Mimi Groves: Tennessee university ‘caving in to hysteria’ by kicking out student over racial slur, says lawyer
The University of Tennessee has been accused of "caving in to hysteria" over its decision to kick a teenager out of her dream college after a video of her using a racial slur when she was 15 went viral online. Shan Wu, an attorney representing student Mimi Groves, said that the university had made a "rush to judgment" after facing backlash over Groves' usage of the n-word, Fox News reported.
The clip -- which lasted barely three seconds -- was leaked online by her biracial classmate Jimmy Galligan, who obtained the Snapchat video showing Groves sitting in traffic before looking into the camera and saying, "I can drive, n****s!"
The video was taken right after the Heritage High School student had received her learners' permit at age 15. Following outrage over the video, several members on social media demanded the university essentially "cancel" the championship-winning cheerleader and revoke her admission offer. Nonetheless, Wu defended his client in a statement to Fox News.
"Mimi was a kid when she did this. She's appalled, and having said that, she's not trying to excuse (her actions) in any way," Wu told the outlet. "What she lost was her dream. Like many athletes, she had worked most of her young adult life for a shot at going to a great school and being on their team. That was taken away from her in what can only be described as a rush to judgment."
According to Wu, the "University of Tennessee caved in - in a panic, to a lot of hysteria, a lot of social media going on - and they didn't give her a meaningful investigation - which would have revealed that this happened years ago, and would have revealed the context of it."
As we previously reported, Groves' biracial classmate Jimmy Galligan publicly shared the video in June after waiting for the right moment "to get her where she would understand the severity of that word."
The 18-year-old plotted to leak the video after Groves had been admitted to her dream college. The high school varsity cheer captain was accepted onto the university's cheer team in May this year. "If I never posted that video, nothing would have ever happened. I’m going to remind myself, you started something. You taught someone a lesson," Galligan told the New York Times, adding that he had no regrets about sharing the video and jeopardizing Groves' future.
Interestingly, Groves was urging her followers on Instagram to “protest, donate, sign a petition, rally, and do something" to support the Black Lives Matter movement when she was met with a major backlash over her comments, which became public after the video had been leaked by Galligan just moments before and begun circulating online. The footage went viral across multiple social media platforms including TikTok and Twitter, where several demanded that the university revoke Groves admission.
On Wednesday, following a racist video and photo surfacing on social media, Athletics made the decision not to allow a prospective student to join the Spirit Program. She will not be attending the university this fall. (3/4)
— UT Knoxville (@UTKnoxville) June 4, 2020
While Galligan is enrolled in his freshman year at Vanguard University in California, Groves is taking online classes at a nearby community college while surrounded by her trophies and medals. “I’ve learned how quickly social media can take something they know very little about, twist the truth and potentially ruin somebody’s life,” she said.
One of Groves’s friends, who is Black, told NYT that she had personally apologized for the video long before it went viral. “We’re supposed to educate people not ruin their lives all because you want to feel a sense of empowerment,” she wrote in a Snapchat post, according to the newspaper.
"I'm not perfect," Groves said in a statement to Fox News. "What I said several years ago as an adolescent, in a short 3-second clip was wrong, irresponsible, degrading and I take full responsibility for my actions - and will continue to learn and understand the history and true meaning of that word."
"I hope others learn from my mistake and understand that words can hurt deeply, and it's never OK to say a racial slur to anyone," she added.