Thumbs Down

"CONDUCT UNBECOMING a Harvard student"--the official phrase for undesirable action usually refers to excessive violations of law or courtesy, such as severely hurting someone or something. But University officials are quietly including another category in the list of traits they'd rather not see undergraduates display--irreverence and independent expression.

Two recent, unrelated moves reflect this emerging mentality. The first involves the marching band, the ragtag collection of rowdies which has come under fire the past couple of years for its cheeky halftime shows. Dean of Students Archie C. Epps III decided that the performances did not "communicate across generations." To insure more widespead comprehension of the shows, Epps decided he would have to start reviewing all scripts beforehand.

Just two days after the band marched under the new arrangement--a rather limp display against Army on October 1--Crimson Key tour guides began to work under a similar, unprecedented system. Traditionally independent, the guides came under the reign of the admissions office, which wanted more control over the focus of tours given to visitors. L. Fred Jewett '57, dean of admissions and financial aid, said he made the move because a survey of admitted high school seniors who snubbed Harvard indicated that the tour did not concentrate enough on undergraduate life.

The band set-up is clearly the harsher of the two, as Epps paranoia for offensive segments has gone to ridiculous extremes. Although millions of theatergoers over the past 300 years have been exposed to the line in Shakespeare's Macbeth by the pricking of my thumbs," the dean felt the phrase too risqué for the football crowd. He asked the band to change the line, originally a direct quote in the Cornell script, to "by the twitching of my thumbs."

But a disturbing likeness between the two situations remains.

Though both Epps and Jewett stressed their concern for quality rather than tone, it seems that each may have had more in mind. The band, though certainly in need of some self-motivated clean up, often poked good, clean fun at Harvard in a manner that any generation could laugh at. Its uncharacteristically lifeless rendition of "Fight Fiercely Harvard," "Soldiers Field," and "Ten Thousand Men of Harvard" two Saturdays ago raises the question of whether Epps will allow any jest at the expense of Harvard.

Similarly, Jewett may be concerned with more than just the fact that guides were not giving enough information about student life. Several Key guides have complained that they now feel slightly constrained as to what they may say to impressionable prospectives. And the admissions office's manner of making the change seems intended to increase that pressure. According to Key members, the office first sent them a letter this summer saying it planned to replace them with professional guides, and only this fall agreed to retain the Crimson Key on a paid, "on trial" basis. Finally, matters of motive aside, paying the guides now opens the potential for the admissions office to control the tours' content sometime in the future.

It would be going overboard to call these two moves an onslaught of censorship or suppression of student freedom; both activities come technically under University control, and the University has a right to handle its own public relations. Yet the actions do signify the demise of an admirable trait perhaps unique to Harvard: the confidence in the institution itself to allow unscreened public displays, and trust in the undergraduates to make them. Harvard's image is strong enough that one student group's tasteless jokes will not tarnish it. The percentage of students admitted who do opt to come to Harvard, each year about 75 percent, is always the highest in the nation, and the admissions office is hardly at the point where a frank discussion of the school's rough spots will turn away prospectives in droves. It might not even be in the best interests of the University if those who would not be happy here decided to come based on misleading advice. Harvard looks much better for allowing and encouraging it students to criticize than for telling them to shut up or toe the party line.