Crimson, University Unfair to AALARM

The Association Against Learning in the Absence of Religion and Morality (AALARM) takes exception to the April 17 Crimson story describing Joshua Oppenheimer's vandalism of an AALARM poster. Although Robert Wasinger of the AALARM Presidential Council provided Crimson reporter Steven Engel with an eyewitness statement of what occurred, the reporter ignored his statement and reported only Oppenheimer's version of events, without giving the unsuspecting reader any reason to suppose that what actually happened was a matter of controversy.

Oppenheimer (apparently to buttress his dubious claim that he had "participated in a debate") claimed that he and Wasinger exchanged words before Oppenheimer tore down the poster (apparently unaware of Wasinger's presence as a representative of AALARM) before Wasinger approached him. The Crimson reporter also failed to report that Oppenheimer made a call to Wasinger late that night, threatening him personally with "retaliation" if Wasinger and AALARM pursued his case with the administration. This, apparently, is the kind of "non-violent, non-affrontive [sic] debate" that Oppenheimer and his fellows on the BGLSA are interested in--the frantic effort to limit the free speech of others by vandalism or intimidation.

Apart from the Crimson's dubious reporting of the story, AALARM found the comment of Dean of the College L. Fred Jewett with which the article closed extremely ironic. Jewett claimed that a student would be exempt from College discipline for tearing down posters if the incident were "casual" and done "out of frustration." Such a policy, if adopted as a matter of precedent, would give license to every frustrated student at Harvard to tear down with impunity any poster which happened to annoy him, as long as he could claim that his action was sufficiently "casual."

Furthermore, we would remind Jewett of the precedent established by an 1985 Ad Board case, in which freshman Samuel Burke was placed on disciplinary probation, even after having offered a public apology to the group which he had offended. His crime? To have removed a "reserved-HRGLSA" (now the more "inclusive" BGLSA) sign from a table in the crowded Union. Burke was prosecuted mercilessly by the college administration for his apparently unforgivable (although inadvertent and certainly "casual") crime against one of the "in" groups. We need not remind the administration of the not-unforeseeable consequences of its zealotry.

Dean Jewett 's partisan response to this latest infraction makes it clear where his own affections lie and casts serious question on his ability to impartially administer the rules of the College where a group such as the BGLSA is concerned. Is a group's right to free speech and the protection of the University dependent on its status as a "politically correct" organization? Can students threaten, deface, and assail without fear of University action so long as their target is an unpopular group such as AALARM?

AALARM calls upon the University to show its non-partisan support for free speech and its commitment to protect all student groups in the exercise of that right by taking strong disciplinary action to condemn Oppenheimer's egregious action: his vandalism and his open threats.

If the University fails to act decisively, it will have opened the floodgates for a wave of swelling and ever-more violent attempts at "censorship" among student groups. Let the University fulfill its obligation to impartially administer its rules and protect the rights of all student groups, and so avert an inevitable and pernicious collapse from protected free speech into a campus-wide brawl in which vandalism and personal threats are the encouraged modes of expressing disagreement. Tung Le '96   Press Secretary, AALARM Harvard