Yes, We Actually Disagree

THE WORD is out.

We are not a monolith.

We are not uncritical, always agreeing, always smiling, never fighting amongst ourselves.

But at Harvard it is news when "minority students" disagree.

Tuesday, The Crimson reported--in a prominently displayed front-page article--that "members of several campus minority groups criticized a report recently published by their umbrella organization," the Third World Students Alliance. At Harvard, it's news when some members of the Asian-American Association, Black Students Association, Raza, La Organizacion Estudiantil Boricua and American Indians at Harvard disagree.

Why? Perhaps it was decided that these groups had not been covered adequately in the media in recent weeks. Probably a combination of factors led to the prominence of an article about some dissension in Harvard's minority community.

But that coincidence of factors does not minimize the significance of the larger issues presented by the article's appearance. It is not a coincidence that many white students expect to find a homogeneous group when they look at minority-Third World students. To be sure, it is ignorant of them, but it is ignorance born of the realities of American society at large and exacerbated at Harvard.

The national media makes the same sort of fuss over dissension among people of color--as if we're supposed to be a monolith, think alike, see the world in the same way simply because we are a shade darker than others--or for some other reason we can't, or don't want to, explain.

WE ARE A color-conscious society. And as far ahead as I can see--in our lifetimes and in the lifetimes of our children and even our grandchildren--we will remain a color-conscious society.

A mere 20 years of quasi-enforced civil rights do not erase the 300 preceeding. We don't like to talk about it--after all, we are liberal-minded. Sure there are racists, but we're cosmopolitan, urban, sophisticated. Maybe down South they care what color you are, but here in Boston and New York and Washington we don't notice.

Right.

In our backbending efforts to ignore color--and other characteristics we associate with "race" and "ethnicity"--we reveal the very real prominence it has in our society and even in our daily lives. I defy someone to tell me they do not notice the color of the person who reads the evening news or drives them to the airport or walks toward them on a dark street late at night.

Wait a minute, though. We're Harvard students, not racists. Think again. Or ask a Black or Asian-American or Spanish-surnamed student if their ethnicity goes unnoticed by their fellow Harvard students. Is there anyone here who could not give me the exact number of Blacks, Asians, and Hispanics in their freshman entryway--that first Valhalla of Harvard diversity?

It is not so easy to get away from the society that made us--especially here at Harvard. The university reinforces our tendency to try to downplay race and issues of race. We proclaim diversity, but let's not go too far in entrenching it. We wouldn't want to have an assistant dean of minority student affairs like most colleges, or a Third World Students Center like many. We all know that a disproportionate number of Third World students live at Currier and Leverett Houses. But let's not find out why or even talk about it.

So it really shouldn't surprise us that, at Harvard, it is news that minority students disagree.

BUT THE CRIMSON article revealed something even more insidious at work: Third World-minority students have themselves fallen into the trap of thinking they have to agree. Maybe it shouldn't startle me; our views about race are also shaped by the society in which we have grown up and the Harvard environment.

The story quoted one student as criticizing the Third World Students Alliance pamphlet as unrepresentative of "the views of the minority students who are here." Just what are the views of Harvard minority students? It is an impossible question to answer. To begin with, there is the problem of defining "minority;" is it those who checked the box on their application or the ones who go to AAA, BSA, Raza, La O and AIH meetings?

This is simply the wrong question to ask. And asking it can be paralyzing. TWSA does not purport to speak for every minority student on campus. It is an alliance of some members of five organizations which represent some Asian-American, Black, Chicano, Native American and Puerto Rican students.

It will be a sad day when the TWSA decides not to publish a booklet or hold a rally or write a letter because they do not represent the "minority students who are here." The TWSA booklet interpreted the history of Third World students here at Harvard, and did so with, in my opinion, some valid political goals in mind. The booklet represents the views of some minority students here.

Minority students who disagree with its interpretations and conclusions should feel free to obtain funding--perhaps with the help of the college--and do the hundreds of hours of research to put together another booklet. And, of course, they should feel free to criticize this booklet. They have no right to assume, however, that its distribution should come to a halt because it did not involve the majority of minority students.

The attitude that we, as minority students, must agree before we act is paralyzing. It can stop leaders from acting; it can quash the voices of those most committed to a group. Let's get the word out.