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Jewish World Review Jan. 27, 2005 / 17 Shevat, 5765 Keeping Those Preconceptions Shiny and New By James Lileks
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
Every week there's a news story that energizes the hard-core faithful, and it usually follows the same trajectory. First: proof of boundless perfidy on the other side. Stage two: muted reaction to a clarification, followed by stage three: "Yes, BUT!"
The last part insists the story is somehow true on a metaphysical level, and thus accurate. A famous minister may not have called Sponge Bob a g-dless proselytizing sodomite, but he probably doesn't like gays, so the story's sort of true. It's a means of keeping your preconceptions as shiny and new as the day you formed them.
This week's Fresh Screaming Outrage regards the decision of the University of Oregon to remove a "Support the Troops" magnet from a campus truck.
Imagine the scene! Hundreds of angry students rocking the truck, shouting DEATH TO AMERICA, no? Burning flags, the driver chased off campus by giant papier-mâché puppets of President Bush with blood dripping from his mouth, etc. Campus administrators, in this easily conjured scenario, caved quickly because they felt in their hearts that it would be wrong to let any expression of patriotism sully the Elysian fields of academia. Perfidy, you think. Just what you've come to expect.
Tempting, but alas, the truth is a little less thrilling. Now we have step two, the muted reaction to the clarification. Facts: One guy had the magnet on a state-owned truck. No riot. One person complained. One.
There are two ways an organization can respond:
A) "We will convene a committee to prepare a policy on the matter, as well as solicit an opinion from the philosophy and art departments on whether a metal magnet shaped like a fabric ribbon is inherently surreal and thus exempt from standing policy. The commission will also address whether left and right turn signals endorse Western notions of rigid dichotomies, and should be replaced with Chinese ideograms depicting the magnetic poles. The commission will also accept comments in an open forum which will inevitably be hijacked by that smelly grad student who has a thing about boycotting grapes; what is he, 50? So moved."
B) You're offended, you say? Well, life must be one continuous scrape of the ol' emery board on your gums, eh? Get a life. I hear they're expecting a big shipment sometime today. NEXT!
You can guess which one a university would choose. Nearly any modern organization curls up in a ball the moment someone pronounces himself offended — as though everyone has the right to coast through life without snagging his sleeve on a contrary idea.
In this case, the University of Oregon released a statement saying it supported the troops — honest, it did — but state vehicles were no place for personal messages. Hard to argue, really. If anything, a university should have "How's My Driving?" with the phone number displayed in some complex algebraic equation. And nothing more.
Yes, BUT. It seems a bit disingenuous for the university to insist it scrupulously avoids mingling public money and private opinion. From art departments to visiting lecturers, universities provide a fecund and humid hothouse for personal opinion, and one can safely say that most would make William F. Buckley cock an eyebrow in distaste.
Universities regard themselves as the guarantors of free thought, keepers of the flame of civilization, but they are often remote from the societies they purport to serve, crimped by PC orthodoxies, and disinclined to understand the culture that sustains them. Town vs. Gown. Nothing new. But at least in the old days the distinctions were less severe — Beethoven vs. Elvis, Picasso vs. Rockwell. Not Chomsky vs. Bush or Smart vs. Evil.
In the end, though, these overreactions teach us important lessons, just like an episode of Barney. You can be a Christian without being an anti-SpongeBob "homophobe." You can be a Democrat at a university and support the troops.
Next week's flame war topic: a high school biology teacher asks his class to consider the philosophical implications of the Big Bang.
Or, as the e-mail in your box will put it: Jesus-freak wingnut tells class the world was created in six days. To the barricades!
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© 2005, James Lileks | ||||||||||
