Social protest at Dartmouth is a bit like a dandelion poking its yellow head up between the used condoms and McDonald's wrappers of an inner city gutter: It is so refreshing to see life's signature under such circumstances that the last thing you want to do is hold out for an orchid.
Thus it is in the spirit of encouragement and constructive suggestion -- not criticism -- that I would like to address two of Dartmouth's more recent tempests-in-a-plastic-cup. To judge from column inches devoted on these pages, the debates following Kappa Kappa Kappa name change and the "Luxon incident" have been some of the most vociferous in short-term memory. And, unlike the civil unrest which followed the keg ban, these reactions are clearly motivated by legitimate concern, not just sheer self-interest.
What both of these cases have in common with so many other Dartmouth mini-controversies past and present (remember Webster Hall?) is that they miss the real issues at hand. This is a charge that has been leveled at both right and left in an attempt to trivialize the grievances of the opposition rather than deal with them substantively, and I do not make it lightly. But is the slightly bizarre (and obviously insensitive) decision of a shrinking house to re-associate themselves with an ignominious history really going to have more of an impact on minorities in this community than the draconian cuts in higher education and financial aid which are on their way to the President's desk? Why do we focus on an altercation between Professor Tom Luxon and a bunch of frat brothers rather than the contents of the video and the sex tapes, the Beta poem and the countless examples of similar behavior that anyone who goes to Dartmouth has heard and seen?
The brother's of Tri-Kap have shown themselves to be deserving of the stereotype which several years ago they tried to leave behind. So don't go to their parties. As this debate rages, Dartmouth could lose all federal funding (including grants to professors) if it allows any group which can be construed as political -- be it the Conservative Union at Dartmouth, bug, Students for Choice, Republicans at Dartmouth or the Environmental Studies Division of the D.O.C. -- to use any college facilities or funding, thanks to proposals which currently enjoy significant support in congress. Unless we and students around the country speak up, campus debate may soon be limited frat nomenclature and equally pressing concerns.
I would like to suggest optimistically that the reason for our communal inability to focus on the meat of the issues at hand is not myopia or stupidity, but rather the difficulty of grappling with issues that seem intractable and beyond our control. And they are, as long as we assume our own impotence, and do nothing. Thus, I offer a few suggestions -- issues which do or will affect our community, and around which those already organized might rally:
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The congressional assault on higher education. Republicans assume that students have no voice, but a national movement has formed. Where is Dartmouth? Communities of color here have moved to address these issues, but broad support has been disgracefully absent. And between cuts to the National Endowment for the Humanities and the National Science Foundation and a crippling blow to the vital but paltry diversity we now enjoy, all of us will suffer if congressional Republicans have their way. New Hampshire's Congressmen and Senators must hear from us!
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The fact that as we bask in the afterglow of 80 cords of wood burnt on the Green last weekend and complain about the coming winter, both federal and state fuel assistance programs were cut drastically in the last year. Unless people move to fill that vacuum (read: Tucker Woodcrew and Operation Insulation), for some people in the Upper Valley, this will be a cold winter indeed.
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In the last year there has been no meaningful public debate on the Greek system, its alternatives and the way it structures life at Dartmouth. Student-initiated change will never happen unless we move beyond polemics and into frank, open discussion between people in and out of the system.
And there are many, many more issues which cry out for action, more than even The Dartmouth will give me space to list. So please, let's step back, listen, then act.
