Student Government Votes to Support Activists Who Think The Harvard Crimson Shouldn't Even Quote ICE in Stories

"The Undergraduate Council stands in solidarity with the concerns of Act on a Dream, undocumented students, and other marginalized individuals on campus."

Harvard's student government, the Undergraduate Council, has voted to support Act on a Dream, an activist student group calling for a boycott of The Harvard Crimson.

The council's statement does not specifically endorse the boycott. But it does express solidarity with Act on a Dream, whose members want the student newspaper to apologize for seeking comment from representatives of U.S. Immigration and Customs and Enforcement in articles.

As I noted in my previous coverage of this kerfuffle, seeking comment from relevant parties is standard journalistic practice and ought to be commended. Instead, the activists have somehow convinced themselves that when The Crimson talks to ICE, it makes the campus less safe for undocumented immigrants.

"In this political climate, a request for comment is virtually the same as tipping [ICE] off, regardless of how they are contacted," the activist group's leaders wrote in their petition.

This concern is silly, and none of the activists have offered any evidence it is legitimate.

And yet yesterday the council voted 15–13–4 to pass a statement in support of this unfounded fear.

"It is necessary for the Undergraduate Council to acknowledge the concerns raised by numerous groups and students on campus over the past few weeks and to recognize the validity of their expressed fear and feelings of unsafety," the statement said.

The Crimson's own coverage of the vote points out that several campus groups, including both Act on a Dream and Harvard's chapter of the College Democrats, are refusing to speak to the paper until it bows to the demands. Time and time again ,sources of institutional authority at Harvard have not simply failed to rebuke unreasonable demands from the campus's progressive sect but have actively sided with them.

Comments

[Jerryskids]

Hard to believe there’s any more marginalized people than people who are told they have no right to speak. But not as hard as it is to believe that the people who decide who has a right to speak and who does not consider themselves to be marginalized.

[Cynical Asshole]

There’ few people more marginalized and victimized than Harvard University students. /sarc

[JoeJoetheIdiotCircusBoy]

I don’t know…not being good enough for Yale could be victimizing.

[Eddy]

Good training for real life. Journalism ain’t beanbag, and if it is, you’re doing it wrong. You should expect to “take flak as you get closer to the target.”

The Crimson is presumably lefty af, but hopefully they will stand by principles which even the NYT professes to adhere to. (“Senator Belfort issued a statement calling the charges ‘spurious’ and ‘uinfounded,’ adding ‘I never touched a goat in my life.'”).

[OpenBordersLiberal-tarian]

More evidence that “wokeness” works to the advantage of Koch / Reason libertarians and our open borders agenda.

#AbolishICE
#DontEvenQuoteICE

[John]

I kind of get Mao and Lenin now. If you ever did take over the country, one of the first things you would want to do is send these little fuckers out to the mines and the farms and get them out of your hair. This would be true regardless of your particular politics. Student activists are just worthless from any perspective.

[Cynical Asshole]

They make good useful idiots during the revolution phase, but yeah, after the revolution the last thing you want to have are bunch of whiny, spoiled, perpetual victims hanging around whinging.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kuckland]

When will the clingers learn the we the non-racist betters will continue to monitor and correct their wrong thinking.

[OpenBordersLiberal-tarian]

Terrible parody. The real Rev. Kirkland would have worked in at least one reference to “culture war.” Probably in the (blank) are among my favorite (blank) format.

[Not Applicable]

The real RAK is a 20 line Perl script.

[Wladimir Klitschko]

Maybe when you actually manage to win an election?

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

After four years of reading Campus outrage stories, I think I get it. The students on college campuses are anti-free speech.

Let me know if this changes.

[OpenBordersLiberal-tarian]

I don’t think “anti-free speech” is fair. Rather, they take a more nuanced view of free speech. Like the one promoted by Reason contributor Noah Berlatsky.

[Wladimir Klitschko]

You’re doing yeoman’s work in elucidating just how far Reason has descended into self parody since Bad Orange Man got elected.

[Trollificus]

“nuanced”? No, that is a devious and slanted point of view. That fuck should never be allowed to READ Reason, or visit the website. He’s either a clueless hack or an “activist in intellectuals’ clothing”.

For instance, his mealy-mouthed dismissal of “slippery slope” concerns is mendacious, accepting with wide-eyed innocence the contrived claims of the interested parties he cites:

“Were the U.S. to properly recognize the danger of hate speech, we wouldn’t look like Orwell’s “1984.” Instead, Delgado told me, we’d “look like France, Germany, The Netherlands, Canada or Sweden, all of whom regulate hate speech but where the political climate is just as free and healthy as our own, if not more so.”

No, the next step on the slippery slope is selective enforcement, weaseling redefinitions of what constitutes “hate speech” and creating ever more “protected classes”, increasingly protected from ever more delicately-defined “harms”. There’s plenty of slope to slip down before we get to 1984, so they make a deliberate straw man argument there. ALSO, their definition of “free and healthy” political climate is pretty obviously slanted towards meaning “victory for the left”. Ugly, ugly shit.

[Jerry B.]

Harvard students are apparently learning censorship early. Wonder when the book burnings on the quad will start?

[Ray McKigney]

Our future leaders.

[Longtobefree]

As soon as they figure out a carbon-free way to burn books – – – – – – – –

[Trollificus]

Nah, the books will just be disappeared from the libraries, the online collections and bookstores. And there are a LOT of pre-2015 books that contain problematic content. Content that might make trans people, illegal immigrants, and other wokeatrarians feel ‘unsafe’.

And the feeling of young healthy people attending an elite university in the safest, most diverse, most prosperous society in history, that they are marginalized, victimized and oppressed, should be of paramount importance in a college education.

[Wladimir Klitschko]

What we don’t know keeps the contracts alive and movin’
They don’t gotta burn the books, they just remove ’em

[Cynical Asshole]

“The Undergraduate Council stands in solidarity with the concerns of Act on a Dream, undocumented students, and other marginalized individuals on campus.”

The funny thing is these morons actually think there are “marginalized individuals” attending Harvard. Let that sink in. The idea that anyone who gets to go to god damned Harvard is “marginalized” is laughable on its face.

Also, are there any “undocumented students” at Harvard? Did they just admit that Harvard routinely admits foreign born students without student visas? Gee, I sure hope ICE doesn’t find out…

[Geraje Guzba]

I have known many a desperate college male willing to stand in solidarity and sign any number of absurd petitions so long as such displays of cosmopolitan virtue yielded prospects of nailing college chicks a few shades darker than he. At the end of the day, a lot of these absurdities are nothing more than political peacocking in order for privileged white dudes to grab a slice of that foreign ass (referenced in their resume as “Proficient in Spanish” and filed under “Special Skills”).

I have a hard time believing that the Chad Chadwick Chadson Jr.’s of the world, having secured their admission to Harvard by virtue of their parents donating a wing or two, are truly concerned with immigrant plight. All they know is that a formidable genre of cleaning lady porn is threatened with obsolescence so long as immigration enforcement continues so, naturally, ICE must never be mentioned in polite company.

[Hit and Run]

Wouldn’t an undocumented student be a person crashing classes without having been officially admitted? Because they were denied by official channels or couldn’t afford it?

[Á àß äẞç ãþÇđ âÞ¢Đæ ǎB€Ðëf ảhf]

Wouldn’t it be interesting to change all student fees to voluntary …. the student government could no longer rely on coercive tax revenue. I wonder how fast they’d change their tune.

[Trollificus]

No, that would just give them a list of targets.

[Á àß äẞç ãþÇđ âÞ¢Đæ ǎB€Ðëf ảhf]

No. If they had only a fraction of the revenue they get now, they’d have to be much more selective about who they targeted, because nothing discourages voluntary donations more than the wannabe-donee being abusive.

[Zeb]

Targets for what? I don’t think student assemblies have much power beyond deciding how to fund student groups.

[Trollificus]

Ah, but the withholding of fees affects the ADMINISTRATION. Student Assembly would just be the tool of punishment for the know wrongthinkers clearly outed by their lack of cooperation with the Great Awokening. Never underestimate the vindictiveness of a thwarted bureaucrat.

Government money flowing into the grand project of “college education for everyone” has allowed those fucks to raise tuition rates faster than anything but medical care (which has had a similar infusion of FedGov funds). And that money has not gone to produce a higher quality of education has it? Rather the comfort of those involved and the splendor of their environment has been dramatically increased, along with compensation, of course.

Try withdrawing any, ANY of that money and see what happens.

[Unicorn Abattoir]

First you ask ICE for a comment, next thing you know they’re putting the campus under martial law.

Shay with a gauge and Vanilla with a 9.

[Hit and Run]

Mmm, a pound of bacon

[Dillinger]

morons. wtf Harvard?

[Eddy]

It’s student govt, not the bottom of the class but not exactly the tippy-top of the class either.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Conservatives — who turn the campuses they control into hundreds of censorship-shackled, nonsense-teaching, viewpoint-discriminatory, science-disdaining, fourth-tier (or unranked) yahoo factories — figure they should be offering pointers to Harvard?

What makes clingers impervious to self-awareness?

Carry on, culture war casualties.

[Eddy]

The Harvard Crimson needs no pointers – so far it’s sticking to its guns.

So which is the clinger faction at Harvard – the Crimson for following standard journalistic practices, or the student government?

[Unicorn Abattoir]

Hi, gecko!

[Metazoan]

Slightly OT, but what is the best way to go about phasing out the massive student loan system? Obviously from a libertarian standpoint it’s best to just end them immediately, though that is not politically palatable (college prices won’t adjust downward fast enough).

[evanswoodrow]

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[TopPaper]

So Harvard no longer educates students on how laws work? Illegal entry to this country should always be treated as a crime.

[Thames]

Harvard with its history and pride should not be caught is such low discussions. Focus on greater issues.