| The Harvard Salient | November 4, 1996 |
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Opinion writers are supposed to be provocative. Grabbing a reader's attention often requires rhetoric that would be unacceptable in a news article. What happens, however, when someone takes an opinion writer at his word? Nasty stuff, as Crimson associate editorial chair Joshua Kaufman found after he penned a savage attack against Peninsula published in the October 15 Crimson. In particular, Kaufman criticized an "enemies list" written by Peninsula editor Christopher Griffith. The next day, a roommate of inactive Peninsula staff member José Padilla found a swastika taped to their door. Although Crimson president Todd Braunstein says that he has "no idea" whether the swastika was connected to the Crimson article, it is difficult to avoid making the connection. According to Peninsula senior council member Bradley Whitman, however, no other members of Peninsula have received criticism in the wake of Kaufman's article.
Padilla blames the Crimson for the swastika and is pressing a complaint with the Dean of Students against Kaufman, the Crimson and Braunstein. Padilla says that he wants nothing more than an apology from the Crimson, but that Braunstein has been unhelpful. "He didn't apologize, not even personally. He said that I deserved what was written about me." Padilla describes Kaufman's article as "pretty much designed to humiliate people," and fears that "someone would read this editorial making such outrageous charges and think less of me.
Indeed, Kaufman's opinion piece was exceptionally ill-conceived and in remarkably poor taste. It achieved the extraordinary result of making Peninsula and its tasteless "enemies list" look sympathetic. Kaufman's attack on Peninsula's use of a post office box (a practice also used by Perspective, the Independent, and Harvard Yearbook Publications among others) seems particularly indicative of a failure even to minimally research his article. He engaged in what can only be described as wholly unsubstantiated slurs accusing Peninsula of being fascist and anti-Semitic. In fact, Kaufman committed a long litany of journalistic sins - the majority of which could have and should have been fixed by his editor. Nonetheless, bad writing and bad editing of one column constitute no reason to call for sanctioning the Crimson.
It is the combination of very provocative writing combined with a decision to list the names and House affiliations of Peninsula staffers that is troubling. The article, titled "Naming Names: Peninsula's Fascists," manages, in a relatively small space, to compare Peninsula to both Nazi Germany and the Catholic Church during the Inquisition. Becoming more specific, Kaufman announces that "anti-Semitic strain runs through all [Peninsula's] rhetoric." To the "virtuous elite" (i.e. those not belonging to Peninsula) Kaufman offers the following advice: "If you know [a Peninsula staffer] (which is ill-advised) or if you know that they live in your house, take the time to acknowledge their contribution to the campus press and let them know just how their drivel makes you feel." Kaufman then speculates on how Harvard could have admitted these "freakish fascists." One could easily describe Kaufman's article as the most vicious personal attackto be printed in a Harvard student publication in the last few years. It is not surprising that of the thousands of articles printed, this one inspired someone to put a swastika on a door.
Kaufman's decision to personalize his dispute with Peninsula is not inherently unacceptable. Often a campus opinion writer cannot help but attack an individual. Nonetheless, personal attacks tend to lower the quality of campus discourse - particularly if, as in Kaufman's article, the attacks are neither backed by evidence nor related to a substantive dispute. Attacking Peninsula editors' views of homosexuality is fair game; questioning why the staff of Peninsula was admitted to Harvard is simply obnoxious. Peninsula is hardly in a position to criticize Kaufman for ad hominem attacks, in light of the magazine's history of doing just that. And yet, the Crimson, a newspaper that claims to be "one of the finest college newspapers in the country," should be held to a higher standard of journalism.
Furthermore, Kaufman did not limit his personal attacks to senior members of Peninsula. José Padilla had not been active on Peninsula for two years. "I have not seen this issue, and I had nothing to do with it." Kaufman and his editors should have been leery of castigating by name every member of an organization. The presence of "inactive staff" is hardly limited to Peninsula, after all. Among the numerous inactive Crimson "editors" is Peninsula senior council member Bradley Whitman.
Crimson president Braunstein describes the Crimson opinion page as a "campus forum" where writers need to be given "maximum leeway to express their views." If, in fact, the campus opinion pages are a "campus forum" to be given the maximum freedom of expression, then maliciously attacking individuals remotely affiliated with Peninsula for an article not written by those individuals is contrary to the spirit of a "campus forum."
Was there anything in Griffith's article to suggest that Peninsula as a whole took credit for the enemies list? Kaufman cites the article's prominent placement and the use of the first person plural to justify his claim that the enemies list was a de facto staff editorial. In regard to the first, Kaufman would have benefited from talking to the editor of any campus magazine. The editor would have explained that his publication chooses cover stories based on whether he believes that the cover topic will interest readers and (sometimes) whether he believes that the cover story is of high quality. Now, Kaufman may disagree with judgment of Peninsula editors on whether the enemies list met these tests, but mere prominent placement can hardly justify the claim that the enemies list was necessarily a staff editorial. In regard to the second claim, Griffith mixes both "we" and "I" essentially randomly. I had the impression on reading the list that the "we" referred to the ideologically pure - not specifically to Peninsula. In any case, however, Kaufman should have at least discussed the question with Peninsula editors before leaping to what seems to have been a spurious conclusion.
It is unfair (and silly) to attack the entire staff of a publication for the ideological content of an opinion article. It is, however, quite appropriate to criticize a magazine for the stylistic flaws in an article. If the Crimson were to make a regular practice of having columnists make personal attacks on random students, I would feel justified in criticizing the Crimson. Specifically, I would blame the editorial page editors for printing such drivel and the executive board for allowing the editorial editors to print it. Likewise, the blame for the stylistic flaws in Griffith's article lie not with José Padilla, but with the editors of Peninsula. It is hard to imagine how Padilla could have even known that the enemies list existed. Blaming him for it is an exercise in vindictive futility. In the same vein, the blame for the failure to edit Kaufman's article properly lies with associate editorial chair David Brown, who was serving as editorial editor the night that Kaufman's article was sent to press, editorial chair Sarah Schaffer, and Todd Braunstein and the Crimson executive board. There is little point, however, in blaming Bradley Whitman or a random comper for the Crimson's failure to edit Kaufman's article properly.
That said, is the Crimson to blame for the swastika outside Padilla's door? Not according to Braunstein: "Anyone who puts a swastika on a door has problems that began long before they may or may not have read something in a newspaper." And Braunstein is entirely correct.
Nonetheless, even though the Crimson is not responsible for inspiring
the swastika, it is responsible for printing an article that substantially
lowered the level of campus discourse and sought to incite students to harass
essentially innocent Peninsula staffers. Kaufman's decision to list
names of low-level and inactive staffers on Peninsula and simultaneously
to accuse the magazine of anti-Semitism and fascism should have made the
editors reading the article proceede with the utmost caution. Instead, the
editors forged ahead and printed an article that was an embarrassment to
their newspaper.