Although relentlessly pushed by Stanford's most militant multiculturalists, the campus speech code nevertheless may have represented a miscalculation on their part. The speech code probably added little to the various informal efforts already in place; the prospect of being thrown out of campus housing, after all, already represented quite a powerful deterrent to would-be dissenters. And although the code was symptomatic of the widespread desire to tell students “what they can and cannot say,” it was more counterproductive than helpful in this regard. The code drew considerable and unwanted attention to the phenomenon of “political correctness” on campus, and these revelations of multicultural repression helped to discredit the multicultural state. Finally, in May 1994, several Stanford students brought a suit against the university, on the grounds that Stanford's speech code violated the U.S. Constitution and California law. In March 1995, the Santa Clara County Superior Court agreed with the students and found Stanford's speech code unconstitutional.9 Because of the ruling, Stanford students are no longer prohibited from speaking as freely as the residents of neighboring Palo Alto.
Otero II: The Empire Strikes Back
Because the freedom of speech has been enshrined in the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, any direct attempt to limit speech draws criticism from across the ideological spectrum. No matter how narrowly drawn, campus speech codes are a red flag, indicating that something has gone very badly askew in the nation's colleges and universities. But campus speech codes are merely a symptom of the underlying problem—of the multicultural regime's need to prevent people from challenging its fundamental premises. Speech codes may be the most obvious way to approach this issue, but they are not the only way, and they are only the tip of the iceberg. The formal code points to the existence of a whole set of informal, but far more powerful, prohibitions and taboos.
Some of these informal efforts include the incidents in Donner, Ujamaa, and Otero. In these cases, no code of rules served as a restraint on multicultural ressentiment. Nevertheless, the lack of a regulatory code does not imply that these violent attacks and accusations are completely at random. On the contrary, they are systematic and follow a rigorous logic of their own—albeit one that the multicultural framework cannot make explicit or encode.
These episodes seem to come from nowhere, periodically interrupting the day-to-day calm of the multicultural regime. Although nobody at the time realized it, Kenny Ehrman's expulsion from Otero in May 1988 proved to be only the prelude to a much greater spectacle that would take place a few years later. After a party on the evening of January 19, 1992, three students were walking through Otero, with the intent of visiting some friends in a neighboring dorm. Two of the students, Keith Rabois and Bret Scher, were friends of Kenny; the third, Michael Ehrman, was Kenny's younger brother.10 The three were not particularly fond of Otero's RF Dennis Matthies, both for what he had done to Kenny and for the ideological fervor with which he indoctrinated a new group of freshmen each year. One of Dennis's favorite targets is Stanford's fraternities, which he considers bastions of racism and sexism.11 Keith, Bret, and Michael were all members of the Alpha Epsilon Pi fraternity.
The three complained about RF Matthies to several of the residents they encountered in Otero. Keith, a first-year law student, decided to show his listeners that one could get away with a great deal at Stanford and that the speech code was really quite narrow in scope. As he was leaving Otero and walking past RF Matthies's cottage, Keith shouted, “Faggot! Faggot! Hope you die of AIDS!” And then, in a pointed reference to the episode involving Kenny, Keith added, “See if you can kick me out of housing!”12 In a more sober moment, Keith would concede that “the comments made were not very articulate, not very intellectual, nor profound.” But that had not been the point: “The intention was for the speech to be outrageous enough to provoke a thought of ‘Wow, if he can say that, I guess I can say a little more than I thought.’”13
As a matter of law, Keith was correct. His words did not violate the speech code. The code was limited to epithets directed towards students. For that matter, Matthies was not even in his residence at the time Keith gave his demonstration. But Keith was dead wrong to think that he could get away with saying what he said, even if he had violated no written policy. For starters, his demonstration directly challenged one of the most fundamental taboos: To suggest a correlation between homosexual acts and AIDS implies that one of the multiculturalists’ favorite lifestyles is more prone to contracting the disease and that not all lifestyles are equally desirable. But by far the most troublesome aspect, to many of the multicultural observers, was Keith's encouragement to other students to see what they could get away with: If others would follow his lead in saying what they thought, then the multicultural regime would be in serious trouble. And so, if for no reason other than deterrence, Keith would have to be punished, albeit necessarily outside the letter of law.
Over the preceding four years (he also had attended Stanford as an undergraduate), Keith had acquired quite a reputation on campus—as an outspoken College Republican, an advocate for his fraternity, and a leading critic of Stanford's administrators. None of these causes were popular with Stanford's multiculturalists, and they could not pass up the perfect opportunity to exact some kind of revenge for the headaches Keith had caused them over the years, while simultaneously reconstituting the multicultural polity.
The charge was led by Dean of Student Affairs Michael Jackson, who in a letter “leaked” the story to the Stanford Daily:
I want to put a big spotlight on the actions of these individuals. I invite others to join me in condemning their behavior, the meanness and viciousness behind it, and in expressing our shock that Stanford students would deliberately behave in so disgusting and hurtful a manner…. The speech…presents an invitation, even an obligation, for the good citizens of our community to speak out against the few who care more for their constitutional rights than for their campus community's need for respect and decency.14
With this letter, Dean Jackson outlined the general strategy: All of the “good citizens” of the multicultural state had an “obligation” to punish Keith through a public outpouring of anger and outrage. Those who did not publicly condemn Keith would be suspected of sharing his views and of not being “good citizens.” Jackson knew that he would be able to trigger a massive response, especially after the Stanford Daily proceeded to vilify Keith: For the next two weeks, front-page articles repeated an exaggerated account of events that failed to present Keith's explanation for what had happened and why.15 Even Stanford President Donald Kennedy issued a statement condemning him.16
The pressure was particularly strong on those who knew Keith. Even his fraternity felt compelled to oblige. It joined Dean Jackson “in publicly condemning his actions,” while emphasizing that “his actions were undertaken independently of our organization and should in no way be construed as indicative of our membership.”17
The excitement surrounding Keith's exorcism was infectious. Stanford lawyer Robin Kennedy (second wife of President Kennedy), in the name of “human dignity,” expressed her hopes that Keith would be punished for the rest of his life:
I am deeply disturbed that a person of Rabois’ character—and with his obvious disrespect for human dignity—may someday become qualified as a member of my profession, displaying two Stanford degrees on his wall. I hope the Bar Association of whatever state in which Rabois elects to practice is informed of his behavior in this incident and aware that such behavior represents a violation of this community's values.18
Senior Gina Durante added her voice to the chorus, suggesting that Keith should be treated like a “hardened criminal”:
Keith Rabois went out of his way to prove that he is capable of spewing the kind of ignorant filth common among hardened criminals…. If nothing else, the majority of people in the Stanford Community can hope that Rabois has learned a thing or two about decorum and public relations from this incident and its resulting publicity. If not, perhaps then t
he community will subject him to the sort of loathing that his kind has always directed toward whatever group happens to be the scapegoat of the day.19
The repetitive nature of these accusations did not make them any more true. But they reinforced the sense among the Stanford community that Keith was guilty of a truly heinous crime. And the more the community focused on Keith's terrible deed, the more convinced it became of how hideously oppressed the everyday lives of homosexuals must be. It was important for all the “good citizens” to attack Keith so as to reinforce the victimized identities of gays and lesbians.
Graduate student Mario Huerta got even more carried away in the enthusiasm of the moment:
When I read in The Daily about the incident at Otero Jan. 19, I was relieved to find out that there had been another homophobic attack. One, that is, which hadn't culminated in murder…. So what is the lesson? Put simply, it is that education is not enough…. If it weren't for the privileges, sanctioned by law, favoring heterosexually-oriented people, nobody—whether educated or uneducated—would be able to get away with his or her homophobic neuroses-turned mad attacks…. The time is ripe for going out to the streets, linking up internationally and demanding the rights that will ensure the liberation of all sexually oppressed sectors. These demands, to be effectuated worldwide, must include:
—The abolition of marriage;
—The abolition of all privileges (such as tax breaks, government subsidies, reduced rates for memberships, etc.) granted to families;
—The complete legalization of abortion, contraceptives, sexual education, prostitution, surrogate motherhood and pornography;
—The recognition of all relationships consented to by people…
—The formation of reproduction (including physical and sexual) and sexual workers’ unions on a transnational level;
—The formation of household inspection committees to put an end to domestic violence and to all undemocratic, sexist, chauvinist and other types of oppressive practices.20
For Huerta, as for many others, the “Otero II” incident provided excellent cover for all forms of multicultural ressentiment, even if some of his demands were inconsistent (simultaneously abolishing marriage and allowing “all relationships consented to by people”).
Stanford Law School was the epicenter of the fury. All notions of due process were thrown out. The reaction was even more personally nasty than elsewhere in the University:
Several law students called a meeting (advertised as “Free Speech, Hate Speech”) for the express purpose of letting other students and faculty vent their anger at Keith. The 100 participants soon found something else to be angry about: Keith had chosen not to attend.21
443 law students, faculty (including those who taught Keith), and administrators signed a quarter-page “Open Letter” in the Stanford Daily denouncing Keith as a bigot.22
Several law students organized a letter-writing campaign to prevent Keith from getting a summer job. The organizers knew that Keith hoped to work in California in 1992, but did not know where—and so they proceeded to write to several hundred California law firms, urging all of them not to hire Keith as a summer associate. Second-year law student Jamie Kershaw described the campaign as “retributive justice or vengeance or whatever.”23
One law student placed two large bulletin boards, adorned with a picture of Keith's face, at the law library entrance. She encouraged other students and faculty to use these boards to sign their own personalized attacks on Keith. These denunciations eventually numbered in the hundreds. Keith was urged to behave more responsibly, encouraged to grow up, and scolded for his “insensitivity.” Others said that they were ashamed to be associated with him by virtue of their common attendance at Stanford Law School, and expressed their shock and anger in a variety of other ways. Another person even questioned Keith's sanity. By chance or design, however, one writer managed to say something profound: “Keith, you witch. Welcome to Salem.”24
Indeed, the group attack eerily recalled the scapegoating of witches in Salem or the collective catharsis achieved during George Orwell's “Minute of Hate” in 1984. Consider cultural critic Jean-Michel Oughourlian's account of a witch-hunt:
When everyone gathers in the village square of the city to burn a sorcerer or a witch, it is a great feast, a very special day. Gathered to take part in the sacrifice, the whole population participates in it and is purified by the fire, united by its belief in the victim's guilt and comforted to be rid of the source of all its troubles. The execution is ritualized, public, and surrounded with civil, military, and religious trappings. Everything is set in motion to make of this punishment a “founding lynching,” to make of this assassination a myth of foundation, so that from this death may come peace, security, and well-being for all the citizens.25
Under the pretense of reacting to some violation or other, Stanford's leaders generated a massive outpouring of popular anger and retribution—focused on Keith, but also encompassing conservatives, fraternities, and the other usual targets. When all was said and done, the particulars of the original incident that led to this chain of events mattered very little. That incident (real or imaginary) had become transformed into a myth which served to reconstitute and rejuvenate the multicultural community. This myth would continue to reassure all those who had participated in Keith's auto-da-fé that they were “good citizens.”
By year's end, Keith had transferred to another law school. For all practical purposes he had been expelled. But before he left, Keith offered some reflections of his own:
When all the resources of the multicultural agenda are directed against you, you quickly find out who your real friends are. In this way, this has been one of the most valuable experiences of my life…. It has certainly not been fun. But if my serving as the personification of “evil” allows the rest of campus to reassure itself that it is “good,” so be it. Others know better.26
Most of the multiculturalists did not know better. They believed their own exaggerations regarding the incident, and concluded that their response had been perfectly even-handed; the punishment had fit the crime.
The storm over Keith's action convulsed the campus for several months. By the end of the process, nobody dared to challenge the claim that homosexuals truly were oppressed. Their fragile identities had been thoroughly reaffirmed. At the same time, the denizens of the multicultural community could be reassured that they were “good citizens” because they were helping victimized homosexuals to confront and overcome their “oppressor.” The crisis was largely self-created, even if its eventual resolution required Keith's physical removal from the multicultural polis. But by that point in time, this removal did not seem like a high price to pay: From the midst of the crisis, calm had been restored.
“Retributive Justice or Vengeance or Whatever”
Keith's condemnation was not the first such hysteria at Stanford, or even at Stanford Law School. Several years earlier, the men's bathroom in the law school had contained chalkboards for people to write messages. On one such board, someone anonymously enumerated a (relatively short) list of attractive women at Stanford Law School. A brigade of activists removed the chalkboard from the bathroom, and deposited it in the student lounge. For the next several months, life at the law school revolved around the chalkboard list, just as several years later it would revolve around Keith Rabois. The law school community generally (and the women not listed, in particular) condemned the chalkboard list—it was taken as evidence of widespread sexism and other forms of oppression. Once again, an “oppressor” served the important role of reinforcing multicultural identities. Law school activists exhorted, implored, and begged the person who had written these things to come forward; they promised that nothing would happen to him—they would just seek to reeducate him. Having some premonition of what might befall him, however, this particular culprit wisely chose to remain silent.
It should be noted that neither Keith Rabois nor the unknown law student was completely innocent
. Keith had said something rude, and the enumeration of good-looking women was hurtful to the others. But it must also be said that in the larger scheme of things, these actions injured nobody physically, and any psychological wounds were largely self-created. In every case, the multiculturalists behaved far more inappropriately. Their convulsive reaction bore no relation to the offending action. Keith did not deserve months of public condemnation and ostracism, and the unknown law student's list should not have become the focus of law school life.
Consider the analogy to Salem suggested on the law school bulletin board. In the case of the witchcraft trials, the accused women likely were not angelic people. Quite the contrary, many of the accused were probably rather unpleasant people who had behaved imperfectly in the past and were partially to blame for the negative attention they received. Nevertheless, the overreaction of the Salem community was as wrong as that of Stanford's multiculturalists. For none of the accused women were witches, just as neither Keith nor the admirer of pretty women were “hardened criminals.”
Scarcely a week would pass at Stanford without exaggerated denunciations and attacks on some individual or other who was saying or doing things the multiculturalists did not like. Over the course of several years, numerous individuals were singled out for being “racist,” “sexist,” “homophobic,” or just plain “insensitive,” often in contexts that had seemingly little to do with any of these matters. For example:
In November 1988, the organizers of the traditional football rally before the annual Big Game against UC Berkeley were accused of racism for naming the event “Cardinal and White Night” (Stanford's school colors are cardinal and white).27
In May 1989, Stanford's College Republicans organized a “Republican Appreciation Day,” in which students were encouraged to ride their bikes to show support for Republican causes. Perhaps because of the parallel to the Gay and Lesbian Alliance's “Shorts Day,” a warm day each spring in which people are exhorted to wear shorts, the Republicans were criticized for being “insulting and disrespectful to truly oppressed minority groups.”28
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