Do you remember this face? You might.
That angry pointing lady above used to be a professor at Mizzou until she got all ‘roid rage Jinx Monsoon on a student journalist attempting to cover a protest, after which — with a long drawn out process in-between — she was fired.
Now, Melissa Click (see above re: angry pointing lady) is speaking out and placing the blame squarely where it belongs: on the fact that she’s white. Wait, what?
Melissa Click, the scowling face of campus repression and candidate for least self-aware person in academia, is attempting to rewrite history in her remarks to an all-too-sympathetic reporter for The Chronicle of Higher Education.
Click’s confusion is such that she sees herself as a white savior of oppressed black students on campus while simultaneously believing that the university fired her because she was a white lady. She is also actively courting free-speech-martyr status, despite the fact that she repeatedly attempted to censor journalists and faculty members. Click isn’t sorry; she’s sorry she got caught.
Let’s delve into some of this nonsense:
But while the video of her screaming at a student went viral, turning her into the Melissa Click, the confrontation on a quad during a protest here last year really wasn’t that remarkable, in her mind. The assistant professor of communication at the University of Missouri was just doing what other professors and administrators were doing there, too, she says. So why did she lose her job? She has one idea. Under pressure from state legislators, she says, Missouri’s Board of Curators fired her to send a message that the university and the state wouldn’t tolerate black people standing up to white people. “This is all about racial politics,” she says. “I’m a white lady. I’m an easy target.”
But if the university’s actions were about sending a message to black people, why was a white person the only one disciplined? If it’s true, as Click claims, that she was singled out because of her race, than she’s really alleging that the university was too kind to people of color engaged in similar activism.
Issues of race, activism, and liberty are kind of beyond the scope of your humble author’s intended purpose for this site, so we’ll just leave that there and move on.
A concerned friend of Click’s has turned to GoFundMe to raise funds for her legal defense against what she calls the “politically and racially-motivated anger” that led to Click’s firing. The funny thing being, Click wouldn’t be in this situation in the first place had she not flipped her shit on the student journalist, but I guess that wouldn’t make for a good GoFundMe story would it?
Dear friends of Melissa,
Many of you have been following the story of videos taken of Melissa last fall while she was supporting the efforts of students of color (ConcernedStudent1950) on the University of Missouri campus. I won’t retell all the details here (see links below).
After months of support from the University, including positive assurances that she will be afforded due process, the politically and racially-motivated anger of Missouri legislators, the Board of Curators, and the MU chancellor, Melissa has been fired from the University of Missouri and her appeal rejected.
Alongside the American Association of University Professor’s announcement that they will investigate the University of Missouri’s failure to follow university procedure, Melissa has retained an employment lawyer experienced with faculty cases. The lawyer’s services are costly and Melissa needs to raise funds quickly for a retainer and for costs associated with Melissa’s case (filing fees, deposition charges, travel between St. Louis and Columbia). Melissa has been advised to expect these costs to be around $25,000.
The past four months are taking a severe toll on our friend. She has endured blow-after-blow and now has to make some very difficult decisions. In addition, she and her family have lost the income that came from her faculty salary. Because she was fired, her eligibility for unemployment is uncertain. While Melissa is looking for new employment, the academic hiring process and time of year will make it difficult for her to find comparable work soon. Furthermore, Melissa has been advised that her legal battle will likely take 1.5 to 2 years to complete.
In other words, because other people are mad (not Click), internet strangers should be expected to pay her way while she battles her way through court over the decision she made to get mouthy with a student journalist well within his rights.
So far, she’s got $13k toward a $38k goal. She also has a lovely collection of comments questioning what on earth these people are thinking.
In case you missed it, you can watch Click’s confrontation here. Judge for yourself.
