Goldberg Supports SGA Decision

Author: Bryan Goldberg

The Student Government Association should be congratulated for the way in which it handled the debate regarding a possible resolution to label our community as anti-war. By tabling the resolution, the SGA interpreted its political role properly and helped to keep this school a forum for free discourse.
One of the biggest problems with the resolution that was envisioned by Wellington Lyons '04 and introduced by Fahim Ahmed '03 is that it "labels" our community.
Rarely, if ever, does a community benefit from being branded with a label.
Furthermore, even if the label is accurate, that does not make it beneficial. For example, Middlebury has long been labeled as a "rich school for white kids." While it is completely true that Middlebury has a large endowment and that it is predominantly white, our college would rather not be "labeled" in such a manner. From an academic standpoint, we are often "labeled" as a language school; however, as excellent as our language program may be, we have many other great departments. Why, then, even if this campus were predominantly against a war in Iraq, would we impose a label upon ourselves? Given the caliber of intellectual ideas here in Middlebury, and given the diversity of thoughts and opinions, it would be foolish for the SGA to "label" our campus as "pro" or"'anti" anything. By the same logic, more than half of our population accepts Christ as its Messiah, but we do not label our school "pro-Jesus."
Another major flaw with the Lyons' plan is that it necessarily hurts the college's mission of promoting thoughtful and educated discussion.
How can a debate about the war be taken seriously when the location of the discussion, Middlebury College, has been labeled in favor of one side?
How can we continue to publish thoughtful articles about our nation's foreign policy in our school newspaper when the school itself prefers petitions to arguments?
In short, Lyons' resolution and truly thoughtful on-campus discussion cannot co-exist.
Finally, I would like to dispel speculation that Lyon's resolution was in any way similar to the school's official affirmative action stance. The reason the school supports affirmative action is because it currently uses the process in order to build its student body; it thus has a direct interest in affirmative action remaining constitutional. The same cannot be said about our current war plans, for a liberation of Iraq has absolutely nothing to do with Middlebury College.

Bryan Goldberg is an
economics major from Los Altos, CA.