The Division of Student Affairs, the Office of Student Conduct, OU Fitness and Recreation and Student Life are looking into an incident from Jan. 17 at the intramural soccer fields where an OU international student alleged members of the OU Men’s Lacrosse Club made racist remarks toward a group of international students.
Ali Barazi, a computer science sophomore from Syria, said he and his friends were playing on the fields when a member of the OU Lacrosse Club came and told them “in a very rude way” to leave the field.
While moving their group of 13-14 people off the field, Barazi said a group, including him and a few friends, walked over to the team to ask why they had to leave and requested the team use a more polite tone the next time they needed the field. Barazi said this resulted in increased verbal aggression from a member of the lacrosse team.
“Then the guy … got kind of aggressive again and was like, ‘Oh, you guys come here every Saturday and depreciate the value of our soccer goals, of our lacrosse goals, and you kick the ball at them,’” Barazi said. “I've seen those goals be there during the snowstorms and during all the rain and thunderstorms, and I don't know how kicking a soccer ball was gonna depreciate it any more than that.”
Barazi said his friend asked if they could use a set of broken goals on the field to continue their game.
“One guy from the back (of the group) responded. … The guy was like, ‘You Mexicans, we are not giving you shit,’” Barazi said. “And I don't think there was a single Mexican there. … It was kind of rude.”
Following this, Barazi said verbal insults were exchanged between him, his group and the team.
“As we were walking away, a bunch of people were like, ‘Yeah, go take your soccer ball and go back to Mexico,’” Barazi said. “I stopped, and I'll be honest, I did say some things back, but none of it was any racist language whatsoever. I may have thrown a couple of insults back at them in the heat of the moment.”
Barazi said he and his friends decided to leave and when they did, a member of the team came over to them and explained they wanted to prevent injury by asking Barazi’s group to leave the fields.
“They said, ‘Okay, (if) you don't want to leave, don't leave, but what if this ball hits you? It may kill one of you because it's very hard,’” Barazi said. “I can't say for sure that that was a threat. It may have been (that) he was actually warning us. … The general tone of the situation and the stuff they had said during that whole altercation makes it seem like it could have been a very clever way of making a threat.”
Ammar Al Batrani, an architecture engineering senior present during the incident, sent an email to various individuals following Jan. 17: Scott Fritzen, the dean of the College of International Studies; Rebecca Cruise, the associate dean of the College of International Studies; Robyn Rojas, director of International Student Services; David Surratt, the vice president of Student Affairs; and Garry Armstrong, the associate director of OU Fitness and Recreation.
“When you are a minority, and you hear those words directed to you, it is immoral and against the University of Oklahoma values,” Batrani wrote. “It was such an unpleasant situation to all of us as (an) international community here. It is a shame that such situations keep happening at OU and no proper actions are taken.”
Kesha Keith, the Student Affairs director of communications, wrote in an email that the Division of Student Affairs will meet with the lacrosse club members, their adviser and the group of international students who reported the incident. Fit+Rec is also analyzing the process of securing field access on intramural fields.
The OU Lacrosse Club wrote to The Daily via Facebook that, on Monday, there was a “misunderstanding” with the group of students who were on the field during their allocated practice time using OU Lacrosse Club-owned equipment.
“After a brief conversation, the students left the field, and we continued with our scheduled practice with no further incident,” a spokesperson from the lacrosse team wrote. “Team leadership is unaware of any derogatory statements made during or after the conversation. Our program respects all students’ rights to use all University facilities. We have met and are currently working with the University to resolve any potential future scheduling conflicts.”
In an email to The Daily, Fritzen wrote that the Office of International Studies supports the international students and “their rights, their well-being, and their belonging in our community.” Fritzen also wrote the office will “take any allegation of discrimination extremely seriously.”
“I feel like something should be done,” Barazi said. “It should be some drastic measure just (because) I feel like if people see where OU stands on this and it's very clear, then stuff like this, I won’t say it'll stop happening, but it will at least make people think twice about doing something like this before they do it. But if nothing at all happens, then I feel like it's just gonna keep going on, and people are gonna think that's completely fine.”
Editor's Note: This article was updated at 3:40 p.m. Jan. 21 to correct Kesha Keith's title and clarify that only Fit+Rec is working on securing the intramural fields.
