Opinion: Expelling the Ole Miss Students Who Made Monkey Noises Is a Mistake. Educate Them Instead.
Calls for the expulsion of the white University of Mississippi students caught on camera making racist gestures are understandable—the footage is appalling. However, I don’t want them expelled. I want them educated.
On Nov. 6, a Ring doorbell camera outside an apartment shared by three Black University of Mississippi students captured two white female students making monkey noises and beating their chests as they walked past. The footage, shared by student Jakiyra Metcalf, went viral almost instantly.
The university condemned the behavior as unacceptable and launched an investigation through its student conduct and equal opportunity offices, according to 11 Alive. Online, the response has been swift and pretty much unanimous, with people arguing that the women should be expelled.
I’m with condemning the behavior and demanding accountability. But it’s the next step where I disagree. For many, expulsion feels like an appropriate consequence when you look at where this incident took place. I mean, this is Ole Miss after all.
It’s the university where two people died and hundreds were injured on the night of September 30, 1962, when a violent white mob rioted to stop James Meredith, a Black Air Force veteran, from becoming the school’s first Black student. The Kennedy administration called some 31,000 National Guardsmen to enforce order.
It’s the same university where, until recently, fans showed up to football games proudly waving Confederate flags. So, I get why many Black folks have little patience for this kind of behavior, especially there. But let’s pump the brakes on expulsion, because kicking them out could turn them into victims.
We’ve seen this play out before. A white woman gets caught doing something racist, and suddenly she’s the victim. Remember “Permit Patty“—who threatened to call the police on an 8-year-old Black girl for selling bottled water without a permit in 2018? How about “Central Park Karen“—who weaponized 911 in 2020 by falsely telling dispatchers a Black birdwatcher was threatening her life after he asked her to leash her dog?
The moment they got caught, they became the victims. And instead of confronting their racist behavior, these women found sympathy from people who believed they’d somehow been done wrong. Aren’t we tired of that in the year of our Lord 2026? Expulsion would give these women a chance to play the victim. I’d rather they confront what they did.
Now this is where it gets sticky: Punishing racists isn’t the same as changing racism. And, full disclosure, this is me coming at this as a professor who has had to deal with students like this in my classes. We should want more than just punishment for racist behavior. What is needed is for people to understand why anti-Black racism is wrong in the first place. I know you’re rolling your eyes, but hear me out.
There is a difference between someone who stops making monkey noises because they’re afraid of getting expelled and someone who understands the history associated with that behavior and chooses not to do it. One is about consequences. The other is about changing someone’s thinking.
If we’re serious about wanting a country that is less racist, shouldn’t changing racist thinking—not just punishing racist behavior—be the goal? I don’t want these women to learn how to hide their racism better. I want them to confront it.
So, what should the university do? Make staying more demanding than leaving.
Force them to complete a sustained educational program on the history of anti-Black racism. Have them participate in facilitated discussions and written reflections that demonstrate they understand the harm of what they did. And if they fail to do what is required or if they mess up again, then the university can expel them. No one would fault them at that point.
Black people deserve more than a world where racists learn to hide how they truly feel. We deserve a world with fewer of them. Expulsion would give us the former. Education would give us the latter.
