Levin regrets T-shirt flap
The Yale Daily News
By Jordi Gasso and Nora Caplan-Bricker
Staff Reporter, Staff Reporter
Published Tuesday, January 19, 2010
In response to the complaint of a free-speech advocacy group, University President Richard Levin said he regrets the controversy surrounding the Freshman Class Council’s axed T-shirt design for the Harvard-Yale Game.
In a Dec. 18 letter to Levin, Adam Kissel of the Foundation for Individuals Rights in Education said Yale College Dean Mary Miller acted inappropriately by ruling “unacceptable” an FCC T-shirt design that offended some members of the gay community. In Jan. 14 a letter to Kissel, provided to the News by FIRE, Levin said the members of FCC reached a decision to change the...
#1 By 00 5:06a.m. on January 19, 2010
great response from levin. fits the culture of the yale i remember and lays some concerns to rest>
#2 By Easily Intimidated? 5:23a.m. on January 19, 2010
What is the lesson? Modern students are too deferential to power? Too easily given to following orders? T'aint the Yale of William Sloane Coffin's day. BTW, nice job of separating the Levins.
PK
M.Div.'80
#3 By Old Blue 10:53a.m. on January 19, 2010
Pllleassse!
Her Deanness finds a tee shirt "unacceptable!"
Me thinks she doth protest too much, and should apologize to the FCC for rendering her opinions in such a heavy handed way. Too bad Levin has to waste his time apologizing for her.
#4 By First Amendment 12:15p.m. on January 19, 2010
C'mon Old Blue:
Levin "waste his time" apologizing? Free speech is the aorta of the University.
PK
M.Div'80
#5 By Kim 12:53p.m. on January 19, 2010
Levin failed to exercise similar restraint when he compared pro-life proponents to terrorists last year. Where was the apology in relation to that?
#6 By Old Blue '73 4:54p.m. on January 19, 2010
It would be nice to see the text of Dean Ou's email to the FCC to judge whether it really is as open to interpretation as Levin says it is. But I agree with #2 above, the bulk of very bright ugrads these days are rules-followers to a fault, by and large.
# 7 By O Full of Scorpions is my Mind 9:25 p.m. January 19, 2010
#6:
And the reason today's ugrads are "rules followers" by and large? The Draft-free world they grew up in. Unfairness is just a "fringe issue" these days. Nothing worth upsetting the apple cart about. The biggest unfairness they've experienced is the Supreme Court cheating Gore out of the presidency:
Nothing that really hits home---like being carted off to Viet Nam and turned into a modern day Macbeth: "Oh full of scorpions is my mind . . .". (Shakespeare's description of PTSD 400 years before the illness was diagnosed.)
#8 By Blood will have blood 9:30 p.m. January 19, 2010
PS to # 6: Shakespeare's other premonitory definition of PTSD (by 400 years) in Macbeth reads thus:
"Blood will have blood."
PK
M.Div. '80
#9 By Egalitarian 10:53p.m. on January 19, 2010
One thing that seems to be missing from this discussion is that these shirts are insulting to a much broader group than just the LGBT community. It is insulting to women because it implies that feminine behavior is undesirable or inferior. It is insulting to men who do not conform to or agree with the alpha male stereotype, for obvious reasons. It has no place in a community that claims to be diverse and tolerant.
As far as the appropriateness of the University's actions, it depends on whether the University is paying for shirts. If so, then it certainly has the right to refuse to pay for them if they carry a hateful message. Otherwise, it would be appropriate for the administration to criticize the message but not to censor it. (It's calling responding to speech you don't like with more speech.)
I agree with #5 that it was improper for Levin to compare the pro-life with terrorism, although it was still certainly protected free speech.
#11 By Borrowed Robes 1;05 a.m. January 20, 2010
I disagree with # 9. "Sissy" does not imply "female", it implies non-agressive. A male is supposed to be agressive i.e. use his muscles to subdue others (the biological determinism model) and a female is supposed to be nurturing, using the soft tissue appeal of the mammary ensemble not to subdue but to enrich and expand others, specifically offspring (also the biological determinism model.)
What is offensive is NOT the donning or doffing of the biological robes, but the SWAPPING of biological robes: Why do you dress me in soft tissue when nature intends me to wear tissue tough and hard?
What is happening as we become more cerebral and less biological (more emancipated from gender identity and less imprisoned by it) is an increasing anxiety about renouncing our biology: Why do you dress me in borrowed robes---or tee-shirts?
PK
#17 By Egalitarian 11:45a.m. on January 20, 2010
To #11: Really? So, it's appropriate to go around imposing one's way on other people by physical force as long it's a male who's doing it? What a wonderful way to needlessly perpetuate violence!
To #13: The Oxford English Dictionary defines the word "sissy" as "An effeminate person; a coward," thereby associating the undesirable trait of cowardice with femininity. It's simply wrong to say that this is a reflection of my prejudices and not those of society.
#18 By Semantic Battlefields 12:50p.m. on January 20, 2010
# 17
I didn't say it was approrpriate. I said it is the sad history of biological determinism: The fate of those with muscles has been to overwhelm others with power. The fate of those with milk-makers and a baby-maker has been to produce children and feed others.
It is only in the recent "liberation epoch" that we have been able to disentangle identity from gender. However, the resulting anxiety manifests
itself on the semantic battlefields of "sissy" and "butch" and "marriage" etc.
PK
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