Racial slurs disrupt virtual Winter Ball
The Crohn’s and Colitis Foundation’s Winter Ball was interrupted by a racially charged incident Saturday evening. One or more intruders infiltrated an externally hosted chat platform and used racial slurs and other inappropriate language during the livestreamed, virtual event, organizers confirmed.
The incident occurred as Roslyn Bazzelle Mitchell, a Black honoree, appeared onscreen. She is one of this year’s 10 Women of Distinction.
Screenshots from the live event on Vimeo show one user post “congrats (racial slur)” repeatedly in the chat feature during Mitchell’s video presentation.
“It happened within a matter of seconds,” said Leigh Ellen Key, executive director of the foundation’s South Texas Chapter. “Essentially there would be a quick series of the word before the users were cut off. Unfortunately, they were able to pop back in again.”
In August, hackers disrupted S.A.F.E. Diversity Communities’ virtual gala with racial slurs and sex sounds. The Harris County nonprofit advocates for stu
dents with disabilities. The FBI and the Harris County Sheriff's Office are investigating the incident as a hate crime.
The Crohn’s and Colitis Foundation on Monday had not yet filed a police report of the incident.
Sharon Saias, vice president of marketing and communications for the Crohn’s and Colitis Foundation, confirmed that the organization has a transcript of the exchange, and that an investigation is underway. The foundation’s chief technology officer, CEO and senior leaders have asked the hosting partner to determine how the security breach took place, she said.
“We think it was a professional, not an attendee,” Saias said. “They were able to get back on, so the chat function was shut down.”
Karana Audiovisual Services LLC handled pre-recorded video and streaming.
On Saturday night, Mitchell hosted a small group of women in her home for a watch party. The plan had been to celebrate the friends who have inspired her. When Mitchell received text messages with screenshots of the racial slurs in the chat box, she excused herself to process what she saw.
“I took about 10 minutes and decided to keep on moving forward,” she said. “I cannot go back downstairs with my guests and be crying. So we still enjoyed each other, and it was fabulous.”
Mitchell said that she slept on it and let the foundation’s president and CEO, Michael Osso, know on Sunday that she was unhappy about what happened. Mitchell — an attorney, accessories designer, fitness expert and the mother of a 10-year-old son with husband Derrick Mitchell — hopes that the organization takes the necessary steps to prevent this from happening
again.
“This is one of those things where I’m trying not to take it personally. But the fact that someone saw an African American woman being celebrated, and had the angst to want to tear that down and put me in my place ... I’m just trying to channel that into action,” Mitchell said. “I don’t want anyone who acts like that to feel like they’ve succeeded. I want to focus on the fact that despite this, we had a fantastic event.”
Over the weekend, Houston Ballet Ball host committee members re-evaluated next month’s virtual Ballet Ball format in light of Saturday’s incident.
“It is such a shame that this spectacular event and the incredible
women it honors were overshadowed by this appalling behavior,” said Angela Lane, chief development officer of Houston Ballet. “The Ballet Ball, set for Feb. 20, will also be virtually hosted on Vimeo. We do not plan to enable the chat feature, as our event is structured around an at-home dinner experience in addition to the presentation.”
The 2021 class of Women of Distinction also includes Robin Angly, Lara Bell, Donae Chramosta, Tracy Faulkner, Leila Perrin, Pat Mann Phillips, Christie Sullivan, Beth Zdeblick, Sherri Zucker and this year’s ambassador, Beth Wolff. Joanne King Herring received the inaugural Paul Somerville Legacy Award.
The event’s honored hero, Wendy Kovich, shared her experiences with Crohn’s disease on the live stream. Kovich and Johnny “Bravo” Holloway shared hosting duties with co-chairs Amy Pierce, Kristina Somerville and Stephanie Tsuru.
The event raised $400,000 to fund inflammatory bowel disease research.
On Sunday, the foundation sent emails to supporters expressing “deep regret that our participants had to see such terrible language in what we had intended to be a safe place where we could celebrate our community and our honorees. As an organization that is deeply committed to anti-racism, we have been actively expanding
our diversity and inclusion efforts in our research, patient engagement, staffing and more.
“The foundation is actively investigating this incident with our technology vendors to ascertain exactly how the hackers were able to infiltrate our event and to try to prevent anything like this from happening again. We are saddened that this incident marred an otherwise wonderful celebration of our inflammatory bowel disease community and our amazing honorees.”
“We’re taking this extremely seriously,” Saias said. “I’m confident we will get to the bottom of this.”