‘It’s solely on the kids, the school shouldn’t be punished,’ says woman who posted Citadel Photos

CHARLESTON, S.C. (WCIV) — The 19-year-old woman who posted photos to Facebook of Citadel cadets wearing white hoods says she doesn’t know why the images were shared with her, but she’s hopeful the people involved learned a lesson.

The woman, who asked not to be identified, said she thought people should know about the images.

“It worried me and I thought more people should know about it, which is why I kind of posted it in the first place,” she said.

She says it started on a popular dating app. She matched with a guy she had never seen before, they talked, traded Snapchat accounts, and continued talking. At one point, the man told her “I always wanted a black girl.”

She says she stopped responding to his advances, but when she looked at her Snapchat feed she could see his story on her feed. When she looked at the story, she could see the photos and videos of the Citadel cadets singing and laughing.

“I screenshotted and decided to share because I was so offended,” she wrote in the Facebook post. “Was this their idea of some kind of joke?”

The woman says in the post that the guy told her the pictured cadets were ghosts and they were only joking.

“They even like comment in one of the videos saying that it’s not what it looks like. They’re supposed to be ghosts, but they’re not white supremacists or something like that,” she said Thursday night.

She says the guy asked her to remove her post, and she did. A number of other cadets also messaged her she said, asking her to remove the post.

But she decided to repost it because she thought it was important other people saw the photos. It gave her friends a chance to offer input on what she had seen.

“Would anybody else take this as really just singing Christmas carols or supposed to be dressed up as ghosts?  ‘Cause in my opinion that’s not…” she said. “That’s not what it looked like at all.”

The Facebook post went viral overnight, she said. When she woke up Thursday morning, news agencies across the country were hoping to land an interview with her. And she quickly realized the images would become the center of a firestorm at South Carolina’s military college, The Citadel.

Still, she doesn’t know why any cadets would want to pose for those images or share them on social media.

“If you’re creating outfits for a skit or whatever they were doing, and you create an outfit that looks like that and you know that, you should not post it,” she said.

But she’s hopeful the cadets involved learned from their mistake. “I think it’s solely on the kids, and the school shouldn’t be punished for something like this,” she said.

During the conversation with ABC News 4 Thursday night, the woman says she has no ill will towards the cadet who shared the videos or the cadets involved.

She said she hopes that they are able to remain cadets, adding she thinks the public shame should be lesson enough for them — and others who think it’s funny to dress up as a racist.

Eight cadets suspended in aftermath of white hood photos

After photos surfaced on social media showing Citadel cadets in white hoods and reportedly singing Christmas carols, eight cadets have been suspended from the school as an investigation continues into the photos.

In a statement from The Citadel’s Lt. Gen. John Rosa, the cadets “were singing Christmas carols as part of a ‘Ghosts of Christmas Past’ skit.  These images are not consistent with our core values of honor, duty and respect.”

Rosa goes on to identify the student in blue as an upperclassmen. Rosa said suspension proceedings had begun for the students involved, but the investigation was ongoing. Since then, school officials said eight students had been suspended.

Their identities were not released.

In one Facebook post, a girl was reportedly “threatened, harassed and offered money from numerous Citadel Cadets to take it offline in order to not ‘ruin their lives.'”

The woman who originally posted the images said no one ever threatened her, however.

A source with knowledge of The Citadel’s rituals said the incident happened in one of the school’s barracks, and that based on the way the men in white hoods are standing, they are likely first year students, known as “knobs,” and this could be considered a form of hazing.

Discussion on Yik Yak, another social media app popular among college students, shows that a mandatory meeting was called by administrators Thursday morning. That’s where the student body as a whole learned of the incident.

The story is also being discussed on The Citadel’s minority alumni pages. Moderators of the page pointed out the global attention on the Confederate Flag flying at the Statehouse after the Emanuel AME shootings led to its takedown despite decades of effort to have it removed before then.

“In many cases it takes a microscope or flashlight larger than The Citadel’s in order to create change or in the least be able to highlight negatives,” the moderator wrote.

Dr. Lamont Melvin, the chairman of the Citadel Minority Alumni Association, released a statement condemning the photos and also praising Rosa for the swift action.

“This is not the first, second or third time that racially charged events have been documented to have occurred at The Citadel.  It is easy to try to isolate events of this sort to a single item or incident, which would, on its face, be a disservice to minority cadets who have and are currently attending The Citadel.  This issue is much bigger,” he wrote.

“It’s a cultural issue and it must be addressed and it must end now.  When racist acts occur on campus, ALL students, black and white should feel the same degree of outrage that we do.  As minority alumni and wearers of the ring, we expect The Citadel to carry out the core values of creating principled leaders…not racist leaders.”

Other graduates said they were happy with Rosa’s statement about the incident, but said they wanted to see administrators to do more to address the underlying issues at The Citadel that made students think this was acceptable behavior.

Officials at The Citadel said the statement from Rosa would be all that was released, and they were making no plans to make on camera statements regarding the incident.

Public condemnation leads to calls for expulsion, resignation

Leaders from around the Charleston area also condemned the photos and the National Action Network is calling for Rosa’s resignation.

The group will hold a press conference Friday morning from the front of The Citadel to address the photos.

Charleston NAACP first vice president Joe Darby called the photos and the actions of the cadets stupid.

“Well, it’s stupid on so many levels. On the one level, it’s stupid if these college students did not find the optics of that to be disturbing. If they really thought that it was for a Christmas skit, then that doesn’t say much to what they’ve learned at The Citadel,” Darby said. “If it was what it looks like, then it’s grossly insulting and it says something about their upbringing.”

WCIV-TV | ABC News 4 – Charleston News, Sports, Weather Clay Middleton, a 2003 graduate of The Citadel and Hillary for South Carolina state director, said he was appalled by the photos, but said he thought school officials would carry out the appropriate investigation to prevent similar incidents in the future. “‘Diversity and inclusion’ must not just be an office, but rather it must reflect a culture of awareness and respect. Racism on campus is an ugly but real truth facing students at colleges across the country. Disturbing incidents like this push intolerance to the surface,” Middleton said. “People of color all too often face subtle, everyday racism at school and work. We must continue to confront the hard truths of our past by correcting the inequities facing African-Americans in South Carolina in our schools, prisons, and neighborhoods.” State Sen. Marlon Kimpson called for the students’ expulsion, adding that he had talked with Rosa after learning of the photos and that the students may be expelled once the investigation is completed.

Statement Regarding The Citadel Cadets Wearing Klu Klux Klan Style Hoods: https://t.co/gYzMsvLrDv — Sen. Marlon Kimpson (@KimpsonForSC) December 10, 2015

“Yet we cannot be satisfied by simply punishing this bad behavior. We must uproot it forever,” Kimpson said in a statement, calling for a removal of the Confederate Flag that hangs in Summerall Chapel.

Democratic presidential candidate Martin O’Malley’s campaign echoed that call Thursday night.

“It’s time for the state legislature to amend the Heritage Act to allow for The Citadel to follow the lead of its Board of Visitors and finally remove the Confederate Naval Jack Flag from the Summerall Chapel. The horrific pictures that surfaced today serve as a reminder that racism and intolerance still exist on college campuses and a public institution of higher learning should not be home to such a divisive and offensive symbol,” said O’Malley’s South Carolina Director Tyler Jones.

This is not the first time that flag has drawn attention from elected officials.

Shortly after the mass shooting at Emanuel AME, a little more than two miles from The Citadel’s campus, the school’s Board of Visitors voted to remove the flag, but the state’s Heritage Act would have to be amended to actually take it from the hall.

Rosa said at the time that one of the Emanuel 9 was a graduate school alumnus and six employees of the military school lost family members in the shooting.

About six week later, the state’s only Democratic congressman Jim Clyburn called for its removal, calling it “a ticking time bomb.”

A year earlier, a Charleston County Council member wanted to withhold $1 million in funding from the school until it was removed. The Confederate Battle Flag has hung in the chapel since 1939 when it was gifted to then-president Gen. Charles Summerall.

That year, the Cadet Yacht Club gave the president the flag as a gift after student engineers said the acoustics in the chapel would improve with flags hanging from the ceiling.

Summerall, after receiving the flag, reportedly referred to it as “a tribute to the courage and valor shown by American manhood in fighting for a cause.”

That Confederate Battle Flag was the first of many gifts and exchanges between The Citadel and other states and countries.

In that case, Solicitor General Robert Cook handed down an opinion saying the flag is a memorial and should remain in place.

The Attorney General’s office has, over the last 15 years, rendered three other opinions on similar questions of the Heritage Act. In each, it opined the monuments or memorials could not be moved.

Still, six months after the shooting, the flag — and the state’s Heritage Act — remain untouched.

History between The Citadel, Mother Emanuel dates back to earliest days

Before The Citadel moved above the Crosstown, it held a space on Marion Square after the state legislature created it in 1842. Before that site became a military college, it was the South Carolina State Arsenal.

When the Civil War began, it was Citadel cadets who fired the first shots, and many of them joined the war effort. During that time, the cadets who stayed behind were often called to help train recruits, guard prisoners, and protect arms and other supplies.

For more than 15 years after the Civil War, the school was closed while Union troops occupied the grounds. In 1882, the military school resumed operation.

But the Arsenal was built in the 1830s after the 1822 slave revolt led by Denmark Vesey, who also helped found Mother Emanuel.

Nervous slaves leaked the details of the planned revolt and he was arrested before it could be carried out.

The church he founded was burned and Vesey, along with dozens of others, were hanged for the revolt.