A VICE Intern Is at the Centre of a Racism Row

Above left: Austrian VICE Alps intern Tori Reichel

Tori Reichel is a journalism student at the University of Vienna. He is also interning for VICE Alps. At the opening of the new Journalism Institution, he sat down on the stairs to chat to two of his friends, when a photographer took their photo. So far, so not racist. But when the university’s new website launched earlier this year, Tori noticed that photo of him was being used… like, a lot. Especially on pages that said things like "INTERNATIONAL" and "WE WELCOME STUDENTS FROM ABROAD". Which is weird, because Tori is extremely Austrian. He just happens to be black.

Tori responded to this in an open letter to the uni published at VICE Alps (read the whole thing here), which has since made headlines, both nationwide and in Germany's Der Speigel. In it, Tori wrote: “The funny thing about the picture: this guy on the picture is not ‘from abroad’. He is not an Erasmus [the name of the university's foreign exchange programme] student. I know this, because it is me on the picture. I study journalism here and I have no idea how I got to be your poster child for internationality.

“I myself would have probably not noticed that I'm regularly seen on the website. But a lot of other students have sent me the link to the picture, because they find it absurd that I have become the symbol for the exchange students."

“This is also very striking: if you are advertising your research, you show people in white coats. If you are advertising your library, you show people with books. And if you are advertising your internationality, for some strange reason, you show me.

“I don’t want to be a hater – I simply expected more of you. Don’t be angry: I like you and I am grateful for just paying €1,850 per semester to get a more or less useful education. One more thing is important to me: I don’t feel good talking about my skin colour and making this an issue. But I am tired of being your figurehead for internationality without ever being asked. I hope you understand this.”

For their part, the university’s social team reacted quickly, promising Tori that the photo selection was not deliberate and pulling the picture from the website immediately, adding, “We will endeavour in future to be more sensitive in our photo selection.” But damn, people. Maybe in 2015 it would be cool if we all promise to stop being racist, latently or otherwise. Especially if we are universities.

@joelgolby