This semester, I’ve been proud to see the Collegian launch a new and improved online paper, even while navigating a relocation from Oliphant Hall to MLIC. I was disappointed, however, to encounter several tropes that are widely regarded as antisemitic in the September 29 Horoscope.
The University of Tulsa is committed to institutional neutrality – which means that as a university we do not take stances on social and political issues, in order to foster open and serious dialogue and debate. But with this commitment comes responsibility from each of us to consider whether the things we do and say really advance our arguments rather than simply giving unnecessary offense. When the nominal purpose of an article is the sort of lighthearted satire we might expect from a horoscope, I would argue that tropes associating Jewish people with secret control of the media, via the manipulative use of money, do not meet that test. This may have been unintentional, but that does not make it right. I also believe, however, that colleges are places for making, and correcting, mistakes, and my hope is that we can use this as a learning opportunity to produce a newspaper of which we can all be proud.
I’m a journalist, having written for over twenty years for publications including TIME magazine, The New Republic, The London Review of Books, and Newsweek. And in the course of my career I’ve often been reminded that freedom of the press does not simply mean that anyone has the right to publish anything. Newspapers, magazines, and book publishers have editors and boards that vet, debate, and shape the pieces that they publish. Any professor can tell you that the best publications reject far more material than they print. When a piece like the Sept. 29 horoscope appears in print, it tells me that we need to improve our own systems of training, editing, and oversight. I hope to work with the editors, writers, and faculty advisors of the Collegian to do just that, fostering a debate that is open, free, fearless, and genuinely conducive to civil discourse.
Sincerely,
Blaine Greteman
Dean of Honors and of the Kendall College of Arts and Sciences
