CW: Confederate flag imagery and discussion.
In less than two weeks the Chance Theater will be hosting the Confederate Railroad band whose namesake and logo celebrate the confederate flag. The Confederate Railroad band’s entrance into Poughkeepsie evokes a painful and all too common pattern of Americans taking pride in the country’s racist origins. The flag has stood as a testament to white supremacy throughout history, from confederate soldiers bearing the flag on their sleeves to segregationists flying it in the wake of Brown v. Board of Education to white nationalists parading it through Charlottesville during the 2017 riots.
As more Americans come to recognize the violent and racist history the Confederate flag holds, venues have begun to shut their doors to acts like the Confederate Railroad band. One of these venues is the Ulster County Fair which was originally planning to host the band until widespread outrage from residents forced the fair to rescind their offer. The response? An invitation from the Chance Theater to perform on September 20th.
The Chance Theater is no stranger to the Vassar community, and, more importantly, the VSA’s pocket book. The VSA and the Senior Class Council have hosted some of the college’s most notorious events at the Chance: UV Ray(ve), Millennial Pink, and 50 nights, just to name a few. Neither VSA representatives nor Senior Class Council members were able to provide me with a quote on how much money was given to the Chance Theater in the past years, but it’s safe to say we’re talking about tens of thousands of dollars here — tens of thousands of dollars spent on a venue which is proudly hosting the Confederate Railroad band.
While it’s certainly comfortable to imagine ourselves as distant members of the Poughkeepsie community, only living here for a few years and largely isolated from the city itself, we are in reality intimately entangled in Poughkeepsie politics. Vassar’s deep pockets give it considerable influence over the surrounding area, which begs members of the Vassar community to accept responsibility for the college’s actions, particularly, its spending. It’s time to hold ourselves accountable, to dispel the myth that we are passive members of the Poughkeepsie community, to demand the VSA to boycott the Chance Theater.
HOW TO CONTACT YOUR STUDENT REPRESENTATIVES:
VSA President: Carlos Eduardo Espina [email protected]
VSA Chair of Programming: Emily Chong [email protected]
VSA Chair of Finance: Emily Janoski [email protected]
Senior Class Council President: Heather Nguyen [email protected]
Class of 2020 Senators: Sasha Luckau ([email protected]), Vincent Zarate ([email protected]) and Ankit Kholsa ([email protected])
Class of 2021 Fall Senators: Prashit Parikh ([email protected]), Rachael Kraft ([email protected]), and Nahid Mahmud ([email protected])
Class of 2022 Senators: Diego Barrutia ([email protected]), Diego Scala Chavez ([email protected]), and Xan Wolstenholme ([email protected])
A petition asking the Chance Theater to cancel the Confederate Railroad band’s performance can be found here.
