Give Grandy a Chance

To the Editor,“F--- your turkey! F--- your holidays! F--- your smiles! F--- you! F---. Your. Children.” These were the provocative words of an essay entitled “This Is What It Means for Me to Teach Your White, Privileged Kids”—and I absolutely loved it. In fact, I found myself defending the piece, despite disagreeing with the bulk of the content. As a counterpoint at the time, a colleague asked about Dr. Chavers’s students, suggesting that a few felt uncomfortable (“unsafe” in modern discourse) in her classroom. It was an argument recently repeated (by an entirely different group of colleagues) in partially explaining the cancelling of Fred Grandy’s senior seminar on politics and the media. Though a compelling argument on the surface, it misses the deeper point: Our students need not fear ideas. And despite the obvious lack of parallelism (public vs. private institutions, adults vs. children, white privileged vs. minority voices) there does lie a bit of irony in a liberally-minded campus invoking the rhetoric of “fear and safety.” I do not know former congressman Grandy. I do know that he denies a continuing relationship with the Center for Security Policy (an oft-labeled “hate group”). Still, after five minutes with the inter-webs, that denial seems tenuous, and the possibility exists that the man is another in a long line of pseudo-conservative, whacko, war-mongering, Islamophobic conspiracy-theorists. All the more reason I need to defend his right to defend himself. At various times in my life, I’ve been a member of the NRA, the ACLU, the California Teachers Association and the Exeter Republican Club. The last time I voted in a presidential election, I voted for Barack Obama, who once associated with Jeremiah Wright (an oft-labeled anti-Semite). I fear the precarious association game. Should I stop donating to and shopping at the Goodwill? Fred Grandy ran that organization for five years, after all, and he’s associated with the Center for Security Policy. Maybe Badwill is the appropriate moniker: guilt by association.Phillips Exeter Academy is not a college or university and will inevitably decide on tighter boundaries in conversation and association than that of an adult community. There are also serious issues of process in Mr. Grandy’s case, and my colleagues will work through each (I have great faith in that extraordinary group). I am not attempting to change minds such that Mr. Grandy’s seminar proceeds (I learned a long time ago to avoid the destructive interference of an echo chamber). I simply want the record to reflect that there are indeed members of the community that disagree with the decision to cancel his seminar. I simply wish to express the hope that fear alone does not guide future decisions, including the fear that invitations might be perceived as endorsements. That is a flaw of perception. Invitations, particularly to those the majority disagrees with, are symbols of a vibrant community that values discourse and does not fear ideas. I know only a few of my colleagues support unbridled, free-market capitalism, but I do hope to find more leaning toward (and not further away from) the free market of ideas. I can’t help but imagine an alternative future (I am a Trekkie) wherein Mr. Grandy arrives on campus, our students determine his views hateful (though, the other possibility certainly exists) and go on to boycott his seminar the following week. It strikes me that leaving the former congressman in an empty classroom might prove a superior challenge to his ideas than locking him out entirely. The former reflects poorly on Mr. Grandy, the latter reflects poorly on us.—Michael McLaughlin, Science Instructor