Word: webb
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...what was the basis of AALARM's accusation? AALARM co-president E. Adam Webb '93 says he based the charge on his understanding that gays and lesbians represent 2 percent of the national population and 10 percent of the Harvard community. Comparing these figures, Webb concluded that "they are having a tip. They are hurting all other groups. It's a farce...
Ignoring for the moment that the 2 percent figure is almost certainly wrong (even in 1954, the Kinsey study reported 10 percent), Webb's reasoning is nothing short of a call for proportional representation in admissions. If the problem with gay students is that they constitute a higher percentage at Harvard than in America, what about the high percentage of Asian-American students on campus? Or of Jewish students...
...wonder the coordinating committee of the Harvard-Radcliffe Hillel took the unprecedented step of condemning AALARM's postering campaign. Webb's response was that Hillel is a "political, P.C. hack group." This is ludicrous. Hillel's coordinating committee can and should make political decisions, which Webb has every right to criticize. But for Webb to suggest that all of Hillel is just a political front group reveals his eagerness to debate through name-calling--the charge that conservatives often level at the campus left...
Ignoring for the moment that Adam Webb's figure for the percentage of homosexuals in America is probably wrong--2 percent is probably too high (see Kinsey, Sex, and Fraud, 1990)--Webb's other comments need to be taken in context...
...unreasonable to assume, as the staff does, that Webb means to attack Hillel as an institution. Rather, he seems to be saying that by coming down on the easy-pickens side of a political issue that does not directly concern it, Hillel's coordinating committee is making Hillel look like "a political, P.C. hack group." As a matter of fact, the committee's actions last week have upset many of Hillel's rank-and-file...