Yale’s Hypocrisy
Captain Ed has a great post about Yale’s courtship and eventual rejection of Hashemi, the Taliban’s former diplomat at large. Quotable:
It’s odd that Yale would have trotted out the diversity argument, considering the regime that Hashemi represented. Let’s recall that the Taliban beat women for not covering themselves from head to toe and men for shaving their faces. Ancient Buddhist carvings, considered artistic and historical treasures, exist no more thanks to Taliban tolerance. The Taliban also reintroduced the lovely Islamic tradition of tolerance by crushing homosexuals to death or throwing them off of towers.
The latter point seems especially germane when it comes to Yale. After all, they have taken the position that the American military cannot stage ROTC classes at the campus due to their “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy regarding homosexuals in the military (which I also oppose, for several reasons). Yale’s students and faculty argued that the university would benefit from having Hashemi’s diverse viewpoint represented on campus, but they kicked out the military for a much milder viewpoint and action than that of Hashemi and his colleagues.And while they argue that Hashemi would have benefited the Yale community by his inclusion, no one appears to wonder whether Yale students might benefit from having the ROTC on campus and the diversity of political opinion it might create.
Yale invited Hashemi — he didn’t just show up and fill out an application. They went out of their way to get him to choose Yale, because as their admissions office stated, they didn’t want to lose another “high profile” candidate to Harvard. Regardless of all the arguments about diversity and openness, all of which get belied by Yale’s policies towards the American military, Yale obviously chose Hashemi as a tweak at the Bush administration. They thought that Hashemi’s presence would embarrass the White House and give Yale some sort of moral authority.
Instead, they have demonstrated themselves to be hypocrites, and still do with this decision.