Ho, Perspective Are Hypocritical

By their own admission, Perspective, Harvard-Radcliffe's Liberal Monthly, has been having difficulties being sensitive enough to minority concerns. It should come as no surprise then that the staff should have trouble living up to their own standards in campus discourse.

In a recent letter to the editors of The Crimson, Perspective Senior Editor Derek T. Ho '96 attacks an editorial by Crimson editor David B. Lat '96 ("Lat Should Eat His Own Words," Opinion, Oct. 22, 1994). Ostensibly as part of his argument, Ho describes Philippine Forum's annual cultural festival as "masturbatory." He then proceeds to characterize the contents of this festival as "bad food, bad music and Filipino cultural pride, all for the low price of $26,000."

The fact that Perspective has yet to distance itself publicly from this attack on Filipino culture suggests that the Perspective staff itself shares Ho's view. We do not understand how a publication so enamored with "sensitivity" could support or even appear to support Ho's statement.

But beyond the sheer hypocrisy of professing sensitivity from one end of the mouth while attacking ethnic minorities out the other, there lies the issue of discourse. It seems that Ho and Perspective cannot bring themselves to argue with Lat on substantive points, rather, they must insult him on the basis of his ethnicity. This is a cheep shot, even from an editor of Perspective. G. Brent McGuire '95   for the Peninsula Council