And I have absolutely no faith or trust in this arrogant and rotting (a bad combination) institution. But I still didn’t think its leadership could be this stupid. Hence my brains and skull fragments being all over the ceiling…
Harvard’s 2024 commencement speaker will be Maria Ressa, the CEO of the Philippines-based news site Rappler and a Nobel Peace Prize laureate. Sounds Harvard-y eneough, doesn’t she? Except that in January, Ressa signed a letter accusing Israel of “unabated killing of journalists in Israeli airstrikes since the start of the Israel-Gaza war”while calling for “immediate end to the bombardment of journalists and apparent targeting in some cases of our colleagues in Gaza and the region.” (This a dubious accusation at best.)
Two months earlier, Rappler called for a ceasefire and compared Israel’s actions to the atrocities of Adolf Hitler:
“What Israel is doing is clearly a disproportionate response and its intention is not simply to retaliate, but to launch an all-out war,” the editorial said. “In the intensity of Israel’s godlike technology, its paleolithic instincts can be seen in the lack of effort to differentiate between civilians and its enemy Hamas….It is a great irony that the [Jewish] race that suffered centuries of oppression, even genocide at the hands of Adolf Hitler, is now [denying] the same aspirations [for] the Palestinians…We like to think that our world is more modern, more aware, and more compassionate, compared for example to the time of Adolf Hitler, or the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima.”
Great. In addition to spreading Hamas propaganda and pushing Hamas strategy (Ressa’s publication refuses to call Hamas a terrorist group) Ressa compares the U.S.’s justified use of the atomic bomb to Hitler’s acts of genocide.
I have no problem with allowing Ressa, or any of a large number of prominent people with repugnant political views, to speak at Harvard. Inviting someone like her to be the commencement speaker, however, comes as close to pouring gasoline on a fire as a speaker choice can get. The university is being credibly accused of allowing Jewish students to be harassed and intimidated on campus. It is under investigation for civil rights violations. Hey, everybody, let’s invites an anti-Israel zealot to be the Commencement speaker!
What’s going on here? I don’t know: institutional suicide, maybe? Wouldn’t the sensible. rational, responsible course be to choose one among thousands of distinguished, justly famous, accomplished, respected, articulate, provocative and entertaining individuals to star in Harvard’s commencement who is not supporting terrorism, warped history and the vilification of Jews? Would that really be so hard?
If Harvard were trying to destroy itself, it could hardly do a better job.
Ethics Alarms 
“…distinguished, justly famous, accomplished, respected, articulate, provocative and entertaining individuals to star in Harvard’s commencement who is not supporting terrorism, warped history and the vilification of Jews? “
Are you sure that any of these exist? Remember, they don’t count if they are ‘alt-right extremists’, ‘MAGA extremists’, ‘white males’, ‘straight’, ‘Christian nationalists’, ‘Constitutionalists’, ‘Jewish’ or members any other ‘hate groups’.
Harvard has to be in lockstep with the their core constituency. Their core constituency has demonized all traditional groups and promoted all groups that previously would have been labelled deviant. This is all they have. They cannot have a speaker who is tolerant of any traditionally respected group in America because ‘silence is violence’. Harvard’s values are Marxists, Muslims, racial minorities that mind their place and aren’t Jewish, and the LGBTQMAP++ soup.
Disproportionate response? Paleolithic instincts?
Ms. Ressa clearly has absolutely zero knowledge of military history at all. World War II started in Europe when a handful of Germans (dressed in Polish uniforms) “crossed the border” and attacked at German radio station. Germany’s “proportionate” response?…60+ divisions screaming into Poland.
When Japan attacked Pearl Harbor – this is somewhat equivalent to the October 7 attacks by Hamas – did the US respond disproportionately? We absolutely did. We threw every resource we could spare at the Japanese army, their navy, and their air assets. We bombed their strongholds until they died, we bombed their conquests until they left, and we bombed their homeland – including civilian populations with nuclear weapons – to a bloody pulp. War is never about proportionality…NEVER. And it’s rarely fought with “paleolithic instincts” (whatever those are), except by the eventual loser. War is the methodical destruction of an enemy and that enemy’s capacity to hopefully ever make war again.
Do I even have to wonder what she’ll talk about at commencement…
I thought WWII started with Hitler sent an aging battleship loaded with troops to Danzig. The former German city was a League of Nations mandate under control of Poland. Germany was allowed to send 1 ship/year to the city. Hitler sent an obsolete ship so it wouldn’t look suspicious (the previous year he had sent a new one and everyone complained). When it docked, the soldiers got off the ship and attacked the Polish troops defending the city. Danzig held out longer than Poland.
The story of Danzig/Gdansk is a useful one for the contrast with this ‘Palestinian’ issue. After WWII, Poland was granted Danzig and they renamed it Gdansk (it was known as Gdansk when the Poles controlled it and Danzig when the Germans did). By 1947, the Polish authorities expelled over 120,000 residents of German ethnicity and replaced them with Poles. By 1950 almost 300,000 Danzigers had fled or been expelled to Germany and replaced with Poles. Where are these Danzigers and their decedents today? Do they live in UN refugee camps? Are they committing terrorist acts against Poland to reclaim their ‘homeland’? No, they got on with their lives. This is what happens when wars are won and lost.
Why can’t the ‘Palestinians’ do this? When Israel was founded, most Middle Eastern countries expelled their Jewish citizens and confiscated their property. Why don’t the Arab countries take in the the ‘Palestinians’ from the territory Israel conquered and give them all the property they confiscated from their Jewish citizens? Is it because Arabs aren’t as kindhearted and compassionate as Nazis?
You want proportionate?
Israel would have to:
Rape, and then shoot in the back of the head, precisely the same number of people.
Murder precisely the same number of babies in their cribs.
Lash together precisely the same number of families and then burn them alive.
Torture and murder precisely the same number of Holocaust survivors and then post video of said murder on Facebook for the victim’s family to witness.
Sodomize precisely the same number of young women and then parade them through the street in their blood soaked sweatpants.
When you enter another country and slaughter 1200 innocent civilians, you get war. That’s how it works. Israel could have (should have?) wiped Gaza off the map on October 8th. That it hasn’t already done so shows remarkable restraint in my opinion.
“Israel could have (should have?) wiped Gaza off the map on October 8th. That it hasn’t already done so shows remarkable restraint in my opinion.” (bolds mine)
Agreed, had Israel engaged in the No-Holds-Barred genocide Lefty claims, Palestine would’ve been reduced to fine dust by Halloween.
PWS
Yep.
I love it. Because millions of Jewish men, women and children were rounded up and murdered by the NAZIs on an industrial scale during World War Two, the Israelis must treat their attackers with kid gloves. What a brilliant piece of legerdemain.
Back to a sage old Army nurse who once replied to an arrogant surgeon who touted his Harvard medical training,; “three things in life are highly overrated, they all begin with H{ Homecolling, Home Screwing and Harvard medicne.” I propose that could be exanded to include Harvard Education at any level, along with Harvard ledership.
2024 Harvard Med School Music Video: https://x.com/EndWokeness/status/1787093247728218519
The saying at my undergraduate institution was “All bad things start at Harvard”.
A very simple and obvious explanation for Harvard’s selecting this woman as the primary speaker at the Harvard commencement: It will appease and placate the Hamas wing of the student body, so they won’t misbehave during the graduation ceremony. Pretty desperate, sure. But it might just work.
If the Jewish students don’t at least turn their backs while she is speaking—heck, if substantial numbers of non-Jewish students don’t do it, it—it will be a disgrace. Another one.
Honestly, as I’ve commented here before, a sizable majority of American Jewry is extremely conflicted (embarrassed?) about Israel’s behavior (and even existence?). I wouldn’t be surprised if more Jewish students at Harvard are running around in Hamas garb than are upset about the pro-Hamas thrust of things on campus. Again, I think many, many American Jews (Chuck Schumer? Amy Schumer?) just wish Israel would back into a hedge and disappear. Who needs Israel when you’ve got Brooklyn and the Upper West Side?
So I think that I (we?) have missed the boat here. Harvard is not destroying itself. My relatives will still send their kids to Harvard and HLS. Employers will still favor Harvard grads. The Government will continue to give millions to the Harvards. It takes a broader and longer historical view than I have to predict when change will happen.
Second. Four hundred years of history.