Fellow Sagehens, help me: I am a tormented minority. If you really want to understand the dynamics of difference and power here at Pomona College then I have a place for you to start: right here. I write you to disagree. By the nation’s standards, I’m a moderate. Imagine if I were a conservative. Wait, I have something worse for you to imagine: what if I voted for Tom McClintock? I bet you don’t like the sound of that one bit.
Now I have another situation for you, imagine that the year is 1953 and Joe McCarthy is having a great time of it over in Washington. But what if I voted for a Communist? What if I was a Communist? It would still be illegal for the federal government to employ me. Society would not accept me.

Understanding the dynamics of difference and power is a wonderful thing. I’ve read Orientalism, I know more about bell hooks than just her stance on patriarchy, and I support the PDAC committee. But I think that requiring DDP would be teaching and enforcing political correctness. Enforced political correctness is as much of a restriction on thought and the ability of a community to express ideas as McCarthyism was on this nation’s ability to express ideas and think freely. What am I saying? Enforced political correctness is neo-McCarthyism.

We do not have to teach political correctness to recognize its value. We have PDAC and we should all support their efforts to raise awareness without mandating its instruction. Individuals in our society should be protected from racists, anti-gays and the like. As a school of intellectuals, we should not start with a series of assumptions and then generate a discourse; rather, we should start with a question. We should come to our beliefs on our own.

To hold values against the grain of society is a brave and difficult task. I salute the true conservatives who have to validate themselves here in this bastion of ultra-liberalism.

I’m a lot more like you than the rest of the country. As liberals, it is our duty to make sure we do not in any way hamper freedom of speech, of the press, or of thought.

Because I think critically about gender does not make me sexist or anti-feminist. Because I understood Jared Diamond’s answer to Yali’s question, and think he’s probably right, doesn’t make me a colonialist. Because I hold some conservative views does not mean that you should assume I’m wrong and dismiss me.

The PAC system was designed to provide a balanced education to the students of Pomona College. Where is our education the most lacking? As a school we shut out the value of the conservative argument and nullify it almost automatically. That is where our PAC system fails us most completely. If we do not have a complete understanding and appreciation for the conservative argument, we will fail to affect change in national policy and George W. Bush’s face will wind up on our coins—in your pocket and mine. If we are so determined to add overlaid requirements to the PAC system, let’s remember that to have a good education we must have a balanced education. If you get the chance, I urge you to vote for a new overlaid PAC: Understanding the Value of the Conservative Argument.

~Brian Hardesty '07