OPINION:
Harvard, in a move that’s supposed to be seen as predicated on principle and rooted in moral standards, told Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting survivor Kyle Kashuv, 18, that sorry, due to your use of the N-word when you were 16, your admissions’ ticket has been yanked. Go home; class dismissed. Harvard doesn’t want your kind.
Hmm.
Monkey see, monkey do. Monkey thinks Harvard’s full of poo.
Not saying Kashuv deserves a free pass for his past rhetoric.
He did, after all, reportedly once write this on a Google document that a classmate then screenshot and shared with HuffPost: “like im really good at typing n—er ok like practice uhhhhh makes perfect son??!!”
He later apologized and said this: “I see the world through different eyes and am embarrassed by the petty, flippant kid represented in those screenshots.” He also, on Twitter, called his comments “egregious and callous.”
They were.
But: He was 16 when he made them.
How many 16-year-olds don’t make dumb, stupid, careless, thoughtless statements they later regret?
Harvard doesn’t see it that way.
Kashuv, who was admitted to Harvard earlier this year, was just informed by the admissions’ office that his acceptance had been rescinded.
“As you know,” Harvard wrote to Kashuv, The Hill reported, “the Committee takes seriously the qualities of maturity and moral character. We are sorry about the circumstances that have led us to withdraw your admission, and we wish you success in your future academic endeavors and beyond.”
How nice.
But isn’t this the same Harvard that’s been fighting off charges of mass discrimination against Asian American students?
The same Harvard that in the 1920s, as the Heritage Foundation’s Hans von Spakovsky put it, “unashamedly” worked to “limit the number of Jewish students” admitted to its fine institution?
The same Harvard that just hosted its first ever “black only” graduation ceremonies — a sort of reverse racism that only reinforces the perception of the university’s embrace of separation-by-skin-color policies?
Interesting.
All that — but Kashuv’s the threat.
All that — but it’s the kid who tossed out the N-word at age 16 who has the problem with moral character.
The “Committee” might want to take a second look — this time, inward.
Taking down a teen who tossed out the N-word, while turning blind eyes to institutional discrimination, seems like throwing a cup of water on a 100-acre forest fire. Yay for the cupholder. But what of the blaze?
For shame, Harvard. This is monkey politics. Monkey justice. And the best reason for upcoming graduating high schoolers to try Yale instead.
• Cheryl Chumley can be reached at cchumley@washingtontimes.com or on Twitter @ckchumley.
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