The videotape is intended as a starting point for discussion. After listening to the tape teachers could talk about the issues brought up in the tape. The Bok Center emphasizes the role of the tape as a discussion facilitator; the intent is not to provide answers, but to force viewers to seek their own answers to the issues.

The problem with this material lies not in accuracy - the video does not seem to contain explicit misinformation - but rather in the belief conveyed that race should be viewed as a factor in any and all classroom discussion. This should be very troubling. As an institution, we should make every effort to prevent race from becoming an issue in the classroom. A presumption of racism in the classroom is antithetical to this goal. To acknowledge the race of students and teachers as a valid factor in classroom discussion is tantamount to abandoning truth, which must stand for itself outside any discussion of race.

In the five vignettes, actual Harvard students play themselves. While the producers "framed the classroom situations for them and occasionally gave someone a role or a line or two, [the students] flesh out the dialogues through their own thoughts and reactions." In essence, "issues of race and of racism are at the center of this tape," according to the accompanying booklet. The scenes show what the producers think happens when (or if) issues of race and of racism become a component of classroom discussion.

But the scenes on the tape seem artificial, even contrived. One of the vignettes, "That's Just the Way She's Been Brought Up," depicts a class discussing a topic that has nothing to do with race. Every student participates except an Asian woman. The teacher, wondering how he can encourage her, decides not to call on her because "Asian women are always quiet. That's just the way she's been brought up." This scene is both unrealistic and stereotypical of both the white male teacher as an insensitive racist and the female Asian student as non-participatory. In fact, the scene in particular seems an attempt to force race into what would otherwise be viewed as a normal healthy classroom discussion. Although the tape did not explicitly seek to portray the teacher as racist, the intended message was clear. The booklet tells readers, "Do not assume that any individual exemplifies the characteristics of his or her group ... it is always crucial to know the individual and not to make assumptions about him or her on the basis of their group membership alone." Yet the video relies on stereotypes to make its point.

"Can You Help Us Out?" displays a discussion about the inner cities. The teacher asks the class why "'these people' don't take advantage of education to get out of there." She then calls on a black female student who does not respond. The voice-overs - actual quotations from the students - provide us with a glimpse into her thoughts. What the student isĘthinking is worthy of note: she feels put on the spot in having to explain the actions of her entire race; she also feels that the teacher called on her for this very purpose. Again, there is no indication in the video that the teacher called on the student with this purpose in mind; rather, the student says that the teacher did. It is quite possible that the teacher either randomly called on the student, or did so because the student (like the Asian above) had been quiet during the entire section. This should be familiar to Harvard students of any race; why, then, does the video attempt to push race into the discussion?

The Bok Center explains that the vignettes simply convey how the students feel at the present moment - that they feel that the teacher is calling on them because of their race or other non-consequential factors. They may feel "put on the spot" and forced to explain or justify something they are not prepared to. I think every Harvard student at one time or another feels "put on the spot" when he is called on in section to explain reading he has not done and is not prepared to discuss.While not the most pleasant occurrence, this is invariably an essential part of the classroom experience and we all learn from it. Race does not - especially here, in an enlightened institution - play a role in who gets called upon in class. Opening the door to such an interpretation, however, as the video does, justifies a racial interpretation of an incident devoid of racial implications..

The problem may lie in the implicit objectives of the producers. First, the booklet presumes that "[a]ll of us - teachers and students alike - come to the classroom with assumptions and stereotypes of various cultures and races." Is this not a dangerous presumption to make, given that the goal of a multicultural classroom should be to overcome these biases? How many Harvard students have "come to the classroom" with an agenda dictated by what race they happen to be? Very few, I would hope. In any case, the goal of the video is, given that every Harvard student and teacher is in some way prejudiced, to "recognize (and deal effectively with) the presence of race and racial dynamics in our classrooms." Beyond that, the video and the booklet do not suggest any answers.

By calling a teacher's attention to these issues, the video may exacerbate the situation. Why make the possibility of racial tension in the classroom a reality by always being aware, even afraid, of it? Instead, would it not better fit the pursuit of truth to peruse race-neutral subject matter in an environment free of distracting concerns? The booklet asserts that those teachers who "fail to recognize racial dynamics in the classroom" as the booklet defines them may exhibit "1) discomfort with their own racism, 2) inability to identify it, 3) denial of its presence, 4) rationalization of racist behavior, 5) fear of loss of control, and 6) fear of the risk of being identified as belonging to one or another political camp... In other words, anyone who does not agree with the assertion that race mustĘbe acknowledged as an issue in the classroom is a racist.

Is it too much to ask to strive for a color-blind classroom? Is it too much to ask for a pursuit of objective truth at an institution which claims Veritas as its motto? Of course, not all subject matter is objective; approaches vary with the individual. These approaches, however, should come from legitimate, scholarly sources. Justifying and nurturing an approach based on race is inexcusable.

As the sun set on Wednesday, April 26, Jews around the world lit yellow Yahrzeit candles to commemorate the six million who died in Hitler's concentration camps. Throughout the day on the 27th, we read the names of those family members and strangers who did not survive the madness of one man and of society. The obvious reasoning behind the ceremonies is to ensure that those who are dead live on, and to ensure that we never forget how and why they died.

The juxtaposition of this day of remembrance with the aftershock of the Oklahoma tragedy resonates with lessons of common humanity and shared responsibility. It is not the fraudulent political assertion that we must support others with our taxes, but rather a more ontological truth that something can exist only if it exists in the shared consciousness of others. To drag political issues into the moment drives wedges between us when we are most in need of a collective bond. These days are not times to discuss the fate of Israel or go witch-hunting for militiamen in our own country. Instead of mourning alone with our politics and principles, we must grow stronger by sharing the pain, no matter whose beliefs are involved.

Both tragedies have been appropriated by those with agendas. If we can simply mourn the Oklahoma tragedy without involving questions of gun control and terrorism, perhaps we are one step closer to joining hands around the Yahrzeit candles with the six million non-Jews who also fell to Hitler, not to mention the millions of others who were slaughtered in the clash of men and machinery. The death toll of modern violence tends to be numbing - it drives us into relinquishment of emotional responsibility. Vaguely, we say that we remember, for if we forget, it could happen again. People will continue to die every day, though. The only way to bring meaning to any death is to share the memory with all humanity. If we can't remember together, we might as well forget it.

There still are serious issues to be addressed concerning the handling of the Oklahoma bombing and the Holocaust. The manhunt going on in this country right now infringes on lots of liberties. Militia are constitutional, as is the right to bear arms as a part of one. Just last week, the Supreme Court got around to rejecting the idea that the federal government can enforce gun free zones around schools. Now Clinton wants to impose them everywhere he smells dissent. Many in the media are joining his paranoia by displaying evil-looking sketches of suspected loonies, and ferreting out conspiracy where it has every right to lie. We are again starting to forget that it is legal to say you don't like the government. Too many lobbyists are using front pages to promote the idea that our Constitution is somehow being circumvented by these "militiamen." Some might be crazy, but they still have rights under the Constitution, just like syndicated columnists. Terrorist witch-trials are haunting avatars of Red scares and Salem witch-trials. We feel helpless, and so we are going to string somebody up if it's the last thing we do.

Clinton suddenly has a national crisis around which to rally voters, and so he exploits the emotion for the vote. He's blaming radio talk shows and religious fanatics; next he will probably ban short-wave radio, over which the loonies talk about him. Republicans are no better. "If only Janet Reno hadn't been so darned liberal and anxious@." Granted, these are politically pragmatic stances, and if we choose to cling to them, that is our prerogative. What is deeply troubling, however, is the freedom we as citizens allow power-competitors in order to assuage our own fear, confusion and pain.

A witch-hunt will no more bring back the victims than the Nazi trials could. To try someone for war crimes is ridiculous. No matter what we pretend, there are no rules in war. In Banality of Evil, Hannah Arendt tells the story of a death-camp commander who was hunted down and finally given a show trial in Israel. Jews wanted this man to be a monster, but it turned out he was simply a bureaucrat - following orders. We cannot gain satisfaction through revenge, for even though it often feels cathartic, it usually ends in disappointment. Jews tend to use Yom HaShoah as an opportunity to conflate Zionism with genocidal reparation. We demand Israel in exchange for our six million, and all of our others who have suffered throughout world history. Just because our kindred were killed, though, does not give us the right to kill others or remove them from their home. Our need for a homeland must be reconciled with the needs of those who already live there. As Americans, we are just beginning to come to terms with the disinheritance of thousands of Native Americans. Are we ready to put another stain on our consciences in the name of military posturing? We are frightened of terrorism, and so just as we are willing to draw and quarter those who target national symbols, we will side with Israel against the Palestinians. Yes, there are individual "militiamen" and Palestinians who do illegal things - like murder. There are plenty, however, who do not.

These troubling issues, even in the face of a national emergency, must be considered. There is no excuse for ignorance of the constitutional word, just as Jews have no more of a claim on Jerusalem than anyone else. Yet, as my parents reminded me as we discussed the lighting of my Yahrzeit candle, there are certain times when we must relinquish principle and enmity and think of the anguish. Mortality is beyond comprehension, but by uniting in grief, we can attempt to find meaning in our shared sorrow. We must not exclude those who died under a different god, a different nationality, or even a different political party. Yes, my people were killed in the Holocaust. The soul, however, ought not to be placed on the political spectrum, or sold in the marketplace.

We owe it to those who died in the death camps, in the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building, and in all places and times, to bring meaning to senseless death. Artists use pen, paper, voice and stone to find something immortal in the dead. The rest of us can honor them with our memory - a communal memory. We need this time to understand tragedy, and to come to terms with its consequences as a united people. Save the politics for tomorrow.

This book was suggested, aptly enough, by Canadian compatriot Patrick Chung over tea. Early in our conversation, the topic turned to UCC, the alma mater from which he has always derived a sense of quiet superiority over us lesser mortals.

UCC, or Upper Canada College, is one of those schools still wrapped in a mythological air of power and prestige. Its name resonates for Canadians as Exeter and Andover do for Americans or Eton and Harrow do for the English. An ancient and established reputation for producing many great men of state and commerce lends itself naturally to the perception of an Old Boys' network. It is, characteristically, an image that the school does nothing to efface: the alumni have always been known as Old Boys.

Unsurprisingly, Old Boys is the name taken by the book, which is edited by James FitzGerald, an Old Boy himself. Edited, because more than anything else, Old Boys is a collection of short memoirs and interviews, gleaned from three hundred oral histories coaxed out of alumni by the author's charms. As a journalist and alumnus, and as a Canadian, FitzGerald thinks that by interviewing selected Old Boys he has mined a unique deposit of Canadian social history. UCC, in his words, "offers a clear window onto the attitudes, mores, and values of an exclusive, privileged community."

And so here is the first pitfall facing the unsuspecting reader. Someone completely unfamiliar with Canadian history and personalities is likely to find the book wholly uninteresting. The incestuous gossip among the Old Boys is at once entertaining and bewildering. John Eaton (of Eaton's, a department store chain) seems oblivious to the fact that his family is regarded as a bunch of dumb tradesmen by his schoolmates. Ted Rogers (of Rogers Communications, a telecommunications company) and Hal Jackman (Lieutenant Governor of Ontario) complement each other's business acumen. Conrad Black (a newspaper baron), only reluctantly an alumnus after being expelled for selling exams, explains away his guilt in his uniquely self-righteous, pedantic style. Names like Conacher, Eaton, Gooderham, Thomson, Wilson register a particular ring in Canada for fame and notoriety of various sorts, and figure gregariously with other Old Boys as peers.

Even personages far removed from the world of business and finance seem clubby in their own way. David Gilmour, an art critic, and Michael Ignatieff, a prominent author and academic at Oxford, talk about each other when they talk about themselves. Robertson Davies, who with his venerable long beard and plaintive, ironic style is one of the greatest novelists writing in English today (his newest work was named as novel of the month by The Economist), is still fondly nostalgic about his days and friends at UCC. The funniest experience belongs to Stanley Ryerson, who alone out of a school of financiers became an active member of the Communist Party. So wide is the Old Boys' network, however, that he later met at a reunion a Mounted Police investigator in charge of surveilling his activities.

But the Old Boys' network has its fault lines. Gradually, FitzGerald's narratives become less and less confident. The anthology opens with the memoirs of Harry Wilson '22, who is not at all shy about UCC's Old Boys image: "One of the great advantages was that if you wanted to find out some particular thing, you would call up Joe Smith and say, 'Joe, can you help me out on this.'" Some one hundred pages down, his son Michael Wilson '55 is much less enthusiastic, although he rose to become the Canada's Finance Minister. The school simply imbued him with a sense of the importance of achievement; that is all. Thirty years later, Geoffrey Wilson '86, son of Michael, is much chattier, but even more self-effacing.

Times have changed. Indeed, the old roster of bland, WASPy names is now filled with names as exotic as Fejer, Dalglish, and Wrzesnewskyi. In a world of chaotic value systems, even stoic and majestic UCC cannot be immune to question. Praise for regimental training has been replaced by anguished pleas for an end to the all-male composition of the student body. Stories of heroism in war give way to tales of suicides and abuse. There is talk of sexual aberrations in the boarding houses, and rumors about affairs between masters and students. To top it off, there is the singular case of Sean Gammage, who doubled as a stripper while a student at UCC. Needless to say, the doddering old masters are everyone's favorite target. Their anachronistic ways have made the contrast with the changing world starker.

This is, in a sense, the UCC of Robertson Davies clashing with the UCC born out of the turmoil of the '60s and '70s. A quiet tradition of elitism based on noblesse oblige, readily accepted earlier in the century, now struggles and drowns in the general democratic tide. The detached and erudite sobriety of Davies has always happily conceded the union of fact and mythology, but later generations can no longer accept this alloy. In their pursuit for the "truth," the young turks are weighed down by the myth of the august tradition of which they are a part.

This is, I suppose, a lesson that needs little Canadianness to understand. The mythology and history of this school are a thousand times magnified in the reminiscences of the Old Boys. The fashionable talk at Harvard has always included an obligatory lament about Harvard's closedness that the present student body has been forced to inherit from earlier classes. There is always some search for the real Harvard, situated in some real world, outside the institutional weight that seems to repress and depress, outside the myth that is so powerful and alluring.

Shall we succeed? Who knows? The evidence from Old Boys is not encouraging. As an editor, FitzGerald is not terribly masterful of the material. For instance, in the interview with Conrad Black, "opprobrium" is transcribed as "approbrium," a grammatical mistake much too glaring for any Old Boy. FitzGerald insists on weaving himself, too, into the myth. Through the mouths of his interviewees, he throws in entirely extraneous complements about himself: how doing the book is recognized to be such a good idea, how he broke the athletic records, etc., etc., etc., . . . lest one forget that he too is one of the Old Boys.