Diatribe on Peninsula Is From a Warped Perspective

Joshua A. Kaufman's recent anti-Peninsula diatribe was both infantile and inaccurate. He conveniently omitted any reference to the initial paragraphs of the piece which make clear to the reader that the "Enemies List" was inspired by the Filegate scandal. Apparently, the humorless columnist believes that I actually want to line these folks up against a wall and send them to their eternal reward. If he's that dense, I wonder if I should even bother to rebut the rest of his hateful manifesto.

As the author of that "vile" enemies list, I regret that I did not include Mr. Kaufman by name. The article was entirely my creation and yes, Joshua, I am proud of it. By listing the entire masthead of the publication, however, Mr. Kaufman committed a libelous offense. The vast majority of those people he named had absolutely no control over the editorial content of the previous issue. He even included the wrong Christopher Brown. Maybe Josh had better do some research next time.

Josh just couldn't leave it at that. He had to urge his readers to terrorize members of Peninsula. What did he have in mind? Verbal abuse? Physical abuse? Letter bombs? I urge Mr. Kaufman to retract this statement. Unless, of course, he believes people should be persecuted for their beliefs. It takes a true coward to encourage terrorism by proxy.

Mr. Kaufman is correct in pointing out that the first people to receive my scorn are the Bisexual, Gay and Lesbian Student Association (BGLSA), not because they are any worse than the others, but merely because "B" precedes most of the other letters in the alphabet. I shall never apologize for writing that this group is manifestly opposed to traditional Christian values. "Christian values according to whom?" According to the revealed word of God, Josh. Not Gomes. God. Mr. Kaufman is also mistaken in believing that I want office space doled out only to group I deem to be politically correct. If that were the case, I'd have to evict the entire University.

His accusations of anti-Semitism and racism are baseless and offensive. In Josh's quaint reality (where Bill Weld and the HRRA are conservatives), anyone who criticizes one member of a group must detest all member of that group. In that case, the editorial displays an alarming anti-Christian and anti-American bias, for I am a proud member of both groups. The "anti-Semitic strain" you see in my article, Mr. Kaufman, exists only in your head.

By yelping about my supposed fascist tendencies, Mr. Kaufman reminds me of those aging American Stalinists who attempt to taint anyone to their right as Nazis and still believe that communist traitors, such as the Rosenbergs, were innocent victims of the mythical "Red Scare." Or can I not mention anyone who is Jewish? --Christopher M. Griffith '97