Peninsula Posters Reveal Hypocrisy

Where is the outrage? Within this school year, two students have received hateful and threatening mail and one organization has had its posters not only defaced but slanderously forged because of one thing and one thing alone: their beliefs. What has been the University's official response? Nothing. This is the ultimate paradox of a University that prides itself on its diversity and spirit of tolerance, as exemplified by its elaborate anti-discrimination policy and numerous events to promote diversity. But the University's inaction demonstrates that its principles of utmost tolerance extend to everybody--as long as your ideas coincide with theirs.

What would have been the response if someone drew swastikas and threats on the doors of two leaders of an ethnic or religious student group? What if someone had slanderously and maliciously forged the posters of the BSA, BGLTSA, Harvard Radcliffe Christian Fellowship or even Room 13? Would the Administration have been silent? Would The Crimson have labeled the forgery a "parody" in its headline, as it did with the Peninsula poster forgery? Would the Crimson article have focused on the victim's position--with which the letter writer disagreed--as it did concerning Steven Mitby and his opinion on anti-discrimination protection of transgendered students? Would the President of the Undergraduate Council brush off the swastikas as a "distraction" which diverted attention from the "issue at hand," as she did in The Crimson (March 1)?

Of course not. I conjecture that there would be universal outrage throughout campus; the Administration would certainly issue formal statements and launch investigations to discover the culprit; and the Undergraduate Council, particularly its President, would speak out against the oppression of someone who is not like the rest of us.

And rightly so. The University's protection against intolerance should apply to everyone, and should not be limited by an individual's beliefs. The fact that this University, the Crimson and the Undergraduate Council, which continually pursue tolerance and diversity on campus, do not apply their standards to an ideological minority is so ironic that it belongs in Alanis Morisette's song. --Alex Herzlinger '00