Yesterday, President Pollack sent an email to the Cornell community condemning the terrorist attacks by Hamas in Israel this weekend. Except, they forgot an all-important word: ‘terrorism.’ Cornell emailed tens of thousands of students, faculty, and staff to declare Hamas’ acts “brutal,” then forgot to include the very word for that evil.
Someone in the University Relations office must have noticed the mistake (or perhaps the enormous campus backlash), and about six hours later, Pollack sent a follow up with her “heartfelt apologies” for the omission of the crime which prompted the original email.
What’s worse: forgetting to call it terrorism or needing to?
That we even need Pollack to clarify that Hamas’ attacks (which included brutalities far too graphic for me to recount in this paper) are terrorism is quite a statement. It should go without saying that a rogue group murdering, kidnapping, and executing civilians (including many of our fellow American citizens) is terrorism.
Yet, because many prominent voices in our country (and a few on this campus) find themselves unable or unwilling to call a spade a spade, we need to have the obvious spelled out for us. Yes, Hamas’ attacks were obviously terrorism. What else would they be?
Presumably, Pollack and her media flaks know that the campus is of a divided mind on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and would have done their due diligence. But they didn’t. They formulated a statement that contained no novel insights beyond tepid offers of counseling and heavy hearts.
Of course, there’s not much that Cornell can do in situations like this. Our alma mater’s only institutional tie to Israel is a partnership with Technion for the campus in New York City. Cornell has no real reason to opine on geopolitical developments half a world away. However, they do this all the time.
Should Cornell weigh in on political topics? The Review argues not.
Indeed, Sidechat users rather quickly discovered a 97% likelihood that the statement was generated by an AI chatbot. Whether this is true or not (which the Review cannot confirm– two of the four AI checkers we used returned >90% likelihood of AI input), that we are unable to discern a clear difference between Media Relations and ChatGPT speaks to how little Cornell’s statements contribute to discourse.
These statements are read and forgotten, changing nothing– unless they screw up, à la today’s omission.
The opportunity for Cornell to weigh in on topics like this also opens the door for the wrong opinions to come through. Inherent in taking a side is the risk of taking the wrong side. Unfortunately, that has also plagued Cornell in recent days.
Yesterday, a diversity, equity, and inclusion officer at the graduate business school posted, let’s just be honest, an unhinged rant calling the unspeakable horrors committed by Hamas “resistance.”
Cornell quickly swept the incident under the rug, saying the official in question has been on leave for many months and does not represent the perspectives of the university. However, the juxtaposition of this official’s behavior and Cornell’s statement is horrifying: here we have Cornell forgetting to call Hamas terrorists, while a DEI director in their employ played whataboutism with that terrorism and Israeli government actions.
Why does Cornell weigh in?
When Cornell’s administration does the right thing – as it did here – and condemns people doing bad things, it’s difficult to criticize. However, more often than not, Cornell wades into unsettled political disputes and puts its enormous institutional thumb on the scale.
The most obvious example of this was Dean Augustine Choi’s university-wide email on the occasion of Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization which overturned Roe v. Wade. Choi described the decision as “deeply disappointing,” following up with his signature on behalf of Weill Cornell Medicine.
More recent examples include Cornell’s discontent with the Court’s decision to end affirmative action.
As I aforesaid: these statements go read and forgotten by most Cornellians. However, those they implicitly target, i.e., dissenters, remember. They remember that their university has publicly and institutionally condemned their views, opinions held by tens of millions of Americans.
In this free expression theme year, Cornell’s administration must consider the chilling effect their statements have on campus discourse. When the dean of Weill Cornell Medicine expresses antipathy for pro-lifers, or when Pollack herself expresses disappointment over the end of affirmative action, are conservative students supposed to feel more welcomed to express these sentiments?
No. They take the hint and keep their opinions to themselves.
In a way, one cannot blame Cornell for proffering their opinion. American society has developed a fascination with institutional commitments of this stripe, demanding every notable company and college declare the right opinion on the cause du jour. Again, in cases like today (or the invasion of Ukraine) when Cornell comes out on the right side, it’s difficult to criticize them.
It’s good to hate and condemn bad things like the bloody slaughter of civilians (even if you forget to call it what it is) or state-on-state war. It’s not good to chill perspectives unpopular on campus but held by tens of millions of Americans.
To recap, the statements – at best – add nothing to campus discourse and – at worst – alienate unpopular perspectives and make honest dialogue much more difficult. Or nobody reads them at all. The last option in Media Relations roulette is an incomplete statement that does more harm than good by leaving out crucial information (i.e., the word ‘terrorism’).
If Cornell kept its mouth shut about everything, we would not be in this mess. If they wanted to speak, all they needed to do was issue a simple statement condemning terrorism. The very least they could do is get it right the first time.
