The Ivory Tower Is Under Siege

Re “Harvard Presidents Used to Be Players,” Commentary, Feb. 28: Richard Bradley gives an interesting short history of Harvard and its presidents. His initial thesis is that, because of Harvard’s increasingly diverse population, a university president should not risk offending some with his ideas or questions.

Bradley claims that Lawrence Summer’s stand against divestment from Israel as anti-Semitic offended Middle Eastern Muslims and Christians. This is only half true. Arab Christians are among the most persecuted minorities in Muslim countries such as Egypt, Palestine, Iraq, Lebanon and Iran, not to mention Sudan, where black Christians have been ethnically cleansed by the Muslims in the north. He uses the false Christian argument to cloak the obvious.

Bradley should be more honest. He feels a university president should not risk raising his voice against the current-day tyranny of the politically correct establishment, much as Galileo could not speak out against the medieval church, or Salman Rushdie against the new intolerance of the radical Muslim world, both Sunni and Shiite.

Whatever happened to the concept of the university as the place to emphasize intellectual freedom and search for the truth? Is it just a tyranny of the majority?

Richard Friedman

Los Angeles