Black cook loses job thanks to fallout from racist video.
Chef Howard Dixon, who somehow refrained from poisoning a bunch of racist frat bros. (via Indiegogo)
On Sunday, Blake Burkhart, a former resident of the University of Oklahoma's Sigma Alpha Epsilon house, started an Indiegogo page to help an employee of the house who will now be leaving his job. So far, Burkhart has raised over $37,000 to help the man "land on his feet."
Burkhart describes Howard Dixon, the SAE house cook, as an institution in the house. Though former brothers may not have loved his "chili dogs," Burkhart writes that many "came to love Howard" and his "infectious smile." They also loved the way he took care of "Mom B" (Beauton Gilbow, the frat's 78-year-old "house mother," who now has her own Internet video scandal to deal with).
(via Indiegogo)
Ironically, Dixon is likely to lose his job because of a video leaked Sunday that shows brothers from the house doing a racist chant that included the n-word and references to lynching. The school immediately shut down the chapter.
Burkhart is concerned that "ignorant kids" will not only end up losing Dixon his job, but that Dixon will "learn who [he] has been working for." In Burkhart's word: "a bus full of racist kids."
The campaign seems to have also become a place for SAE brothers who are upset by the video to show their remorse on behalf of their brothers. At least one donor identifies as an "SAE from Penn," while another included this message to SAE brothers:
From an SAE, their actions are not something we support. Their chant was evil, vile and wrong. All the students on the bus need to be kicked out of school. Howard May you land on your feet and never change who you are.
Let's hope the national organization goes beyond this well-meaning symbolic gesture to address the institutional racism that traces to the fraternity's founding.