Subject: | Concerns about ROTC |
Date: | Monday, May 02, 2005 3:42 PM |
From: | M Foss |
To: | Scott Stewart |
Cc: | Sean Wilkes; Eric Chen; Michael Segal; Prof. Allan Silver |
Scott and others,
Thank you for taking the time to reply to my concerns regarding your desire to
return ROTC to Columbia. Just a few thoughts on this matter:
First, having just reviewed the Advocates for ROTC website, I take serious issue
with the document entitled "Handout for 15 April 2005 Senate debate on ROTC."
While your group seems in other places to meekly claim that it is opposed to
DADT, this document defends the military's discrimination against homosexuals by
comparing homosexuality to a disability. I am incredulous and deeply troubled
that any Columbia student would defend the ban on openly serving gays in any
part of the military or, indeed, would suggest that homosexuality be viewed as a
disability. To even suggest that homosexuals should be relegated to certain
areas of the military on grounds that they cannot share barracks with
heterosexual soldiers is offensive to me. I am in the process of forwarding this
document to a variety of student leaders, alumni, faculty and administrators and
it has strengthened my resolve to do everything I can to see that this proposal
does not pass.
Secondly, by allowing ROTC back on campus, Columbia would send a message to the
world that discrimination is acceptable. To send such a message is worse than
having no voice in the debate at all. The fact that an institution that has led
our nation on issues of non-discrimination is now willing to accept an
institution that discriminates, will only strengthen DADT in the short term. The
fact that Columbia does not currently allow organizations to discriminate is
deeply important to me and many others, and allowing ROTC back on to campus
would be a powerful blow against all that for which Columbia has come to stand.
Please, don't bother telling me about Barnard, since alternative opportunities
replicate what is available to Barnard students for males in other areas of the
University.
I appreciate your position that the military needs more liberal individuals to
bring about change. This is certainly true. However, Columbia is unlikely to
graduate large numbers of officers (if the military even establishes a ROTC
program at Columbia). Unfortunately, the damage done by the message that
Columbia will send by allowing ROTC back on campus will not be undone by the
small contribution in officers that Columbia will make. It is unlike that we
will see a return to the days of V-12 at Columbia and I doubt that large numbers
of students would participate in the program.
Finally, Columbia Advocates for ROTC could certainly do more to send a message
to Washington and our nation that the military needs to change its policy. Your
statement that the military needs more liberal officers is a weak response to
concerns about discrimination and seems designed more to diffuse critics of your
goal than really bring about change. In reality, it is not apparent to me that
your group has done very much to advocate for change in the military's policy.
Have your supporters, such as Admiral James Lowe, who served in the military,
written to the Secretary of Defense and other officials in Washington?
Have you written letters to Washington telling that military that it needs to
change? If so, you should post such letters on your website which does not seem
to take a strong stance on DADT. Since you are the ones who would return ROTC to
campus, the onus to advocate for such changes lies on you.
A few suggestions as to what your group might do (or have done) to advocate for
change in the military and to reassure those opposed to bringing ROTC back to
Columbia:
- Any proposal to bring ROTC back to campus should be contingent upon a change
in the military's policy on DADT. If all of the Ivies, along with a group of the
nation's other elite colleges, signed a proposal stating that they stand ready
to support ROTC when the military changes its policy and sent it to Washington,
it would be a powerful message to the world about the need to change. Instead,
you hope to send the message that Columbia is ready to cave in on an issue of
discrimination.
- Your group has done little to engage and reassure Columbia's alumni,
especially its gay alumni, about what you are doing to advocate for change to
the military's policies, and show little indication that you are aware of why we
might be upset with a proposal to bring back to campus an institution that
discriminates. Regardless of how the Senate votes on Friday, some alumni will be
alienated from the University.
- Any attempt to return ROTC to Columbia should be tied to a creation of a
program that would provide similar opportunities to students who cannot
participate in the program for reasons of sexuality (assuming that the
military's policy remains in place), disability or conscience. Such a
program could provide scholarship and training in return for several years of
national service in programs such as the Peace Corps, NY Teaching Fellows or
AmeriCorps. If there are indeed a significant number of alums supporting your
goal, they could work to fund such a program which would do much to diffuse the
uneasiness that many of us have with ROTC at Columbia.
Again, thank you for taking the time to engage in dialogue on this issue and to
listen to my thoughts.
Best regards,
M Foss
CC'03