At BYU is it an honor code or a color code?
Yesterday, at the sports blog Deadspin, Darron Smith—who is African-American and Mormon, and editor of the praised Black and Mormon (University of Illinois, 2004)—argued that the Davies incident is but one in a much larger pattern of honor code harrassment of African-American athletes at BYU.
According to Smith, athletes of color, who make up about 23% of the athletes at BYU, make up nearly 80% of the athletes suspended, dismissed, or forced to withdraw for alleged honor code violations. African-American athletes are experiencing a disproportionate rate of honor code enforcement.
Interviews with African-American former BYU athletes conducted by Smith and his co-author Luke O’Brien present an even more damning picture of “bait and switch” tactics used by BYU recruiters inferring, promising, or actually supplying easy access to women and alcohol to lure teenaged athletes to Provo, downplaying the University honor code, then expecting young men to fend for themselves in a highly conservative Utah town where trouble finds black folks fast.