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The Yale Alumni Magazine is owned and operated by Yale Alumni Publications, Inc., a nonprofit corporation independent of Yale University. The content of the magazine and its website is the responsibility of the editors and does not necessarily reflect the views of Yale or its officers. |
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Note to readers As the graduates of 2006 get accustomed to their new identity as Yale alumni, we'd like to welcome them to the Yale Alumni Magazine— and take this opportunity to remind all our readers that this is your publication. Unlike most alumni magazines, this one is editorially independent, produced not by the university but by a separate alumni-based nonprofit and funded principally by advertising, class dues, and alumni donations. It was founded in 1891 by the Yale Daily News, “exclusively for the benefit of the graduates.” The magazine’s statement of purpose charges it to “impartially explore the achievements, issues, and problems of the University … in order to convey a complete, fair, and accurate understanding of Yale today.” To learn more about the magazine and our nonprofit publisher, Yale Alumni Publications, Inc., see “About the Yale Alumni Magazine.” We welcome questions and comments from readers.—Eds.
Yale and Rahmatullah Hashemi Outside the university, academicians are generally mistrusted. Jefferson expressed his mistrust as follows: “State a problem to a ploughman and a professor. The former will decide it often better than the latter, because he had not been led astray by artificial rules.” By admitting a member of the Taliban (“Should Sayed Rahmatullah Hashemi Be at Yale?", May/June), Yale has managed a particularly grotesque application of artificial rules. You utterly missed the story regarding Yale admitting the former deputy former minister and ambassador at large of the Taliban. The story is not the varying views, right vs. left‚ on whether to admit the former foreign minister of one of the most repressive regimes in history—one that harbored terrorists and terror camps and the al Qaida leadership that directed the death of thousands of Americans in numerous terrorist attacks, as well as acquired chemical and biological weapons inside Afghanistan to use against Americans. No, the story is the total and utter destruction of what used to constitute liberal thought. If today’s left believes tolerance means tolerating absolutely everyone, then it is saying that there is no moral absolute right or wrong ever, anywhere, any longer. If Hashemi—a former official of the Taliban—is OK to learn from, despite the absence of repentance or rejection of past beliefs, then the left logically would also tolerate Yale admitting members of the former Serbian Socialist Party under Slobodan Milosevic, Sudanese government supporters of the Janjaweed, Hamas officials now governing the Palestinian Authority, the Colombian Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, and maybe even Islamic Jihad members who advocate Islamic law for Iraq—after all, it is just their political perspective. I was delighted to read about Yale’s acceptance of Sayed Rahmatullah Hashemi as a student, even if not yet as a degree student. Yale prides itself as an incubator of leaders and, often, of diplomats. These aspiring diplomats would be extremely well served by having shared a political science class with a man of Hashemi’s history. It is always easier to deal with a thing if you know somewhat about it. I think this may be especially the case for something as evil as fanaticism. As far as Hashemi’s personal involvement with the Taliban, I find it difficult to fault very much in one of the age he was when he was their spokesman. When I arrived at Yale at age 17, I was certain that Marxism (but not totalitarian communism) was the right path. I left at 21 as a member of the Party of the Right. In the ensuing 42 years, I have learned that neither extreme position is the correct approach. How can I fault a 16-year-old youth who wanted to return to his country under a regime that promised peace? After all, Bush only wants peace, too. I hope the admissions office approves his application for the Eli Whitney program. Yale students learn not only from their professors, but also from their fellow students. What an opportunity for the rest of the students at Yale! Did anyone else notice the ironic juxtaposition of articles in the May/June alumni magazine? “Old Yale” highlighted the heroic conduct of Lieutenant Clark Poling, a Yale Divinity School graduate who volunteered to fight Nazi tyranny and died in the North Atlantic after giving his life jacket to a shipmate. Lt. Poling thought it worthwhile to defend freedom from a foreign madman who had never attacked the United States. The magazine also included an article about the Law School’s efforts to ban military recruiters and a feature about Yale opening its doors to a former Taliban representative. I smiled at a statement from a recent Yale graduate in the Hashemi article that he had “faith in Yale’s mission as a marketplace of ideas.” For more than half the time since Lt. Poling gave his life fighting for our freedom, Yale has been a “marketplace” only for certain ideas. I was present on April 4, 1972, when a mob of Yale students prevented General William Westmoreland from speaking. The university did not apologize to General Westmoreland and did not discipline any of the students who disrupted his speech. During my seven years at Yale, the administration was similarly silent when students forcibly prevented other speeches with which they disagreed. It’s no wonder that a Taliban supporter would feel so comfortable at Yale. I stopped giving money to Yale some time ago. I now support the United States Naval Academy, from which my son graduated before serving as an officer on a fast-attack nuclear submarine. I prefer to support an institution that still produces heroes like Lt. Poling—not a university that bans the heroes and embraces the tyrants. I want to thank the editors for the article on the issues surrounding the admission of former Taliban spokesman Sayed Rahmatullah Hashemi into a special students program. It was an unusually objective examination of contentious and divisive questions. It did not by any means retire those questions. Mr. Hashemi appears to be well qualified intellectually. He may have demonstrated for Yale interviewers moral growth and renounced Taliban barbarities. Eventually he may embrace and defend the wider community of humanity that is otherwise despised by the fanatics he once served. This is by no means guaranteed. Consider the example of Iranian-born Muslim Mohammed Reza Taheri-azar, a recent graduate of the University of North Carolina who has lived in the U.S. for much of his life. Earlier this year, he deliberately drove a Jeep Cherokee into a crowd of students. He has stated that he was attempting to kill as many Americans as possible, in order to punish the United States for its treatment of Muslims around the world. Those who defend Yale’s extension of privilege presume that the experience will necessarily have a mutually wholesome effect. But a Western education does not equate to a transfer of loyalties or foreswearing of evil. A degree of any sort is rightly taken by the rest of the world as an endorsement of its holder by the grantor institution. Yale treads the razor’s edge in balancing the goals of diversity with its responsibility to the civilization which cradles the university. Privately endowed, Yale is less vulnerable than many schools to coercion from threats of funding loss from its own government. But in the fullness of time Yale must satisfy its donor base that it is not determined to commit suicide at the altar of transnational progressivism. As a retired chairman and CEO of a Fortune 500 company, I was appalled to read in the latest Yale Alumni Magazine that President Levin apparently doesn’t realize that the “buck stops with him.” Decisions made within his administration to admit a former member of the Taliban for whatever reasons reflect on his leadership. The fact that he had no direct involvement and relied on the decisions of others is reminiscent of the Ken Lay defense in the Enron debacle. Yale once embodied democratic principles; now it appears to support those who are dedicated to the destruction of America. Shame on President Levin, shame on Yale.
Coffin’s counsel I appreciated reading Warren Goldstein’s well-written obituary of William Sloane Coffin Jr. (Milestones, May/June). It is reasonable that Goldstein, like others writing about Coffin, would emphasize his powerful public impact. However, to round out the greatness of Coffin’s presence at Yale, we must also note his private interactions as chaplain. As one of the students deeply touched by his speeches and sermons, I sought out Rev. Coffin to discuss my decision to go to jail if drafted. He wisely perceived my decision as containing a bit too much arrogance and self-indulgence, and successfully counseled me to seek conscientious objector status instead. I owe Bill Coffin a tremendous debt for arousing my conscience and then channeling it in the most meaningful way. We can only guess at how many other students' lives he affected in such fundamental ways with empathic private counsel. William Sloane Coffin’s recent death in Vermont brings to an end the colorful career of a man who was a dominant presence on campus when I was a Yale student nearly half a century ago. Coffin was a “happy warrior”—highly intelligent and courageous, personally accessible, energetic, and full of enthusiasm. I’ll always remember a talk he gave in one of my classes about the need to “drop the mask” and deal with people in simple honesty. But he also had a shadow side. He was insensitive in his convictions and, in important ways, misread the tides of history. Back in those days there was talk of conservative “Neanderthals” clinging to positions that would soon become extinct. I remember Coffin addressing a group of fundamentalists from the Intervarsity Christian Fellowship. He told them that their type of religion was outmoded. In hindsight, we can see that fundamentalist Christianity has not only remained but grown in numbers and influence. It is Coffin’s own brand of religion which today seems threatened. More notorious is the statement which Coffin reportedly made to George W. Bush after his father lost an election for U.S. senator from Texas: “Frankly, the better man won.” This was a disrespectful remark that seared the younger Bush and may have set him more determinedly upon a conservative political course. But it’s likely Coffin meant no malice; he was so firm in his convictions that he failed to see the injury he was creating. Coffin was a larger-than-life figure who has left enduring political legacies. One, the civil rights movement, has become a kind of civic religion. A second, the presidency of George W. Bush, has taken the country in another direction with a frat-boy personality that resonates with middle American voters. Now that the Yale chaplain of my day “belongs to the ages,” I think the culture cries out for a novelist who will treat Rev. William Sloane Coffin Jr. as a character of great moral complexity or, perhaps, a filmmaker who will bring his charismatic presence to the silver screen. How long can this magazine go on lionizing Bill Coffin? Endowed with musical aptitude, linguistic ability, and unusual energy, he wasted his talents on attention-getting and relentless self-promotional mischief ruining the lives of other people. Twice he sent Russians to their death in the Soviet Union; the first time at gunpoint, the second time as naïve volunteers. Twice he failed at marriage. Neglecting his family, he encouraged young people to violate the law, and then weaseled out of his own responsibility for doing so. The man was a menace to himself and to others, and someone should say so.
Cancer Center kudos I found your recent story about the Yale Cancer Center (Light & Verity, May/June) a bit disappointing in the “giving credit where credit is due” department. I’m sure that New Haven mayor John DeStefano Jr. and Yale’s own Bruce Alexander did much to bring this contentious issue to closure, but I was disappointed that the “YNHH officials” were unnamed. Yale–New Haven Hospital has a new CEO, Marna Borgstrom, and her leadership is also considered to have played a major role in bringing this seemingly intractable stalemate to an end. And by the way, Marna happens to be a Yale graduate [Master of Public Health, 1979].
Do the right thing I am upset to read about the fate of “Geronimo's” skull in Notebook ( May/June). Whether or not it belongs to Geronimo, its continued presence demonstrates arrogance and insensitivity on the part of Skull and Bones toward other human beings, especially Native Americans. By keeping this skull and other bones in their possession, Skull and Bones continues to venerate the original act of desecration by Prescott Bush and his friends. In 1983, I was given a short tour of the society. At that time, the skull was locked in a safe along with some other longish bones. There were also two or three smaller skulls on tables in the library, perhaps the plunder of other graves. How would Bonesmen feel today if a fraternity plundered Prescott Bush’s grave and kept his skull as a trophy for the next 90 years? I suspect Mr. Bush and Mr. Davison never offered the Apache representative, Ned Anderson, what they believed to be Geronimo’s skull. According to the article, he was shown only the skull of a ten-year-old. The skull that was identified to me in 1983 as Geronimo’s belonged to an adult. Mr. Anderson, moreover, was never shown any femur bones. It is possible one of the smaller skulls sitting in the library was substituted. The return of “Geronimo's” skull and the other remains in Skull and Bones to the communities from where they came is long overdue. As the society has the chance to reflect on its past and present actions, I hope it will do so.
Me and him In his review of my book, Us and Them (Arts & Culture, May/June), Richard Conniff '73 writes that my view of “group” identity is “highly negative.” Commitment to a religion, nation, or other important identity is often very positive. It can free people from the little prison of the self, making them better in every way. The book notes that we need such loyalties to be fully human, because they are an inescapable part of our nature. Is that a negative view? I also note how oppressed people have protected their health and dignity, and changed the world, by refusing stigma and forging new identities. Is that a negative view? What seems to trouble Mr. Conniff is my argument that tribal feeling is morally neutral—that solidarity with “our people” can underlie a civil rights movement or a neo-Nazi party, depending on what definition of “our people” is persuasive. He’s missed my observation that persuasion is important, because identity is not a fixed or unitary experience. We all have multiple overlapping “groups” with which we identify. I am, for example, a Yale alumnus, a New Yorker, an American, and a person traduced by Mr. Conniff. The reviewer was irritated that I refuse to use the word “group” to describe religions, nations, political movements, and other categories for people. But “group” is a cliché and a misnomer, which obscures the issues. The world’s Muslims share a vital identity, but they don’t occupy a single territory, or agree about the meaning of their religion, or hold meetings to decide what their “group” will do. The world’s mothers also share a life-altering identity, but ditto. I avoided the usual language, and earned Mr. Conniff’s wrath. Too bad for him. Also for your readers.
Hard-wired for altruism? In the article “Evolution in a Petri Dish” in the May/June issue, Carl Zimmer states that “natural selection cannot shape instincts to reach some long-term goal. It can only shape the behavior of individuals based on their reproductive success.” This assertion neglects the long-standing study of altruism in animals, in which the behavior of one individual in a community of a single species favors the reproductive success of another individual of that same species at the expense of its own. A theory called “kinship selection” explains that, where such altruistic behavior furthers the reproductive success of a close relative (brother, sister, etc.), genes held in common among the two individuals propagate and the behavior is therefore naturally selected for. More intriguing is the case of “true altruism,” in which the individual’s behavior favors the reproductive success of an unrelated individual (of the same species) at the expense of its own. A study by a research team at the University of California at Santa Cruz, published recently in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, for the first time demonstrates this phenomenon in a vertebrate, the blue-throated variety of the side-blotched lizard.
Jesus and marriage Concerning Harold Attridge’s article, “The Magdalen and The Da Vinci Code” (Forum, May/June 2006), the only sources with roots in Late Antiquity claiming that Christ married anyone assert that he was espoused not to Mary Magdalen but—more surprising still to a modern audience—John the Evangelist! According to the second-century apocryphal Acts of John, John was to have married but instead remained a virgin by virtue of Christ’s having called him to be his “beloved” disciple. The fourth-century Monarchist prologue to John’s Gospel argues that he was called from his nuptuals to marry God. By the early twelfth century, some maintained that John was the groom to have been married at Cana and that the bride he abandoned to follow Christ was none other than Mary Magdalen. The story was controversial, as some held it could be used in favor of divorce. Nonetheless, some sources characterize John’s attachment to Christ as a marriage. There are in fact a number of images—both sculptures and paintings—from the later Middle Ages that actually show John as Christ’s “bride,” occasionally with feminine features such as rosy cheeks or, in one instance, long blond hair and a bridal chaplet. Whereas Mary’s virginity, via the Incarnation, was held to refer to Christ’s humanity, John’s virginity was taken to designate Christ’s divinity. According to these readings, John’s virginity made possible his visionary insight into the mysteries of the Godhead, which he then revealed in his Gospel—the most theological of the four Gospels—and the Book of Revelation (attributed in the Middle Ages to one and the same author). By the sixteenth century, the story of John’s marriage to Christ was sufficiently infamous to earn the condemnation of Counter-Reformation critics such as Molanus. From this one can conclude that the “truth” of Christian history (and art history) is more interesting and stranger than anything authors of pulp fiction such as Dan Brown can dream up.
Self-esteem dept. The May/June issue was one of the more interesting I’ve received in 56 years. Good job! I can’t recall a previous issue that I literally read from cover to cover.
The wrong rocket In the March/April Forum, Bruce Ackerman writes, “We made war against Nazi Germany, not the U-2 rocket.” The U-2 was not a rocket but a U.S. spy plane. I suspect that what Professor Ackerman had in mind was the Nazis' V-2 rocket.
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