Professor Demands Black Staff Get Paid Time Off for ‘Trauma’ over Systemic Racism

Professor Angel Jones of Southern Illinois University Edwardsville has called for black staff to get paid time off to deal with “trauma” from systemic racism.

As a visiting professor, Angel Jones adheres to Critical Race Theory (CRT), which holds that America’s institutions and levers of power are systemically racist and designed to benefit both “white people” and people who attain a status of “whiteness.” In an article published in Times Higher Education late last month, Jones said that black faculty need special paid time off along with special mental health therapy to deal with systemic racism. Per Fox News:

She called campus-wide statements to students in the aftermath of racial events in the news as “obligatory” and “performative,” adding it didn’t go far enough to address Black faculty’s “trauma,” which they need to “process.”

“Where are our counseling services? Where is our grace for missed meetings and deadlines while we mourn? Yes, we have jobs to do and students to support, but we also have trauma to process.”

In order to deal with “racial battle fatigue,” the professor said funding should be allocated to the mental health of Black staff.

Jones said this “racial battle fatigue,” which refers to the psychological impact of systemic racism, has deadly consequences if not dealt with properly, such as suicidal thoughts along with an “elevated heart rate, tension headaches, and stomach ulcers.”

“We experience these symptoms on a regular basis as a result of our first-hand racial trauma,” she said. “Free counseling services, by culturally competent counselors familiar with identifying and addressing [racial battle fatigue], should be available at all times.”

Jones also called for “black bereavement leave,” which will offer the faculty the “space and time to grieve” in the wake of a traumatic event.

“Don’t assume you know what they want or need just because you read this article. Anti-Blackness is intentional, so your efforts to combat it must also be,” she said.

In the wake of the 2020 protests over the murder of George Floyd at the hands of a white police officer, Lecturer Gordon Klein of the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) was placed on mandatory leave when he refused to alter the final exam and grading procedures for black students.