Some people seem to want to see racism everywhere. Construction sites are particular targets these days, since looped ropes and cables can be common.
The latest example comes from Central Connecticut State University, where a construction company has been building a new parking structure, The College Fix reported. For Memorial Day, the company used one of the construction cranes to raise an American Flag, which required a steel cable loop. Someone saw this loop and insisted it was a noose, reporting such to campus officials.
As always, instead of trying to educate the university community on not being so quick to assume ill intent, campus officials apologized that someone could be so sensitive or so wanting to be a victim.
“Early this evening, we received a complaint about a possible noose found hanging from a construction site on the CCSU campus. Campus Police … investigated and found that it was not a noose but a standard steel cable loop hanging from a crane,” CCSU president Zulma Toro wrote in a campus-wide email Saturday night.
“A construction crew working on campus hung an American flag from the crane’s cable to recognize Memorial Day,” Toro added.
The Fix reported that Toro explained in her email about steel cable loops being used by cranes, but also mentioned recent reports of “nooses” found at an Amazon construction site. Toro then condemned construction sites for using loops of cable or rope.
“Quite frankly, I think it is reckless and tone deaf behavior,” she wrote. “We have been in contact with the construction company and demanded that the cable be lowered tonight. We have a team on site tonight monitoring the situation.”
The Fix reported, however, that the loop and flag were still up on Sunday morning, because, as interim Vice President for Student Affairs John Tully told Fox 61, the university couldn’t find someone who could safely operate the crane at short notice to take the loop down. Like Toro, Tully also sided with those claiming to be victimized by construction equipment.
“The perception of its noose-like appearance is concerning. We were speaking to people last night who certainly felt some pain, we feel that pain, our president has issued a statement expressing her concern about this and we are working diligently to get it down,” Tully told the outlet.
The fact that this is not a noose but a common construction item was ignored. Fox 61 also interviewed Ronald Davis, president of the New Britain NAACP, who insisted it would be seen as a noose by black people.
“Regardless of what someone else says about that, what I see, as a black man? That’s a noose. Period. No ifs, ands, or buts about it. Take it down,” he said.
A College Fix reader noted that an image of the cable loop that has offended at least one person actually shows there are multiple steel cable loops hanging from the crane, but that the only one mentioned by the offended is the one connected to the American Flag.
“I guess they noticed only the one holding the flag, which means that it’s the flag that triggers them,” the reader told the outlet.
This is simply the latest noose claim that has fallen apart under basic scrutiny. As The Daily Wire previously reported, two black Penn State University professors claimed they saw a noose in a tree behind their house. It turned out to be a length of rope from a swing set.
The most famous recent example involved NASCAR driver Bubba Wallace, whose team claimed to find a noose hanging in their garage stall at the Talladega Superspeedway. The “noose” turned out to be a garage pull that had been hanging for more than a year and was similar to garage pulls in numerous other stalls.
The Daily Wire has also reported on numerous other incidents where a noose turned out to be no such thing. In June 2020, a noose was found in a Harlem park. The New York Police Department investigated the incident and determined it was just some rope left over from construction scaffolding and had been hanging in the park unnoticed for six months. Of course, the determination came after protests and numerous officials, including Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D-NY), chimed in on the alleged hate crime.
In July 2019, the University of Michigan investigated a “noose” that had been found at a shared employee table at the university hospital. That investigation concluded that the “noose” wasn’t actually a noose but a “Uni Knot,” used for fishing. Someone had been practicing and merely left the rope on the table before chaos ensued.