Wylliam Smith, one of the assholes leading the "Iowa Freedom Riders" through their terrorism and destruction in Iowa City, just so happens to be a total racist and black supremacist, at least that's the impression I get when reading his columns a few years ago in the Daily Iowan and watching his dumb short film that is anti-cop fantasy.
Do you mean to say that corporate tools like Hillary Ojeda and Zachary Oren Smith at the Iowa City Press-Citizen, the Cedar Rapids Gazette, the local TV news, or anybody at the Little Village lefty weekly hasn't bother to perform a quick check of Smith's past writings?
Yes, that's right. The same bunch of fucking asshole "journalists" who have no problem with deep diving into Children's Hospital charity organizer Carson King's dumb teenage joke tweets and trashing him, can't be bothered to perform a simple Google search on some dickhead black supremacist racist loser who wants to "defund the police" and amass power through intimidation and destruction.
Let's take a look at some of Wylliam Smith's writings, archived in case the Daily Iowa decides to memory hole this shit.
Headline: Why the University of Iowa needs Black only Events, by Wylliam Smith, published February 12, 2018. Archive link.
Black students should host all-black events made by black people for black people. Black students need events in which there are other black men and women as a means to help them feel comfortable.
Iowa is a strange place. Living in Iowa City, where the population of black individuals is below 10 percent, is something I had never experienced before, and it is constantly changing my viewpoints on race relations. Last year, I would’ve said that all-black or black-only events are wrong.
I’m sure on face value, black-only seems wrong. Separating black kids into areas in which it is just them and excluding other students looks prejudicial. Some may even say it is racist.
But is it? Is asking for a safe place for black students to be black without consequence wrong? No — not only is it not wrong, it is heavily needed, especially here in Iowa.
Only 3.1 percent of students at the University of Iowa are black, according to the UI Undergraduate Admissions. A lot of those students come from Chicago, making that transition to Iowa a real game-changer for them. I don’t even live in Chicago, and it was hard for me to adjust to the overwhelmingly large white-to-black ratio.
Being thrust into a situation like that is almost heartbreaking, because as silly as it sounds, not seeing someone like you can make the campus seem even more foreign. It’s hard to feel the university is your new home or that “you are welcome here” when you constantly feel like an outsider.
Not only that, but being in a white-majority area comes with a cost. In order to be seen as professional, there is almost a constant need to conform. Code switching, or talking white, is just the tip of the iceberg. A black or brown student in Iowa has to talk white, act white, dress white in order to fit in.
Of course you don’t have to conform, but that’s when you get the stares. The people asking you borderline racist questions, the people who cross to the other side of the street when they see you coming, those who follow you throughout the store to make sure you’re not stealing anything.
Having events where black kids can just be black, where they can relax and be themselves without judgment is extremely needed. An environment like this can be lonely for students of color.
I was hesitant to say that UI needed black-only events, and I found myself trying to compromise. I thought perhaps we could have black-theme events that still encourage everyone of coming. But even in situations such as that, you find problems.
Once I took a friend to Panchero’s. The people behind the counter were black, and I started joking with them. After leaving with our food, my friend looked at me and said, “It’s really cool how you can switch from talking white to talking black like that.”
While he may have thought that was a compliment, to me it was slightly annoying and a little sad that he couldn’t even recognize why black people need to code switch in the first place.
Most white people are not inherently trying to be racist, but Iowa as a whole has a culture that either rejects or glorifies blackness. If we have black-only events it removes those ingrained expectations. It rids black kids of the constant need to fight stereotypes. It frees students to truly be themselves, with no onlookers casting judgment.
Wylliam Smith made a weird short film that's available on the University of Iowa Libraries site. It's called PowerLess Smalltown Hero. He uses the music of gay UK band Bronski Beat and their gay anthem "Smalltown Boy" in an amateurish mess that ends with a female cop shooting him in the back for no reason.
Back to Wylliam Smith's columns, because they are telling.
Here is "The Reality of Being Black in Iowa" by Wylliam Smith, published May 2, 2018. Archive link.
When I was about to graduate from high school in Grand Rapids, Michigan, many people ridiculed me for only applying to three colleges. My classmates had applied to eight or nine colleges and insisted I needed to broaden my options.
But I didn’t need to apply to 15 schools because I knew that no matter what happened, I was going to the University of Iowa. I wanted to to go to the UI because I’m a writer, and this is ranked No. 1 in the nation for its writing program.
When I told my family this, my mother said, “Enjoy all the White people and the corn.” I ignored everyone and came here anyway.
I didn’t think about the race, money, or location when I moved here. In my mind, it didn’t matter. I had secured a job at The Daily Iowan, I was a getting a degree for a career I loved, I was making connections with great writers, and I was following my dreams.
It never occurred to me that being one of 1,035 Black students in a school of 33,564 students would be a problem.
It’s been two years since I first visited UI to sign my registration papers. Now, I see the uglier side of Iowa. I see the kids crossing to the other of the street when I walk by. I notice professors complimenting me on how “articulate” I am. I hear conversations cease when I walk into the room.
“Sometimes the s****y part is you don’t know if it’s in your head or if it’s actually happening,” said UI senior Sam Osaro, who is involved in Hubbard Scholars, a black male group on campus, as well as the National Association of Black Journalists.
I felt crazy. People told me I was being overly dramatic, or that I was looking for racism in society, and that’s why I kept seeing it.
“As somebody who studies race, I can say that things aren’t just in people’s head,” said Jessica Welburn, a UI assistant professor of sociology and African American Studies. “I’ve gone into the CVS in the mall and felt like I was being watched and followed … And I knew that [the CVS employee] would never guess that I was a faculty member on campus.”
After my first year, I started to embrace my Blackness, and there was a massive backlash. Whenever I tried to speak out both in my classes and when I wrote for the DI, I was met with hate mail and bigotry.
After I wrote the story “Why the University of Iowa Needs Black-Only Events,” I received an email from “mlucky99” that said, “Can we get our drinking fountains back too. It goes both ways young man. Be careful what you wish for …”
When I grew my hair out, I was told it was nappy. When I wore a hoodie to my job, someone said I looked ghetto.
Black student activist and UI senior Matthew Bruce has described people telling him his natural hair being dreadlocks are unprofessional, and some have suggested he change it for job interviews.
The campus claims it’s diverse, and its motto is, “You Are Welcome Here.” But everywhere I turn, I feel as if I am instead being told, I am not welcome. My feelings on this issue are complex, but some UI students fully feel campus is “anti-Black.”
“My initial gut reaction is no, [UI is] not anti-Black. I think what the campus is, is status quo,” said Nadine Petty, the executive director of the Center for Diversity and Enrichment. “And the status quo here on this campus is White.
“Most of the campus community who are decision-makers are White, which means most of the programming and the services and the campus-focused activities are going to come from a lens that is also White.”
I find that people at the UI liked me more when I was being complicit in the racist beliefs on campus. They liked it when I laughed at stereotypes, such as “all Black men are criminals.”
When I say that this campus is not a place where Black students thrive, I am met with a five-worded response: “You chose to come here.”
Some would argue because of that fact alone, Black students should get over it. We did, after all, choose to go to this school.
Yes, I chose to go here, but I came here because I love to write. I did not come here to suffer racism both in and out of the classroom, and the idea that Black individuals should “know what they are getting into” is asinine to me.
I am not expecting the university population to have a Black percentage in the double digits, but that does not excuse both subtle, and blatant, racism. Saying that racism is just a product of being Black in the Midwest is the reason it still exists.
They did not like it when I wrote stories dissecting those racist beliefs, such as my DI article “Acting Black, acting the part.”
What is there to say about this column?
Grand Rapids, Michigan is only 20% black.
The University of Iowa is dominated by Democrats, which is the party of slavery, Jim Crow, the KKK, separate but equal, and aborting black babies.
Many years ago, it was determined that 8% of employees identified as Republican, and most of them were doctors. I'm sure the number is even smaller today.
Maybe you should be blaming racist Democrats for all your problems, rather than "white people in Iowa".
And, if all that wasn't enough, Wylliam Smith claims to be bi-sexual.
This is from a column headlined "The myth of gay being the new black" by Wylliam Smith, published November 14, 2017. Archive link.
When I was in high school, my school put on the play To Kill a Mockingbird. Regardless of my school’s lack of actual black students in a play that focused heavily on racism, the performance was quite good. Because my school had a heavy majority of white students, the play felt the need to include a questionnaire afterward to open the discussion of racism for the students and their parents.
That was the first time I heard the notion of “gay being the new black.” Of course, my entire family erupted in laughter, thinking the idea was a joke at best, but what I noticed was that other people in the audience were calmly nodding their heads in agreement.
At first I dismissed it, chalking it up to my school just being blind to racism, something that I realized it was prone to do quite a bit. But recently, I have been hearing this idea of “gay being the new black” more and more.
There is no way being a member of the LGBTQIA+ community could ever be compared to being black in America.
Both are two completely separate circumstances that come complete with their own problems. Yes, both are under attack from prejudice, but the situations are in no way the same.
The systemic racism that has been a part of this country since its foundation has caused problems from slavery to unjust shootings of black men to stereotypes as simple as the assumption of amazing athletic ability.
African Americans are still dealing with racism to this day, and it exists on a systemic level. The very play To Kill A Mockingbird, and the book it’s based on, is about the unjust legal system convicting an obviously innocent black man of a crime he didn’t commit.
One thing that separates the two is one cannot hide that he or she is black. You cannot come out as black. You receive racism from the day you’re born and most likely to the day you draw your last breath.
I’m not condoning that some people hide their sexual orientation, but people in the LGBTQIA+ community have a choice to mark the day they start telling people about who they really are. They can wait until they know who they are inside before revealing that to the world. You can’t wait till you’re ready to be black. In most cases, it’s the first thing people notice about me.
As a bisexual black man, I can definitely state that I can see the problems that arise in both situations. I have dealt with racism and with bigots against gay rights. I am not saying that one is easier to handle than the other. But the fact remains is that one problem does not equal the other.
Non-black people of the LGBTQIA+ community don’t face the problems of inherently being seen as delinquents. They don’t have to code switch or learn to “talk white.” They will never struggle with the thought of their names being “ghetto.” And while they do suffer many hate crimes, when police notice them, their defining feature won’t be black male.
After all that narcissistic insanity, what comes next?
Yes, that's right: AWARDS (archive link)
Wylliam Smith was awarded the Master Columnist award, first place, for his racist bullshit in the Daily Iowan. And look at everybody else who won awards: that anti-Semitic bomb-thrower Rekha Basu, that leftist ass-licker Todd Dorman, and thankfully now-dead gambling addict and fatso Ken Fuson.
For being a dick-sucking black guy from Grand Rapids, it seems that Wylliam Smith has done fairly well in Iowa City.
Poor Wylliam Smith. He's never happy.
Just recently the Press Citizen let Smith have a column (archive link) to bitch and moan that "his side of the story" wasn't being told. Smith couldn't even handle a column in the Little Village (archive link) that interviewed a variety of people who took part in the protest.
One wonders why Wylliam Smith continues to hang around Iowa.
It's easy to push around lefty whitey in Iowa. All a black person has to do is spout some racist bullshit in print and the fat white Democrat seals start clapping and giving him awards. A white person couldn't talk that way, or they'd be called a "white supremacist", and rightfully so.
What happens in the future?
I don't know. How long can somebody continue to play the self-hating / narcissistic card before it gets old, they commit suicide, or they get into trouble and have to leave?
If we had a responsible media in Iowa, much less at the University of Iowa, then we wouldn't see this kind of racist stuff printed and Wylliam Smith given awards. He should have been run out of the state a long time ago for being a racist fucking asshole.
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