The Associated Press posted the following tweet regarding Claudine Gay's belated ouster:
“Harvard's president's resignation highlights a new weapon in conservative arms against universities: plagiarism.”
Perfect, right? The big bad conservatives are to blame. Plagiarism is not a heinous academic crime, but a weapon.
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When a public figure cannot be defended, they blame the attacker without addressing the nature of the accusation. The Associated Press softened its tweet after the backlash, echoing reporting by many news outlets. Politico's headline: “How the Right Toppled Harvard's President.”
Another proven technique is to blame whatever happens on racial or ethnic identity. It's not a crime, it's demonizing the victim.
Former Harvard University President Claudine Gay, who recently made headlines for refusing to say during a Congressional hearing whether the genocide of Jews was against Harvard's policy, has been accused of plagiarism in recent weeks. I'm making an accusation. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
Gay himself said in his resignation letter Tuesday that he had been “subjected to personal attacks and threats fueled by racial animus.”
No mention is made of the mounting and humiliating allegations that he stole someone else's words. There is no mention of her passionate refusal to condemn her anti-Semitism in her House hearings. They are simply doing what is in the best interest of the organization.
Let's get this straight. Claudine Gay was not excluded by the university's Board of Governors because she was the first black president of Harvard University. Rather, she has survived this long because of her race. A white leader would have been kicked out of there sooner.
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Case in point: Elizabeth McGill resigned as UPenn's president days after giving similarly evasive testimony about anti-Semitism on campus.
Harvard's Board of Trustees did everything it could to protect Gaye, who promptly apologized the day after his damning testimony. She got it all back. After consulting and preparing her law firm, which McGill also used, she said she was wrong.
Harvard University President Claudine Gay attends a menorah lighting ceremony with the university's Jewish community on the seventh night of Hanukkah on December 13, 2023 at Harvard Yard in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Harvard University's Board of Trustees voted to keep Gaye in his position after he answered questions about hate speech on campus during a congressional hearing. (Andrew Lichtenstein/Corbis via Getty Images)
Is that leadership? How difficult is it to say that anti-Semitic bigotry and behavior are shameful and have no place on our campuses? Were the gays simply trying to cater to liberal students and faculty who supported Hamas terrorists?
Instead, she told Elise Stefanik that it all depends on “context,” which Republicans quickly rejected and called on Gay to resign.
During a hearing on anti-Semitism, when asked by Representative Elise Stefanik whether calls for the genocide of Jews violated the organization's policy on bullying and harassment, Mr. McGill, Mr. Gay, Mr. Kornbluth gave a “confused'' answer to all of the questions. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
But then accusations of plagiarism arose. The Harvard Board of Regents, which has not yet taken responsibility, dismissed them. It was just bad attribution or some such nonsense.
In fact, gay behavior was against the school's own rules and would have resulted in expulsion if he were a student.
To their credit, the New York Times and other major news outlets continued to cover the incident. And the Washington Free Beacon and activist Christopher Rufo reported that Gay had plagiarized his own student paper in 1997. So, while you could say that conservatives played a role in her demise, they are not alone, and the added virtue that they are right.
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As it turns out, Gay plagiarized half of his few published papers.
The situation had become unsustainable. Harvard University became the punchline. The board can no longer protect Claudine Gay. And she has a final outburst about her racial hatred, revealing that she still doesn't understand the gravity of what she did and she had to resign.
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footnote: Perhaps the liberals on “SNL” want to revisit that skit in which they mocked Elise Stefanik as an out-of-control fiend and simply portrayed a college president as a bit of a mess?
