Shenanigans A plea for pragmatism

Author: Alex Garlick

Impassioned debate is good for the liberal arts educational experience. Unfortunately, as of late I have observed the debate regarding these pages to be pathetically partisan and personal. (I apologize for all the alliteration).

Last week, Ward Wolff '08 penned an opinion piece on the conduct of Frederick Fritz '68, the chairman of the Middlebury Board of Trustees, with a local bookstore. Wolff accused Mr. Fritz of leveraging his power at the College to intimidate the owner to remove mints from her cash register that are offensive to President George W. Bush. Now this is a loaded incident to begin with, with many angles to analyze. What troubled me about this piece are not the actions of Fritz or Wolff's piece, but the reaction to the column on The Campus' Web site. One poster labeled Wolff's work as "a wining [sic], cry baby, typical Leftist emotional reactionary op-ed" and "anti-American." I'm sorry, but Mr. Wolff is perfectly entitled to defend his place of employment, and is not anti-American.

It's even happened to me. I recently wrote in this space that Al Gore did not deserve the Nobel Peace Prize for his promotion of a pro-environmental agenda. There were well-reasoned critiques in The Campus, and while I stand by what I wrote, I appreciated their arguments. However, in the comments section of The Campus Web site, I was labeled a staunch conservative. The poster wrote, "It just once again shows how conservatives will stoop to any level to show their hatred for Al Gore." This actually made me chuckle, as I spent an entire semester working for John Kerry's presidential campaign. Pencil me in as the new Ari Fleischer at Middlebury. Also, I'm sorry but I don't hate Al Gore. I would vote for Al Gore tomorrow if he were running for President

This may be more of a critique of the blogosphere, which by its nature allows anonymous commentary without any editorial filter, but I think it runs deeper than that. Debate on campus is increasingly not based on merit, but rather ideology. The College Republicans' "Never Forget" poster campaign that was criticized as anti-Muslim is a perfect example. After the posters began getting torn down, Heather Pangle '10, the president of the College Republicans, wrote a letter to the editor admitting the posters were "deliberately provocative." She then characterized the ensuing debate as "a symptom of what many conservatives here on campus feel is a general atmosphere of intolerance toward any deviation from mainstream liberal views." Should this be a surprise? A partisan salvo is answered by an equally partisan retort. This is not intelligent rhetoric - this is using Middlebury's hallowed academic halls as an arena for a shouting match.

The campus community is capable of pragmatic debate. For example, consider the discussion regarding John McCardell's Choose Responsibility initiative. At press time, there were 33 responses to the latest Campus article on the subject, not one of which referred to McCardell as a fascist or flaming liberal. This is because the proposal to lower the drinking age transcends traditional party lines. A piece regarding abortion or gay marriage would receive the predictable partisan banter.

My charge to you, the Middlebury College community, is to not let partisan emotion overtake you during heated debate. An essay littered with partisan rhetoric would receive a failing grade. Don't fail what this college stands for with your rhetoric.

Alex Garlick '08.5 is a Political Science and Economics major from Needham, Mass.