Cedar City trends on social media after Halloween video of teens in blackface at Walmart goes viral

Outside the Walmart in Cedar City, Utah, Nov. 1, 2022 | Photo by Jeff Richards, St. George News

ST. GEORGE — A video taken in the Cedar City Walmart on Halloween night of teenagers dressed in blackface and prisoner garb that spread on social media has drawn local, state, national and international outcry. 

Inside the Walmart in Cedar City, Utah, Nov. 1, 2022 | Photo by Jeff Richards, St. George News

In the video, which  St. George / Cedar City News has chosen not to publish, three of the teens are in dark makeup that was once used by minstrel performers to create bigoted caricatures of Black people. They are also wearing “jailbird” costumes with black stripes. Two other teens are seen in police officer outfits holding handcuffs. 

The person filming the video is heard confronting the teens about the appropriateness of the outfits but is laughed off by them.  

After initial confusion as to whether the incident took place in Cedar City or at a Walmart in the Northern Utah suburb of Cedar Hills, Cedar City Mayor Garth Green told St. George / Cedar City News that “it was in Cedar.”

The city and Cedar City Police later released a joint statement that said while police weren’t called to the store at 1330 S. Providence Center at the time of the incident, it is now under investigation. 

“Cedar City Police Department and Cedar City officials do not condone this type of activity,” the statement said.

While many social media users, including the person who filmed the video, talked about a hate crime being committed, Iron County Attorney Chad Dotson said the act of wearing blackface is not technically a hate crime.

“I don’t have enough information watching the video to make that judgment, but certainly just dressing like that is not a hate crime. “

By definition, a hate crime has to be an actual crime, such as theft or assault, that can be linked to hatred of the victim’s race, ethnicity, religion or sexual orientation.

A media representative from Walmart’s corporate offices provided a statement saying that the teens were ultimately kicked out of the store. 

After learning these people were in the building, our associates immediately instructed them to leave the property,” the statement read. “We don’t tolerate discrimination or demeaning behavior of any kind and are incredibly disappointed by what is shown in this video.”

Outside the Walmart in Cedar City, Utah, Nov. 1, 2022 | Photo by Jeff Richards, St. George News

The video, which was initially on the internet video service TikTok, then spread throughout Twitter – where “Cedar City” was among the top trending topics on Tuesday afternoon – as well as Instagram and Facebook.  

It has also spread on national and international media including being reported by the British tabloid Daily Mail.

It also drew the attention of Utah’s governor.

“We strongly condemn racism in all its forms and we call on every Utahn to reject such offensive stereotypes, slurs and attitudes,” Gov. Spencer Cox said in a statement. “We must do better.”

A part of the confusion as to where in Utah the incident took place stemmed from people on social media trying to identify the teenagers involved as well as the schools they attend. 

Shauna Lund, a spokesperson with the Iron County School District, said while they are not able to identify specifically the names of students who may have been involved in the incident, the teens in blackface don’t seem to be students in the area. 

“Based on the information we have obtained, preliminary findings indicate the individuals in blackface are not students enrolled in Iron County schools,” Lund said, though she did not eliminate the possibility that some of those in the video do attend local schools. “We have opened an investigation into the student involvement and will take appropriate action once that investigation is complete.”

St. George News has learned that the switchboards of the high schools in the Cedar City area have been inundated with calls described as harassing as well as accusing the community of being racist. 

In  July 2021, the Iron County School District released a racism directive that said, “Iron County School District will NOT tolerate any action, practice, process or approach that promotes racism.” The month before, a school board measure to ban the teaching of critical race theory – the idea that racism is systemic in the nation’s institutions for the dominance of white people – in area schools was defeated by one vote

In a file photo, the marquee sign on Cedar High School campus showed its “Redmen” mascot, Cedar City, Utah, Jan. 15, 2019 | Photo by Jeff Richards. St. George News / Cedar City News

In 2019, the board removed the “Redmen” mascot from Cedar High because some had determined it was derogatory to Native Americans continues to draw criticism from those who say it is not derogatory. In another recent incident involving race in Cedar City, an elementary school student said students, parents and administrators bullied her because she is half-Black

The spread of some information that has been proven false has nonetheless led to some minors and institutions facing harassment online and offline Tuesday. 

Along with condemning the act, Cedar City officials also cautioned against harassing people online or jumping to conclusions without confirmation – including accusing teenagers or institutions not involved in the incident.

“While topics such as these can cause an emotional reaction, we encourage everyone to be mindful when sharing videos of juveniles on social media, including any cyber or other harassment that can accompany this type of incident,” Cedar City officials said in their statement.

University of Cambridge and Oslo Metropolitan University Researcher Rebekah Larsen, author of an often-cited July study on how Facebook uses people’s personal data, told St. George News that a lack of regulations on how information on minors is spread on social media is leaving young people vulnerable to harassment. 

“My first response is that the U.S. needs more regulation on protecting minors around this sort of thing, but also just people in general,” said Larsen, who before becoming an internationally-known researcher grew up in Utah. 

Larsen noted privacy measures in place throughout the European Union known as the “right to be forgotten” where people can submit to have their information removed from search engines if it is untrue or causes them harm – even mistakes done in their youth. 

“Regulation was pushed because of people who had done things when they were not of age that made it online, and then were keeping them from getting jobs or just impacting their personal lives. But the U.S. doesn’t have anything like that, Larsen said,. “Basically anything that’s being indexed by search engines that’s inaccurate, no longer relevant, potentially harmful and not about a public figure … that person can petition for those search results to be removed from Google.”

St. George News / Cedar City News reporters Nick Yamashita and Jeff Richards contributed to this story.

Copyright St. George News, SaintGeorgeUtah.com LLC, 2022, all rights reserved.

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