the university and students who are aggressors.
“[The aggressors] aren’t punished in the way they should, they’re let off pretty easy,” Le said. “Racism is not something that should be let go of that easy.”
She has not reported the altercation to the police, and said she does not intend to report the crime at this time.
UW-Madison Director of News and Media Relations Meredith McGlone said the incident was “deeply disturbing” and the university would be reaching out to the affected students to offer support.
