The University of Virginia has come under fire for suspending campus tours that acknowledged founder Thomas Jefferson’s history of owning slaves. According to NBC News, the tours—which were completed by University Guide Services—have been riddled by a lack of “consistency” in content, school officials have stated.
However, conservative alumni group Jefferson Council have been rallying for the tour program to end because of how the volunteers discussed Jefferson. Apparently, slaveowner isn’t a title they want associated with him...even though that’s literally what he was.
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Oh, the caucasity.
Council president Thomas Neale, who graduated from the University of Virginia in 1974, stated that the tours shouldn’t erase Jefferson’s past as much as it should contextualize it. Jefferson was also this nation’s third president as well as the author of the Declaration of Independence.
The news comes about two months after a new set of appointees—chosen by Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin—confirmed his administration’s control of the university’s governing board of trustees. Currently, his appointees now fill 13 of 17 seats.
“He’s (Jefferson) quoted by every country in the modern era having started a democracy,” Neale said. “There are many commendable things about him. Of course, mention he was a slave owner. That’s not hidden.”
Neale also wants the tour to add that Jefferson signed a law that made importing slaves illegal in 1807, though it was poorly enforced.
In a statement made Wednesday on social media, the University Guide Services said it wants to work with administrators to make the tours “an honest and complete account of UVA and its history.”
University Guide Services added: “To our stakeholders, collaborators, community members, and fellow students, we are deeply sorry that we cannot fulfill our mission to the fullest extent this semester.”
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