An online exchange, which a Syracuse University administrator called “disrespectful and offensive” at times, played out in every SU student’s inbox Tuesday afternoon after an email meant only for members of a student organization was mistakenly sent to the entire university listserv.

“Stop hitting ‘reply all,’” said Ernest Daily, assistant director of SU’s Collegiate Science and Technology Entry Program, after two people replied all to the mistaken email.

Eight people would eventually “reply all” to the chain before Dolan Evanovich, senior vice president for enrollment and the student experience, sent another campus-wide email clarifying the mistake.

The exchange began just after 1 p.m. when Jordan Lally, acting president of the SU College Democrats, accidentally sent an email, meant only for organization members, to the SU student body listserv. The email was intended to remind members that the organization would vote to endorse Democratic congressional candidate Dana Balter at its next meeting.

Shan Jiang, a graduate student in the School of Information Studies, replied to the email a few minutes later calling it “obnoxious” and “polarizing.”

“Lots of us are still sane and brave enough to be firm believers and defenders of conservative values,” Jiang sent to the email chain.

Carly Beck, a senior in the iSchool, emailed the chain portions of the script to “Bee Movie.”

“Please do not associate mental illness with those who do not believe in conservative political values,” said Tyler Smart, a graduate student in the College of Arts and Sciences, in the exchange about an hour later.

SU policy prohibits student organizations from using university listservs to endorse political candidates, Evanovich said in a separate campus-wide email.  

“Regretfully, because this email was distributed to the entire student body, several additional emails were exchanged, some of which were disrespectful and offensive in nature,” he said.

In a statement to The Daily Orange, the College Democrats apologized for inconveniencing and upsetting members of the SU community.

Published on March 27, 2018 at 10:24 pm

Contact Jordan: jmulle01@syr.edu | @jordanmuller18