Opinion: A culture of moral relativism is biting universities following Hamas’ terrorist attacks
Many of the nation’s most prestigious universities are learning the limits of moral relativism. It withers in the face of a clear choice between right and wrong.
At Pennsylvania, Harvard, Yale and elsewhere, professors and administrators are under fire, either for actively supporting Hamas, which is labeled a terrorist group by the United States and the European Union, or for failing to speak out against those who use their campuses to support Hamas in its recent surprise attack against Israel. Hamas has refused to recognize the state of Israel, and its charter calls for Israel’s destruction.
Perhaps most importantly, donors to these universities are speaking with their pocketbooks.
Universities, ideally, should be bastions of free speech. Sadly, that is often no longer the case where certain conservative or religious viewpoints are concerned. But while free speech should be cherished, and allowed to flourish, universities and administrations themselves should exhibit moral clarity where answers are clear. And, as the Deseret News recently reported, it’s clear antisemitism is on the rise at many of the nation’s elite college campuses. It’s also clear the horrific attacks by Hamas and kidnappings merit strong condemnation.
Related
Former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr., who also was U.S. ambassador to Russia and China, sent an email to Penn President Liz Magill over the weekend saying his family will stop making donations to the school, his alma mater.
“The University’s silence in the face of reprehensible and historic Hamas evil against the people of Israel (when the only response should be outright condemnation) is a new low,” he wrote. The school, he said, has become “deeply adrift in ways that make it almost unrecognizable.”
This is an appropriate response, and one that brings relativism to a head-on collision with reality.
Other Penn alumni, such as Marc Rowan, who has donated more than $50 million to the school, called for donors to cut off donations. Vahan H. Gureghian, a Penn trustee appointed by the state’s General Assembly, resigned. He and others are also protesting the school’s decision to allow a conference on Palestinian art and culture, which featured some speakers who hold radical anti-Israel views.
At Harvard, donors have reacted to the university’s lack of response to a letter from 30 student groups, which blamed Israel solely for the atrocities Hamas committed in its attack. The New York Times reported that Kenneth Griffin, whose donations to the school this year alone equal $300 million, had a private conversation with the senior fellow of the Harvard Corporation.
Related
Former Harvard president Lawrence H. Summers, who also is a former Treasury secretary, wrote on X that, “In nearly 50 years of @Harvard affiliation, I have never been as disillusioned and alienated as I am today” because of the school’s lack of condemnation toward the letter.
The Times said the most powerful pressure is coming away from the spotlight, in private conversations with Wall Street financiers and school administrators.
The results have been telling. Harvard issued two statements condemning the atrocities of Hamas. Penn’s president issued a statement saying both she and the school are “horrified by and condemn Hamas’s terrorist assault on Israel and their violent atrocities against civilians.”
But these statements obviously were in response to the potential loss of funding. Time will tell whether these and other schools become more thoughtful about addressing matters of importance with moral clarity.
Meanwhile, several student groups have backed away from the letter by the Harvard coalition, saying they weren’t aware it was being written and were not consulted.
To Israelis and most Americans, the attacks presented zero ambiguity. Among other things, Hamas attacked a peaceful music festival, brutally murdering many people and taking hundreds hostage. This has been documented in many videos and by eyewitness accounts. Officials have verified that 30 Americans were killed in the attacks, with 13 still unaccounted for, according to The Wall Street Journal.
A CNN-SSRS poll found 71% of Americans feeling “a lot” of sympathy toward Israelis in this conflict, with 96% expressing at least some sympathy.
Reflecting this, members of Congress have shown little ambiguity. Utah Sen. Mitt Romney and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer visited Israel over the weekend and met with families of hostages. Schumer, who is Jewish, recalled his own family’s horrific experiences during the Holocaust of WWII.
“And the world can’t move on and say oh, well, that was yesterday,” he said in a statement. “Because if we don’t prevent the threat from Hamas from occurring, it’ll happen again, and again, and again.”
Those who don’t remember the past can forget that evil laughs at moral relativism as it rampages.
