No Mag Is an Island

NO QUESTION about it, these folks unashamedly claim to be in exclusive possession of The Truth.

In the manifesto of Peninsula--Harvard's new right-wing magazine--the editors declare that "We exist to tell the truth." The word "truth" appears 14 times in the statement of purpose--more than once for every three sentences. The editors immodestly proclaim that they are the "good men" whose intervention will save us from "the triumph of evil."

If the message of Peninsula can be distilled into two sentences, this is it: There are certain absolute moral truths that cannot be rationally discerned, but which must nevertheless be accepted on faith. These beliefs are not only the moral beacon for our personal behavior; they are universally applicable, and should be enforced by government decree, if necessary.

Oddly enough, the editors disclaim self-righteousness, saying that they are "fallible" and as open to "recognize that we will make mistakes" as the next person.

But the implication is clear. Mistakes can only be of one sort--errors of logic that lead them to derive incorrect conclusions from absolutely correct premises. Those premises are The Truth: homosexuality is immoral, abortion is immoral, contraception is immoral, sex for enjoyment is a violation of natural law. The Truth is immutable.

And it must be evangelized.Peninsula doesn't disguise this agenda: "[N]o one should come to Harvard with a firm grasp of the truth just to lose it in the quagmire of attitudes prevalent here...[W]e hope to present the truth in such a manner that those willing can accept and believe it," (emphasis mine).

This isn't the language of a journal of opinion; it's the language of a tent revival. For the Peninsula editors, Harvard isn't a place for the pursuit of truth, but the maintenance of Truth--the defense of dogma against dissenters. Forget thinking, exploration and questioning. What this "moral wasteland" needs is a healthy dose of belief.

SOME articles in Peninsula attempt rational defenses of their moral disapproval. One piece goes to great lengths to argue that homosexuality and contraception are immoral because they are "inescapably unnatural." Abortion, the author argues, is "an act contrary to nature in its most basic sense."

The naturalist fallacy in this argument is easy to discern. By the author's moral criteria, taking a dose of penicillin to cure strep throat is a profoundly immoral act.

But most of the articles don't even aim for rational persuasion--fallacious or not. The basic thrust of the magazine is not rigorous debate, but frightened reaction against "moral decay and degradation."

Thus, one piece does nothing but portray a stark, future utopia at Harvard in which a perverse sexual morality reigns and heterosexuals are executed for their failure to "experiment with an alternative lifestyle." The author doesn't recognize the irony that the improbable, intolerant nightmare she envisages--one for which no liberal would ever wish--is merely a mirror image of the more conventional sexual morality that she evidently sincerely wishes to impose on everyone.

Matthew M. McDonald '92, a member of Peninsula's "council," is much more explicit in his advocacy of legislating The Truth.

McDonald gives a version of the fallacious naturalistic argument that is more consistent with Peninsula's philosophical underpinnings. "Bad things really do happen when one violates basic laws of nature...gonorrhea, AIDS, and drug overdose."

When you disagree with The Truth, you have to reckon with divine justice. Are you sexually attracted to people of your own gender? Remember Sodom and Gommorrah.

"[A]ge-old evils," McDonald writes, "can be tolerated only to the ruination of our society and its citizenry....Our laws must reflect what we believe to be good and right and true for all members of society."

Now we see why Peninsula staffers feel so uncomfortable at Harvard. If their first issue accurately reflects their beliefs, they must reject everything a liberal university upholds--tolerance of individual differences, personal autonomy and skepticism of dogma.

In short, the magazine is the product of a totalitarian impulse, (which may explain its obsession with the pre-Vatican II incarnation of the Catholic church, with its insistence on doctrinal purity and intolerance of dissent).

Of course, Peninsula staffers have every right to publish these views. Fortunately for them, the rest of Harvard doesn't treat them as they would like to treat the rest of Harvard.