Our policies, however, protect Professor Katz’s freedom to say what he did, just as they protected the Black Justice League’s.
Regardless of whether the particular conclusions he draws are correct or not, or whether his chosen language is hyperbolic, he has made a worthwhile contribution that other members of the University community should engage with rather than condemn.
We, the undersigned students and alumni of the Princeton Department of Classics and the Department of Linguistics, unequivocally denounce “A Declaration of Independence by a Princeton Professor,” written by Professor of Classics Joshua T. Katz. We condemn its demonization of student organizers, its belittling of faculty members in their support of anti-racism, and its flippant dismissal of efforts to combat systemic racism at Princeton while minimizing the very presence of that racism itself.
Sally Frank was not a club officer, and yet she persisted until all the clubs were coeducated.
It is a sad reality that the mission of the Prize has become only more urgent in the 17 years since its founding. While racial animus, ever present in our American experience, has seeped even more into the national discourse, we are nonetheless inspired and rejuvenated in hope by each years’ Prize winners. We are also invigorated by the ongoing opportunities for Princeton alumni to gather together to further explore our own racial identities and to push each other to expand our anti-racist actions.
Put more simply, we care a great deal about how discourse is conducted at a university and could not care less about what.
If Princeton retains its name it will be interesting to see how it justifies William’s legacy and its affiliation with a King who once ruled over England’s colonies, including those in North America, and oversaw the dawn of a period in slave trading in which the trade of African slaves peaked.
I challenge the entire Editorial Board to embrace your Public Safety department and make an appointment to speak with these dedicated officers who put their lives on the line every day to keep you safe.
It is our hope that the University will strive to bring as many students back to campus as possible.
We feel that we have not been prepared by the School to confront the structures of race and power which undergird policy crises.
As some of the oldest and most well-established organizations on campus, we recognize our and Princeton’s complex history with race and our role in directly recognizing and calling out the injustices that have impacted and continue to impact Black students.
As students, activists, and proponents of a better world, it is our duty to stand up against injustice and fight for the equal treatment of all.
Instead of addressing the inequities and burdens of online learning, the destabilizing effect of lost income or housing, or the trauma of a public health crisis, Betsy DeVos has devoted the Department of Education’s energy to making the Title IX process more difficult for survivors.
Although this might seem at first contradictory to the stay-at-home orders, for those of us with the privilege and comfort of safe environments, now is our time to get involved. We came to Princeton to become leaders in our fields and serve the world – a pandemic isn’t the time to forget that mission, but rather the time to get to work.
This public health crisis has required us to ask all Princeton undergraduates to do a difficult thing: to complete their semesters online, and, in the case of our seniors, to forgo experiences that they had anticipated throughout their time here.
We hesitated to write you because we feel you've done an outstanding job leading the University, and with the gravity of the pandemic backdrop, because you obviously are facing many unforeseen and serious challenges every day. However, we feel compelled to reach out to you on this issue because we feel strongly that Princeton has made the wrong decision on not permitting its students to withdraw and come back next spring.
We, the Princeton University AASA E-Board, strongly believe that unity and community is the need of this hour of crisis. As such, we cannot sit idly and watch as racist attacks continue to threaten and divide our country.
Our “belief” that this year’s room draw process “will run smoothly” isn’t based on pure optimism, but rather the culmination of several months of work and advocacy.
Whatever my political preferences are, I should be given the same opportunity as any other American to choose from the wide array of candidates.
