Critics of Powell are Practicing Intolerance

I am writing to respond to the various members of the Harvard gay and lesbian community who have criticized the choice of General Colin Powell as the primary Commencement day speaker. First, I wish to express my sympathy to any group that must endure the constant burden of discrimination and oppression. I think almost anyone would agree that this nation was founded on the principle that intolerance of any kind should be battled indefatigably until it is defeated. At least, in a perfect world, that is the ideal. At the same time, however, it is counterproductive if victims of discrimination lash out at other victims, just because their respective political agendas may conflict.

Colin Powell is more than just a prominent Black figure. He is a living embodiment of the American success story. The son of Jamaican immigrants, General Powell never acquired the cachet of West Point or Annapolis (the military's Ivy League). Instead, he graduated from the City College of New York and went on to become a war hero in Vietnam. He is the first Black man to be appointed Head of the Joint Chiefs. Think about that for a second--what it must be like to be the first Black anything in this country. Whether you're the first Black big league ballplayer or the first Black Harvard student, everyone is waiting for you to fail somehow so they can say, "See, we knew you'd fail. You were the first...and you'll be the last."

Colin Powell, when the pressure was at its highest, didn't fail. He achieved the kind of success of which legends are made. He won a war for America. From the humblest of beginnings, he has gone on to become a figure who should be lionized in our history books (though I have a sneaking suspicion that, thirty years from now, schoolchildren will be taught that Schwartzkopf was a hero and Powell will be an historical footnote, if he's lucky).

My point is that Powell is not just a famous Black leader. He is a "first," just like Thurgood Marshall or Jackie Robinson or Phyllis Wheatley. He is not important for what he represents simply to Black Americans but what he represents to all Americans.

Thus, I find it ironic that members of Harvard's gay community would think General Powell is unaware "that intolerance and resistance to social change causes real and constant pain in the lives of fellow human beings" (Thurston Smith's letter in the April 19th Crimson). Considering the U.S. military's treatment of its Black forces in the last 30 years, I think few of us would be as qualified to discuss the "pain of social change" as General Powell is. Yet, I think it would be a waste of time for members of the Harvard community to try to prioritize the oppressions of different groups.

Unfortunately, by branding General Powell as a bastion of "intolerance and homophobia," that is exactly what Powell's critics are doing--to hell with what he's accomplished and what he means to everyone else in the community. They are saying that General Powell's presence acts as an affront to homosexuals more than it does as a source of pride and admiration especially, but not exclusively, for Blacks at Harvard. Well, that's an impossible claim to make. Furthermore, I consider it an egregious error to discount every positive contribution a man has made because one disagrees with his position on a single issue.

Could I, as a Black man, discount everything Thomas Jefferson ever accomplished because he owned slaves? Of course not. That type of blanket dismissal would prevent me from appreciating one of the greatest figures in history. It is no more accurate to call Powell a propagator of "anti-humanist rhetoric" than it is to call Jefferson nothing more than a famous slaveowner.

These reductionist labels oversimplify the multidimensional aspect of the figures to which they are applied. Doesn't it make more sense to gauge what Colin Powell means to the Harvard community as a whole and not what he means to one sector of it? Harvard is so diverse, it would be impossible to find a speaker whom some groups did not consider controversial or even offensive. Keeping that fact in mind, Colin Powell is a speaker who can relate to a great portion of the Harvard community better than most for two simple reasons: 1. he has faced intolerance and 2. he has vanquished it.

In closing, I just want to urge every member of the Harvard community to keep an open mind when assessing General Powell's suitability as a speaker. Consider the possibility that the General might be able to enlighten most of the Harvard community (especially those who consider themselves the sole proprietors of oppression) with regards to the subject of clawing your way to success while overcoming every possible obstacle. After all, if we succumb to knee-jerk, P.C. condemnation of General Powell, we will indeed be practicing the one thing we all claim to abhor: intolerance. Jon-Peter Kelly '94