In an informative John Fund WSJ piece about the temporary suspension of Yale’s assistant director of annual giving, Alexis Surovov—who blasted critics of Yale’s decision to admit a former Taliban spokesman with a fourth grade education to one of the Ivy League’s most prestigious schools (as opposed to, say, vociferously condemning him for representing a regime that stoned women and dropped walls on gays)—emailer Terry Hastings excerpts the following bit, which both highlights and pressures Yale’s commitment to “diversity” in its current superficial incarnation:
[…] I spoke with an American military officer who is about to return to his post in Afghanistan. “I can’t imagine explaining to my troops back there that while they just lost four of their comrades to the Taliban that one of America’s most prestigious universities is giving a valued place as a student to a largely unrepentant Taliban official,” he told me.
[…]
Yale will have more explaining to do to prospective students and their parents late this month when it begins sending out acceptance letters to 1,300 applicants for coveted positions in its undergraduate class of 2010. The highly selective school will also mail out 19,300 rejection letters. “I can’t imagine it will be easy for Yale to convince those it rejects that the Taliban student isn’t taking a place they could have had,” a former Yale administrator told me. Mr. Rahmatullah boasts only a fourth-grade education and a high-school equivalency degree.
[My emphasis]
Of course, that’s how the average schmoe would see things—but the sad fact is that for Yale, matriculating Rahmatullah is actually a coup , and Mr Surovov’s outburst, while impolitic (there is a time and place for candor, my dear boy), precisely mirrors the internal logic of those who approved this detestable bit of multiculturalist feel-goodism. In short, this is a major win in the academic “diversity” wars, and Yale, if it can hold off the immediate firestorm, will have the ultimate in brochure fodder.
In fact, from Yale’s perspective, the only trump, say, Harvard or Princeton could possibly pull off would be to convince Usama Bin Laden to enroll on a full soccer scholarship (or perhaps as a visiting professor of political theory). And believe me when I tell you that if they could, they absolutely would.
Such is the intellectual bankruptcy of this movement (whose only worth, such as it is, is derived from its marketing potential, and even that is contingent on the current social love affair with superficial “diversity” as a shortcut to professing a rejection of racialism); which is why it is so important to continue to pressure Yale over its decision to admit this fellow: because they believe they have done the right thing, and if we are unable to defeat them by deconstructing the logic of their own animating philosophical principles, the only thing left to do is to beat them by applying outside pressure and some loud “dissenting” of our own.
Blast the meritocracy. Doesn’t the guy speak like 4 languages or something?
Like that’s hard, or something. Anyway, back to the point: it’s not like he’s just some random Afghan dude off the streets of Kabul.
One wonders how Yale’s pet Taliban feels about Yale’s seal, with its Hebrew writing.
And he was an offical in one of the most wretched regimes in modern history. What a catch! You know, community colleges all over the country are looking better by comparison. As a matter of fact that might be a good slogan… “Junior colleges, we don’t promote facist bigotry and religious hate!” Even better, is it possible to “home college” one’s kids as well?
Nice try though, Actus, the point is that Yale scuttled its own standards to inusre a former terrorist-state offical and current facist entered their school as a “prize” catch. It’s hard to dress that up. Though props to you for trying. Perhaps one day you’ll take a shot at defending Mao and Stalin as well.
Hmmm.
I suppose Yale could go the other route and boast about how much federal money Yale got from the taxes of the parents of declined students.
A sort of:
“Not only do we not want your kid, but we’re sucking $x,xxx.xx in taxes from your fat ass too to send this Taliban freak to our university!”
Followed up with a:
“Don’t like it? Like I give a fuck. Just keep dem tax dollars rolling in or I’ll have one of our ex-SDS members on the faculty come on over to your house and bitch-slap you.”
Yeah. That’s the ticket.
Didn’t that freak Al Gore go to Yale? Flunked out, to boot.
“He speaks four languages” Hmm. So what it takes to go to Yale is high IQ and no real education or achievement, except standing up for seventh-century murderers. I thought liberals didn’t believe in IQ. And I thought it was discriminatory to require study of foreign languages. Now that we know the number of languages you speak is a standard for admittance, we can look at the linguistic achievements of all those affirmative action candidates in a different light.
Rihgt. Random afghan dude needs quite a bit of ESL.
Think they’ll make him a bonesman?
So a fourth grade education in four languages garners admission to Yale?
The admittance of the Taliban-man has nothing to do with the merit of student performance or capability, it’s based upon the amorphous concept of diversity, where the “ends justify the means.”
It’s a spoils system for college administrators based on their subjective choices regarding social engineering. A grand experiment with plenty of evidence of its failure, though facts will never change the views of the rality-based community because they know the one, true way forward to Utopia.
Just learn to smile…
Not to play the victim card (I got into a just as good alternative), but I was dropped from Yale Graduate admissions due to a lack of work experience (coming right out of undergraduate).
Perhaps I took the wrong route!
Nikkolai: No, Al Gore was a Harvard man, he flunked out of Vanderbilt twice, first Divinity school, then law school.
So he can marry a series of women each of which is wealthier than the last and ride their riches instead of making an honest living? Maybe.
I was thinking more getting into the energy business. I don’t see him getting a divorce.
Eh, the guy’s just a stoner. He won’t make it.
I disagree, I think Iosif Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili would be a MUCH bigger prize.
That was Bush, and his father and grandfather. GW was incompetent academically, as one would imagine.
Or perhaps an ex-Nazi official. Many of them were multilingual as well. Granted, they’re getting awfully old, but then there are additional diversity points for students from non-traditional age groups. A win all around, I’d say.
I suspect he has more in common with the self-confessed war criminal to whom I was alluding.
Why not? He’s not a woman. Should be a piece of cake for him.
I don’t know whether that says more about Harvard or Vanderbilt.
Esp. since it would be the first resurrection from the dead for 1739 years, and even then Jesus had only been dead for 3 days, not over 30 years.
Stick to something achievable, like trying to snare Osama Bin Laden. But then again … why would Harvard succeed where the Pentagon has failed?
“Just a stoner.”
That’s classic! Thanks.
I always thought I couldn’t make it into Yale. Although my SATs were only a couple percent off perfect, and my grades were standard for Ivy types, my extracurriculars were pretty weak. Couple sports, no Masonic junk, wrong politics, and a bunch of real, local charity work, rather than the showy college-application standards. So I didn’t bother applying.
I was stupid. I fell for the image. If I’d known what kind of student they were really looking for, everything could have gone differently for me. Because even compared to Washington, Connecticut is a paradise of perfectly secluded necrophiliac havens.
I wasted my life.
sorry that should read 1973 years, not a lysdexic 1739
Yes. like waspy privilege and boston brahimness.
Didn’t seem the type from the NYT piece. But who knows. He may yet learn to like the elite life.
Imagine the rejection letter:
Just for the record, While Pres. Bush was not an “A” student, his grades were higher than Sen. Kerry’s.
TW:higher Now that is just getting freaky…….
The comments on divorce simply show the cultural provincialism of those who make them. Divorce is not necessary in certain societies to enable men to marry multiple heiresses. After all, Mohammed’s first wife bankrolled his later exploits – by dying.
And, by the way multilingualism is a characteristic of people from small countries or those who are on the lam. It is rarely a mark of intelligence, simply a reflection of necessity.
gahrie, Wadard’s trollery isn’t worth rebutting.
The Al Gore comments only get off because of Gore’s anti-American remarks to the anti-American crowd.
Why does Actus remind me of Wormtongue in LOTR? It’s not the non-sequiturs…
Or their familiarity with the bonesman that our taliban man may emulate.
Wow. Rejected by God AND the Devil…
Wow! Think of the diversity they could celenbrate with a Shining Path cell…
And dammit, there’s gotta be Khmer Rouge left out there SOMEWHERE!
I had to go to the American Embassy today to take care of some paperwork. As a US Citizen, I got to breeze right in, but what I noticed- what I always notice when I go to the US Embassy- is the length of the line of people waiting to get visas to go to the US. It’s always long, and it was even this morning at 8:30 am. I saw Africans, Asians, Russians, and Middle-East people all waiting in that long line.
I’ll bet I could have picked out any of the Filipinos and they would have known at least 4 languages (Tagalogue, English, Japanese, their own dialect, maybe some Spanish), ditto most of the Africans in line. Certainly, not all of them or even many of them were qualified for Yale. Then, how many were ex-Taliban? However, many of them won’t be allowed even visitor’s visas.
A Chinese Taxi driver once told my husband of his son’s acceptance to Oxford, and the great pride he had in it. Of course, he said, many of his Chinese and international passengers told him Harvard and Yale were better– what did my husband think?
Our elite Universities have world-wide reputations, and the best and brightest from most countries, including the US, would give an arm and a leg to get in. Even being allowed entry into our country is a dream beyond possibility for many. It disgusts me that Yale wasted its prestige and all the opportunity that comes with it- on a Taliban spokseman.
I think the other Ivy League schools are waiting for Moussaoui to “walk”. After all, we have no proof Hashemi had any direct involvement in 9/11. So Moussaoui has to have more “star power”.
Rumor has it that Lucifer has applied for admission to Princeton. Hear he aced his SAT’s.
So much for bringing the A game. Actus, you are falling into the “Wadard” category of uselessness.
Afghanis grow up with Dari and Pashto, and any language their particular ethnic group might have (ie. Tajik, Uzbek, etc.). Saying this guy is anything special is just damned ignorant of the people that live in that part of the world. I meet dozens of Afghanis who spoke Dari, Pashto, Farsi, Russian and English – they would not have considered themselves anything extraordinary.
To think you have stooped to defending this admission is startling, even for you…
From reading the NYT piece, I think its a good idea. The tone of the article was that he’s as much in transition as his country. The guy is definately ex-taliban, turned himself in to US authorities, and ended up applying to yale. He looks like he studies harder than others, and even eats at the Jewish dining hall. I think it nice that he get himself an elite education and go back to his country ready to join the transnational elite. “Ah the good ole days of yale, what are you, an oxford man?”
Too bad Actus wasn’t at Nuremberg. He could have helped Rudolf Hess turn his life around and become Pope.
Really?! WOW! How open-minded of him!
Asshat.
Exactly. It does look like he’s opening his mind. Pretty soon he’ll get a job with an international consultancy, working on central asian pipelines.
Surtout, on doit outrager la bourgeoisie.
Turing = activity, as in Middle American onlookers ought not be surprised, just saddened, at this kind of lefty-academia-at-play activity.
Actus – Its a jailhouse conversion without even the discomfort of a cell…is there nothing he should be held accountable for? He says he’s sorry, here is a Yale slot and some tution assistance?
I was directly involved with the Afghan Government’s reconciliation effort with the ex-Taliban. I can tell you the people of Kabul, Parwan, Bamian and other provinces would not be so delighted to see this “catch” sitting in an American University while they are trying to rebuild from the atrocities committed by those he represented. If he gave a damn he would be in Afghanistan RIGHT NOW trying to help. Is he at Yale to get a Civil Engineering degree and come back to help rebuild, or a medical degree to come heal the hurts he and his inflicted?
He turned himself in to the US, and they let him go. I would think that if the president has supremacy to declare enemy combatants and put them in gitmo, then the counter is that the people that get let out of gitmo are accounted for. I don’t think putting ex-talibans into yale is the only way to achieve de-talibanization, but it is consistent with it.
It looked like he was studying liberal arts.
Oh, so only the government can hold anyone acountable for their actions – very revealing position.
I know plenty of Afghans that would be a much better person to fill that spot – but I guess trying to rebuild their country, having fought against the Taliban and all that doesn’t make them much of a “catch”.
Why do you continue to hold it out that this guy is a suitbale person to recieve this academic dream. Is nobody back in Afghanistan a better choice? Did Yale even think of that? God, they make me so mad I could spit.
You should have them apply. Yale didn’t go looking for the guy, he came to them.
You should have them apply. Yale didn’t go looking for the guy, he came to them.
They turn away 1000’s of people that apply. Yale looks for that extra something when it accepts or rejects people.
They should have turned him away. I’m sure the story of how he planned to turn his life around was compelling, but there are wonderful, brilliant people turned away from Yale every year that were too good to have to have had to turn their lives around.
It bothers me that a story of “redemption” is more compelling than the story of never having to be redeem oneself.
I’m sure that whatever person would have otherwise gotten into yale found some other elite institution to attend. I cry for them.
What makes you sure of that? The world is large, actus. Opportunities are limited. I’m sad and mad that Yale chose to give this particular man their stamp of approval.
I have a hard time imagining someone getting into yale but not other elite institutions.
Well, but of course Harvard, Yale, Oxford, etc make different choices about who they will accept. It isn’t the same 1500 people getting acceptance letters from all three. That’s really neither here nor there. That this guy took one spot away from someone else isn’t my issue- it is just one spot. It’s that he got a spot at all that is galling.
The point is, Yale makes choices about who they let in- it isn’t strictly a formulaic acceptance. It isn’t even strictly on merits, we all know they search for abstract qualities as well. The same is true of every elite university. That they chose to bestow the honor of acceptance on this person is grating, given that he made a choice to devote part of his life to the Taliban. That should have been a big black mark on his record, not kind of an interesting life story that gets swept aside because he can speak 4 languages and dares to eat with jews.
And I think part of de-talibanization is going to be to take people like him into post taliban afghanistan. Thats it. While girls may go to school there, its still going to be quite a traditional patriarchical society.
Rewarding the most patriarchical of them all hardly seems a message of hope for his victims.
Accepting someone that chose to be a member of a totalitarian regime into Yale hardly seems a proven way to get the power out of the hands of those that would be totalitarians.
Imagine someone keeping you from getting an education, actus, then being rewarded with a fine education while you suffer the results of being uneducated. Would you want to follow that person in the future? Would you trust that person to lead your country?
I think we all agree (except one of us) the this chap sucks and does not belong at East Egypt Community College, much less Yale.
Thanks Maybee, I am too damned mad to post on this with much thought behind it anymore. You said exactly what I was hoping someone would.
But he’s not the most. And frankly I don’t think there was a choice between an ex-RAWA or a taliban representative. I’d prefer the ex-RAWA, would prefer even more a current RAWA, of course. But I also know that current afghanistan includes ex-talibans. Part of our takeover plan was to simply get warlords to switch away from the taliban to our guys. That looks like what happened here, except he was never a warlord.
It certainly doesn’t work by itself.
Major John- I considered myself to be posting from the backseat of your bandwagon.