Columbia University suspends entire men’s wrestling team over ‘homophobic texts’
The entire men’s wrestling team at Columbia University has been suspended over a string of “racist, misogynistic and homophobic” text messages.
Administrators are looking into the texts, sent between team members, according to the New York Times.
The investigation comes after student news site BWOG published screenshots of texts dating back as far as 2014.
They included “jokes” about rape, as well as homophobic, misogynistic and racist slurs.
One message refers to a fellow student as a “gay fuck”, and another reads: “We got a missing faggot no Jews back at Claremont”.
Of the news that a social evet had been canceled over fears of sexual assaults, one person wrote: “I hope someone actually gets sexually assaulted”
A string of messages refer to black staff members at a UPS store and Black Lives Matter protesters as “nigs” and “niggers”.
And many include derogatory comments about female students. One reads: “Columbia bitches feel entitled to something when in reality they are all ugly socially awkward cunts”.
According to the school’s athletic department, it has “decided that Columbia wrestlers will not compete until we have a full understanding of the facts on which to base the official response to this disturbing matter.”
The New York Times reports that the team did not compete on Sunday, but that it did practice on Monday.
The team is next scheduled to compete at a meet on Sunday.
But many think the suspension does not go far enough, and nearly a thousand people have signed a petition calling for all those involved to be expelled.
Protests were held outside the fraternity house of Kappa Delta Rho, which houses wrestling team members.
