'It's okay to be white' flyers found on other campuses recently, other schools this time last year

The "It's okay to be white" flyers that were reported Thursday morning to have been found on Duke's campus were not the only ones discovered at schools.

At multiple college campuses across the country, the flyers were reported. From North Carolina State University to Tufts University in Massachusetts.

Last year around this time, the signs were also found on other college campuses. In early November 2017, the signs were found throughout the country and in Canada—spotted in Harvard University, Tulane University and the University of Alberta in Canada. 

Michael Schoenfeld, vice president for public affairs and government relations, wrote in an email that this is the first time he knows of that the flyers have been found on campus. 

"College campuses are frequent targets of anonymous cowards who try to provoke division and discord," Schoenfeld wrote. "To be clear: we denounce these actions for what they are: acts of vandalism that are intended to intimidate, but instead remind us that we are, and will continue to be, a strong inclusive community that stands up to hate and bigotry."

The flyers were first reported by The Chronicle Thursday afternoon, after a Thursday morning email from L.B. Bergene, associate dean of East Campus, to East Campus resident assistants. The flyers were found on the Wilson Dorm bench and the area around Baldwin Auditorium and Bassett Dorm. 

Bergene wrote in the email that at that time it was unknown who placed the flyers there.

Last year, the Washington Post reported that the flyers originated from 4chan in October, and that they were intended to provoke a response. The idea was that media outlets would draw attention to the posters, and that would result in "normies"—a white nationalist term for other white Americans—would then stop viewing news outlets as credible and convert to white nationalism, according to the Post's description. 

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