Blacks say they face some bias at BYU

Most white people don't understand the daily frustration of being stared at or followed in stores or being asked to speak for an entire race, Smith says. And those are the minor annoyances.

The father of one black player currently suspended said his son called him shortly after arriving in Provo to tell him he "felt like he was segregated."

"You feel like you're always under surveillance, that you're always being watched," Smith says players have told him. "And if you're being watched, you're bound to slip up. You feel like a fish out of water."

"We have already paid the price all over the country for all this ignorance. It's time to stop," President Harwell says. "It's time to judge a person by their character, not the color of their skin."

Because many people in Utah have had little exposure to blacks, they form opinions based on what they see in movies or in music videos, President Harwell says. It's an observation shared by Whalen.

"When they see a black person, the first thing they think is trouble. They say, 'Oh, this guy's a thug,' and that's not true at all. That's just as racist as going up to some little black kid and calling him a (racial slur)."

Both President Harwell and Smith have talked to players recently dismissed for Honor Code violations, as well as their parents. The families feel hurt and betrayed, Smith says, and are growing impatient with how long the Utah County Attorney's Office has taken to investigate the case.

"If they're guilty, we as a black community want them charged and arrested," President Harwell says. "But if they're not guilty, then let them go. They have left these boys hanging since August. There's no proof anything went on.

"If they were white? I don't know what would've happened. But with no evidence, with nothing on them, I think they would have been given the benefit of the doubt."

Three black football players currently on the team — Curtis Brown, Daniel Coats and Antwaun Harris — say they don't think the Honor Code Office or the Provo police discriminate.

"It's not if you're white, it's if you're right or wrong," Coats says. "Anybody could've done it, and it would've come out the same way."

Still, Coates admits adjusting to life in Utah is difficult for blacks.

"I've lived here a good part of my life, and it still shocks me how ignorant some people are."

The search for answers

Holmoe, the BYU athletic department administrator, is white, but he understands how it feels to adjust to a different culture. When Holmoe came to play football for BYU, he found Provo "peculiar." After all, he wasn't LDS, and he was coming to Utah from Los Angeles.