To the Editor:
Re “Penn’s President Felled by Furor Over Testimony” (entrance web page, Dec. 10):
I too was not pleased with M. Elizabeth Magill’s and the opposite college presidents’ responses on the congressional listening to about antisemitism on campus, however I don’t assist resignation or firing. Everybody in a troublesome job has made errors and has discovered from these errors. Ought to any of us be fired or pressured to resign for each mistake we make?
All of those achieved ladies had been grilled on the listening to attempting to steadiness their duties to guard the security of their college students and their proper to free speech. Even the Supreme Court docket struggles with the identical situation.
Sure, their solutions on the time had been insufficient, however they’ve subsequently defined their considering and plans to maneuver ahead. They deserved a possibility to get it proper. We might anticipate the identical for ourselves.
Kenneth Olshansky
San Rafael, Calif.
To the Editor:
There is no such thing as a place, any time, anyplace that calling for the genocide of any group of individuals is suitable. Full cease.
Lynn Bernstein
Brooklyn
To the Editor:
M. Elizabeth Magill’s primary level — that her college’s penalty for hateful speech is dependent upon the particular info — was each considerate and acceptable. However the reply can’t be considered in isolation.
The query wasn’t requested, however it appears unimaginable that Ms. Magill (or the opposite two faculty presidents) earlier than that Home committee would have proven such nuanced equivocation if the query was whether or not a pupil can be disciplined for advocating the genocide of, say, Black individuals or Native People or homosexuals.
I believe that a lot of the furor is as a result of their rigorously rehearsed solutions recommend a troubling campus double customary: a protecting one for a lot of historically oppressed teams — and a distinct customary for Jews.
Greg Schwed
New York
The author is a lawyer.
To the Editor:
Re “College Presidents Walked Right into a Lure,” by Michelle Goldberg (column, Dec. 10):
Ms. Goldberg’s considerate commentary relating to the testimony of the three college presidents earlier than Congress sadly misses the purpose.
Sure, freedom of speech and debate is important and have to be protected. Nevertheless, when hateful speech turns into conduct is just not the correct take a look at for triggering self-discipline.
Freedom of speech ends the place it turns into bullying, intimidation or incitement, or the place it places individuals in concern of bodily hurt or suppresses the speech of others. It definitely ends the place an inexpensive listener can interpret it as a name to commit horrific crimes similar to genocide.
There was far an excessive amount of hypocrisy, together with the selective enforcement of guidelines. That is the place the college presidents and the establishments they lead fall quick. Whether or not within the academy or on the road, people should discover ways to allow and debate any aspect of a difficulty with out crossing the road into hate speech.
Younger individuals and plenty of others don’t perceive this as a result of our educators have failed to show them how to take action — a activity that’s important to a wholesome society.
William Titelman
Athens
The author is a retired lawyer.
To the Editor:
I feel that college directors throughout the nation are abdicating their position to teach college students. Below the guise of free speech, they’re lacking the purpose. Somewhat than merely defending a pupil’s proper to talk freely, they need to be ensuring that college students are educated on the problems.
As a professor at Kent State College, I’ve greater than as soon as encountered college students who rally and maintain movie screenings with no full understanding of what they had been combating for and towards, nor the implications of their positions each right here and overseas. I’ve seen that when given the good thing about information, college students have modified course and reconsidered their actions.
By sitting again and asserting free speech above all, directors are lacking the chance to have interaction college students in their very own schooling, and failing the very college students they’re working so onerous to guard.
Becky Rolnick-Fox
Akron, Ohio
The Homeless Downside Persists on the Subway
To the Editor:
Re “Adams Says Metropolis Is Seeing Ends in Its Effort to Get Assist to the Mentally Unwell” (information article, Nov. 30):
As somebody who rides the subway steadily, I’ve a tough time aligning Mayor Eric Adams’s optimism concerning the progress the town is making in serving to the homeless with the scenes that proceed to play out in New York underground.
The identical huddled figures attempt to discover sleep on the wood benches, their belongings stuffed into plastic rubbish baggage — all that’s left of their lives. And within the subway, my fellow passengers and I pray that the one who simply entered the automobile shouting, “I don’t need to hurt anybody — I simply want some cash!” will, in actual fact, do no hurt.
And nobody appears to note that there’s nonetheless scant seen police presence to observe and defend the homeless in addition to ourselves. For straphangers, there’s only a numbing acceptance that we have to avert our eyes from the struggling as we proceed to our vacation spot.
To the Editor:
Re “Let Us Inform You a Story: What Would American Theater Be With out Its Jewish Actors, Playwrights and Administrators?” (T Journal, Dec. 3):
Whereas there’s a lot to admire on this fascinating piece, it’s disturbing that Jesse Inexperienced doesn’t write about and even point out any Jewish ladies playwrights.
The article reinforces the pervasive erasure of ladies writers within the theater business, whereas lauding the standard suspects. Sure, Arthur Miller, Lerner and Loewe, Neil Simon and Tom Stoppard have to be included on this story. So ought to the feminine Jewish playwrights, lyricists and librettists who constructed and proceed to construct the American theater.
The article overlooks a century of Jewish ladies theater writers, together with Edna Ferber (“Dinner at Eight,” 1932); Lillian Hellman (“The Youngsters’s Hour,” 1934); Betty Comden (“On the City,” 1944); Dorothy Fields (“Annie Get Your Gun,” 1946); Bella Spewack (“Kiss Me, Kate,” 1948); Susan Yankowitz (“Terminal,” 1969); Liz Swados (“Runaways,” 1978); Wendy Wasserstein (“The Heidi Chronicles,” 1988); Paula Vogel (“How I Discovered to Drive,” 1997); Lynn Ahrens (“Ragtime,” 1998); Winnie Holzman (“Depraved,” 2003); and Lisa Kron (“Enjoyable Residence,” 2013), to call only a few. It additionally ignores numerous Jewish ladies playwrights and musical theater writers who’re in the present day redefining American theater.
Alice Eve Cohen
New York
The author is a playwright whose “Oklahoma Samovar” received the Nationwide Jewish Playwriting Contest.
The Uncommon Hardship of a Uncommon Identify
To the Editor:
Re “An Uncommon Identify Can Be a Burden. In Japan, Mother and father Are Being Reined In” (information article, Dec. 3):
This text mentioned how Japan is attempting to restrict the prevalence of bizarre child names. There’s good purpose to take action. As a psychiatrist, I’ve met many sufferers who discovered that having an uncommon identify was an actual social obstacle all through their lives.
Iceland has resolution to this drawback: It provides all dad and mom six months to decide on their child’s identify. This enables them time to think about the implications of selecting a reputation that would later make their baby an object of ridicule or pity. It additionally ends in many colourful methods to check with a new child (a few of that are a bit salty), for the reason that baby could also be formally anonymous for the primary six months. (Icelandic regulation really forbids names which will trigger embarrassment.)
Harvey M. Berman
White Plains, N.Y.
