Columnist Self-Righteous and Unconstructive

It stumps me that The Crimson reserves a column for Jordan Schreiber's typically self-righteous and never-constructive tirades--this time [Crimson, October 27] against those who are willing to profess (courageously, in my opinion) their moral ambivalence toward and reservations against homosexuality. Though a liberal and a gay-rights supporter myself, it's clear to me that Schreiber is not at all interested in provoking a serious, compassionate discussion about campus issues like homosexuality. In fact, he seems psychologically incapable of the task.

Schreiber launches his latest polemic by saying that Prof. Harvey C. Mansfield's moral condemnation of homosexuality lacks any logical foundation and doesn't even deserve a rational response. Schreiber then ends by comparing Mansfield and Peninsula editor Rob Wasinger to "immature children" who are only encouraged by the attention people waste on them. Then what exactly is Schreiber up to in the intervening 17 paragraphs of verbiage? I'd love to know.

Strangely, Schreiber is obsessed with demonstrating the obvious irrationality of statements that he considers so obviously irrational as to require no demonstration. Schreiber reiterates endlessly and neurotically that it "is pointless...to refute their comments"; that "Mansfield's assault does not merit forceful rebuttal"; that these conservatives' statement "neither deserve nor require...angry or concerted response"; that to "bother to demonstrate the ridiculousness and hypocrisy of Wasinger's blather...is to fall into the trap of debating unsupportable absurdities"; and that "these attacks...do not deserve rational refutation."

It would save all of your readers much time and nausea if Schreiber saved us the righteous fireworks and just got to the point. Perhaps if he tried this, he might discover he has no point at all. After reading his last piece, I couldn't help laughing at the title, "Mindless Moralizing." Indeed. Alfred Lin '94