Guilt By Association

IT IS CORRECT to look beyond the Pi Eta affair itself to see the kind of lessons it teaches, but the majority opinion goes too far in attacking the final clubs.

University disapproval of the newsletter, with luck, will inspire a strong anti-sexism in the same league as the Pi Eta Speakers Club, the majority makes an unfair and uninformed connection. In so far as the final clubs are sexist by virtue (or lack thereof) of not admitting women, the link is obvious. However, grouping the clubs together assumes that the final clubs house the same dangerous mentality about women as the Pi Eta, and it also lessens the offense itself.

The clubs are sexist by historical tradition, not by intentional malice--just as Harvard was a few years ago. Harvard has gradually been moving to the ideal of equality from men and women, and it is this example that must be followed. Final clubs do not admit women and therefore, by definition, are sexist, a gradual integration of women into the clubs is a good and necessary thing. However, now is not the time for those pseudo-idealists who profess a fundamental "opposition" to all the world's evils, to jump on the Pi Ett condemnation bandwagon in order to "expose" harmful sexism campus-wide. Such a move is not constructive. Instead, let the outrageous act stand alone as an example and a lesson for the Harvard community.