Talk:The Dartmouth Review

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Contents

[edit] Current Review Positions on Homosexuality

The article states that 'The Review routinely refers to gays as "sodomites".' Over the past two years that I've read the Review, I haven't seen any such reference. Searching their website for "sodomite" or "sodomy" reveals no hits in the back issues going back to 1999. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.170.95.85 (talk • contribs) 00:19, March 4, 2005

[edit] Considered by whom?

Recently added: "However, it is still considered superior in quality to its main competitors, The Dartmouth and the college-funded Dartmouth Free-Press, a left-wing answer to the Review." This sentence lacks agency. Considered by whom? I'd be glad to have a cited statement on this, but as it stands it is pure POV, and if no one can cite a source to this effect, it should be removed on that grounds. -- Jmabel | Talk 01:46, Apr 19, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Citations

This article serious lacks citations for the Review's alleged exploits. ND Conservative 02:06, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

Read the Dartmouth Free Press article about the Review. It confirms all of the bulleted points and a whole lot more. Dylan 13:26, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
I don't think that the Free Press can be considered NPOV on this issue. Dartmouthstudent July 17, 2006
Sources are not held to NPOV rules, only the writing in the content of Wikipedia articles is: "that a source has strong views is not necessarily a reason not to use it, although editors should avoid using political groups with widely acknowledged extremist views, like Stormfront.org or Al-Qaeda." The criterion for inclusion is whether or not a statement has been published in a verifiable, reliable source. Whether or not a college paper is a legitimately "reliable" source is perhaps another item for discussion; I don't know specifically if college publications have set precedent as an acceptable source, but it seems to me that they are (and have been used as such in other articles). Dylan 01:58, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
I would say that both the Free Press and the Review would be considered prima facie citable; on the other hand, if there are published sources disagreeing with them, on many matters I wouldn't consider either a particularly good source, and would rather see something more solid. Yes, there is precedent for citing college newspapers and even campus independent papers like the Review. - Jmabel | Talk 20:43, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Alcohol policy

What stand has the Review taken on the college alcohol policy? I'm not sure that a liberal or conservative position is easily identified.Dynzmoar 12:53, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Partial revert

I reverted two of the many changes by User:ChulaOne. They aren't major or very contentious, but explaining them will take more space than is available in an edit summary, and I didn't want to revert those two things without explaining why.

  • I replaced the removed "and has been at the center of several lawsuits" clause. This is not only true but a very defining characteristic about the Review. It seems based on the title of their book (The Dartmouth Review Pleads Innocent: Twenty-Five Years of Being Threatened, Impugned, Vandalized, Sued, Suspended, and Bitten at the Ivy League's Most Controversial Conservative Newspaper) that it is acknowledged as an important part of their history. It doesn't seem to me that it reflects negatively on the newspaper (i.e. in an NPOV way) to mention something like that.
  • I removed the inserted "alleged" preceding the list of controversial actions by the Review. All of the things there are recorded in the cited sources as having actually occurred; none seem contentious, at least not to the point that anyone denies that they happened. "Alleged" makes it seems like these are stories made up to discredit the Review.

Some of the other changes (e.g. "right-wing" to "politically conservative") seem a bit odd to me (at least in the context of being an attempt to de-POV the article), but they don't need reverting.

Let me know if anyone has any problems with this partial revert. Dylan 00:57, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

It might be even more accurate to say "has filed several lawsuits," most importantly its attempt at a civil rights case, The Dartmouth Review v. Dartmouth College, 709 F.Supp. 32 (D.N.H. 1989), which the Review lost on a 12(b)(6) motion. --Edit07 17:10, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Book

Re: The Dartmouth Review Pleads Innocent: Normally, we don't link to Amazon (or any other retailer) for a book. Is there a site on the web for the book itself? If not, we should probably get it out of "External links" and into "Further reading", and just give publication information and ISBN, which will bring up our usual ISBN-based page that doesn't favor one retailer. - Jmabel | Talk 03:13, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] They know who inserted the Hitler quote

Buckley is quoted in this Wikipedia article as saying that the Review published a quotation from Hitler in its masthead because a "former staffer" inserted it. Jeffrey Hart has claimed that "a disgruntled or perverted junior staffer on the newspaper invaded the word-processor circuit," implying that some kind of cyber-crime took place [in 1989!]. The Review's offices were locked upstairs rooms on Main Street, and it is highly doubtful that their computers were on the college's AppleTalk network (dialup, perhaps?).

The article would be improved by naming the person who inserted the quotation. It was very likely a staffer who worked on the paper at the time, and the editors at the time almost certainly knew who he was, although they seem to have tried (successfully) to hide his identity.

The present editors certainly know who he was, as they admitted after a February 18, 1998 article by Buckley: "Editor's Note: The identity of the individual responsible for placing the Hitler quote in The Review was established after the publication of In Search of Anti-Semitism. He was known to the Hanover police in connection with other incidents. [[1]]

Why not reveal his name? Is it because he was still at the paper when he inserted the quote? --Edit07 17:11, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

If you have a reliable source that identifies the person by name, then I see no reason not to include it. schi talk 18:41, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
"The Dartmouth Review Pleads Innocent" names Pang-Chun Chen '92. Beginning on p.222, a great deal of evidence is presented that links him to the quote. The evidence would be insufficient to establish his guilt in court, but it seems highly doubtful that anyone else was responsible. I'm not sure if that warrants inclusion, so take it as you will. Also, I seriously dislike the section of the article that claims the Review published a list of those present at a gay student organization. This is factually inaccurate; the review published the names of the officers only, which were already a matter of public record. I will change and appropriately cite this in a day or two if there are no objections. Vonspringer 04:14, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
Specifically it was an article by editor Kevin Pritchett reprinted in the book that made the claim that Chen was responsible. While a reasonable supposition based on the evidence, the editors of the book nonetheless made the statement quoted below. (I'm not disputing that Chen was likely guilty but just clarifying what's evidence and what's conjecture.)

04:50, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

According to "The Dartmouth Review Pleads Innocent," "It has never been officially established who inserted the Hitler quote in the credo of The Dartmouth Review." [pg. 225] The apparent inconsistency arises because there were apparently strong suspicions bordering on certainty (for a variety of reasons) about a junior staffer who left the paper in the aftermath. However, it was never "officially established" nor admitted to, as far as I know. I imagine that this is why you've never seen someone named in print (again AFAIK) even though, in the minds of some, the identity of the individual "was established." Basinrange 23:32, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

I don't have a copy of The Dartmouth Review Pleads Innocent to check for myself, but considering the uncertainty surrounding the identification, you should just make sure that it passes WP:BLP criteria before adding this name. schi talk 23:06, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
I agree. It seems questionable that the individual should be named given that the identification is apparently speculation--even according to the editors of the The Dartmouth Review Pleads Innocent. WP:BLP criteria would seem to suggest that this doesn't justify a "some have speculated that XYZ was the person responsible" sort of thing.

Basinrange 23:57, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Hitler Quote scandal

I reverted some edits my addition to the Hitler Quote scandal elicited. Several points:

  • There is no disputing the scandal came to be known as the Hitler Quote scandal.
  • There is no doubt that the Freedman administration was the precursor of the Rally, as it took place barely two days after discovery of the quote, and was carried out by Building & Grounds people, as everyone who was a student at Dartmouth at the time can attest. Furthermore, no demonstration on campus could have been carried out on College property without the Administration's explicit approval.
  • President Freedman himself accused the Review of anti-semitism, in public and often, again as all who were on campus that fall can attest.
  • It is a matter of record that a former editor-in-chief of the Review was Jewish, and that several senior staffers at the time of the scandal were Jewish.
  • Finally, it is also a matter of record that several national media, including The Wall Street Journal, severely criticized the Freedman administration for its handling of the affair.

The Review might well be obnoxious, but the behavior of the Administration in the fall of 1990 was clearly cynical and opportunistic. --TallulahBelle 23:30, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Can you find sources for your points, re: criticism of the rally as intimidation tactic? If the WSJ covered it, then that will certainly count as a reliable source. Also, this sentence (It is also believed that it became the reason President Freedman was not offered the job of Harvard president.) is highly speculative and really requires a source.
I haven't seen sources that say the Freedman administration organized the rally — I think the fact that it was carried out on College property (is the Green technically College property? I thought it was the town's, but I am likely wrong about that) means it's implicit aproval. That would be like saying "The Wright administration organized this blood drive." just because a blood drive is happening on campus.
I don't seriously contest the "Hitler quote scandal" name, although your source, the clearly POV article by Hart, doesn't even call it that (he refers to it as the "Mein Kampf Affair"). Really, I'm not sure if it's institutionally known as the "Hitler quote scandal". In fact, when I google "Hitler quote scandal" (in quotes), the only result I get is the James O. Freedman Wikipedia page.
As for this (President Freedman himself accused the Review of anti-semitism, in public and often, again as all who were on campus that fall can attest.), while many people can probably attest to that, on Wikipedia, we need to rely on reliable sources. So if you find reliable sources and appropriately cite them, you can keep such claims in the article. I assume that you're referring to this bit (...came on the heels of several smaller incidents allegedly suggesting anti-Semitism on the part of the Review.) This I also find vague and requires sourcing.
This sentence (It should be noted that many of the senior staffers at the Review at this time were, in fact, Jewish, as had a previous editor-in-chief.) still strikes me as POV (it should be noted). I think it could be appropriately re-worded if we properly attribute the defense, e.g. "In response to Freedman's and others' accusations of racial bias, Hart pointed out that the Review staff included black, Jewish, and Indian staffers."
Finally, I see no reason to take out the D cite about the rally that I had added, and I will reinstate it. schi talk 01:14, 23 February 2007 (UTC)
As Dartmouth College owns all the land it is on, including the Green, all campus demonstrations have to be explicitly approved of by the administration, if it involves more than ten individuals. "Explicitly" in this case meaning it has to have an approval in writing from the office of the Dean of the College. If students organize a demonstration without explicit College approval, the organizers and/or participants can be hauled in front of COS and potentially expelled, aside from any criminal charges that the College administration might pursue in Grafton County.
Insofar as Jewish students being Jewish, sorry, but maybe I'm a little stupid: I thought being Jewish was an issue of fact, not a point-of-view matter of opinion. That the Review staffers were called in toto "anti-Semites" was notedly offensive to many staffers at the time precisely because they were Jewish.
Finally, the Daily Dartmouth reference inserted misses the point entirely of the incident; it's a summing-up of the Review's history, not an account of the Rally Against Hate or the Hitler Quote scandal per se. Since the Daily D's web site currently extends only to 1992, and thus does not include incidents that happened in the fall of 1990, I suppose it will have to do.
--TallulahBelle 13:42, 23 February 2007 (UTC)
Schi is correct, the Green is town property (and Dartmouth is not located "on" the Green at all, it's located around it). Furthermore, the Handbook states that "Protest or demonstration shall not be discouraged so long as neither force nor the threat of force is used, and so long as the orderly processes of the College are not deliberately obstructed." -- there's no mention at all of requiring permission.
Point is, if you want to include such a claim, you need to find a cite for it. Dylan 14:29, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

That is innacurate: Dartmouth College owns the Green outright—five of its seven acres were part of the original land grant establishing the college. In fact, the college's first two buildings, Old College and Commons Hall, begun in 1770 and standing until 1789, were located on what is now the south east corner of the Green.[2] [3]

Second, the Student Handbook states very clearly that "All events and activities other than informal use may be permitted only upon application to, and approval of, the Conferences and Events office and, if necessary, the Town of Hanover." Furthermore, the Student Handbook, in the "Guidelines for Outdoor Events", aside from reiterating the previously stated condition, adds that, "Permits are required for any outside activity which is planned to take place in Hanover and is anticipated to attract 50 people of more." In both relevant passages, disciplinary action is threatened in the case of non-compliance.

Finally, please, your condescension is duly noted—however, it is grammatically correct to write "Dartmouth College owns all the land it is on, including the Green." I take it, Dylan, you're not a Dartmouth student—so be sure to take that remedial grammar course at your middle school. --TallulahBelle 22:48, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

TallulahBelle, I believe Dylan is in fact a Dartmouth student, but that's irrelevant. Regarding your "remedial grammar course" comment, please consider WP:CIVIL.
As to the question of whether "the Freedman Administration" organized the rally: I found the source of your quote from the handbook, Use of the College Green and Campus Grounds (please try to supply links to what you're citing when possible.) You omitted to quote the very first sentence of the rule: The College Green and campus grounds are reserved primarily for informal use, including rallies and other assemblies, by students, faculty, staff, and guests of the College. Your quote points out uses other than informal uses, but the very first sentence lists rallies as an informal use.
Even if we agreed to your analysis of the handbook's rules & regulations re: the organization of a rally on the Green (whether it's owned by the College or town), it would still be irrelevant because that's original research. Until we find a reliable source that reports that the Freedman administration organized the rally, I don't think it's reasonable to attribute it to them. Like I tried to point out earlier, it's not a reasonable assumption to assume that every event that occurs on campus is explicitly approved, much less organized, by the current administration. There's a Drag Ball that happens every year in Collis, but it's absolutely not organized by the Wright administration - it's organized by certain student groups. It's like saying, "The Bush Administration organized this massive anti-war protest in San Francisco." simply because the protest occurred in the United States.
As for the fact that some Review staffers were Jewish - yes, this may be a matter of fact, but my point is that the way it's worded (it should be noted) is POV. The sentence clearly implies discredit on any accusation of anti-Semitism.
Finally, regarding the D cite, I agree that if we had access to contemporary D articles covering the Rally, that would be preferable, but in the absence of that, I think the cite there is legit and appropriate. Again, you should find cites to support your claims about national, severe criticism of the administration, or I will take them out. (Edited to add: That also goes for the "Hitler quote scandal" name — is that really an institutionalized, widely-accepted name for the event?) schi talk 00:16, 24 February 2007 (UTC)
You just don't get it, do you: Dartmouth College is a private institution—that is, private property. Every event on its campus by definition has the explicit approval of the administration. Your Bush-rally analogy is incorrect, because there are lots of places and spaces in San Francisco that are not owned by the Federal government—yet all of the Dartmouth campus, from the Green to the BEMA to Collis, is owned by the College. Thus the administration has control through the Conferences and Events office, or the Dean of the College's office, of which rallies, events or demonstrations are permitted, and which are not.
And insofar as the citation you made from the Student Handbook, informal in this case is akin to spontaneous. The Rally Against Hate was anounced on the very day that the scandal broke, and as I said before, it was set up by Buildings & Grounds people (who work directly for the College administration), so clearly, the rally wasn't spontaneous or "informal". It's a spurious argument.
Next point: The fact that there were Jewish staffers on the Review is relevant to the issue. Otherwise, there is the clear threat of biasing the article by omission. Had the quote incident, for instance, been racist as opposed to anti-semitic, then mentioning the religion of senior staffers and an editor-in-chief would indeed have been superfluous and unnecessary. But had that been the case, it would have been reasonable, and indeed, necessary for the sake of fairness, to mention that the then-editor-in-chief, Kevin Pritchett, was black. As it is, since the issue was anti-semitism, not race, Kevin Pritchett's race would have been irrelevant—but not the fact that several staffers both past and present were Jewish.
Finally, calling the incident the "Hitler Quote scandal", "Hitler Quote affair", "Mein Kampf Quote scandal" or combinations thereof, is how that particular event has always been referred to, by students, alums, administrators and faculty. The discussion as to whether or not that is the actual name, and that the name should be struck, sounds a lot like the Orwellian habit of unnaming things, in the hope that the event will disappear from memory, which I'm sure both the Freedman fans and the Wright people would love to see happen. --TallulahBelle 02:28, 24 February 2007 (UTC)
Every event on its campus by definition has the explicit approval of the administration.
Quite the contrary -- Dartmouth gives implicit permission by allowing its grounds to be used by its students, conditional on their self-policed adherence to the rules; to suggest that "explicit approval" is given for everything that occurs would mean that no one could ever be punished for anything that happened on campus. The College didn't give explicit approval for Reviewers to destroy shanties on the Green in the 1990s, nor to Psi U students to yell racist epithets from their frat house in 2001,[4] nor to Phi Delt to try to burn down Chi Gam,[5] nor to any of the countless alcohol or drug violations in any of the College-owned Greek houses on any Friday night, nor to any student who violated the honor code while on College property, etc. ad finitum. Not intervening to stop something is hardly the same as "explicit approval." Regarding demonstrations specifically, a violation of College policy could be punished afterwards, but the simple fact that such an "illegal" demonstration could occur would not mean that the College had permitted, encouraged, or "organized" it.
as I said before, it was set up by Buildings & Grounds people
This certainly sounds relevant and important for inclusion, if you can find a cite for it.
Finally, calling the incident the "Hitler Quote scandal", "Hitler Quote affair", "Mein Kampf Quote scandal" or combinations thereof, is how that particular event has always been referred to, by students, alums, administrators and faculty.
Again: do you have a citation demonstrating that this is how "students, alums, administrators, and faculty" have always referred to it?
One more important issue is that it is hard, if not impossible to demonstrate that the current Student Handbook shows the same policies as the 1990s at-the-time version of the Handbook. We can't assume that it does and so I would therefore be partial to erring on the side of caution and simply saying (or writing the article as if) we don't know what the Handbook said. If you want to bring the Handbook text into play as a reliable source, you'll have to show that the relevant passages were in the book at the time. Dylan 05:50, 24 February 2007 (UTC)
Hey, TallulahBelle, You just don't get it, do you:
Perhaps the San Francisco protest analogy was imperfect, but the other points I and Dylan have made still stand. The fact that an activity occurred on campus, on private property, does not mean that the owner of that property explicitly endorsed it, much less organized it, as your wording claims. And again, all this looking into (non-contemporaneous) policies is original research, that is, an unpublished synthesis of published material — find a cite.
The fact that there were Jewish staffers on the Review is relevant to the issue. — I never said it wasn't. I just think that this fact needs to be included in as NPOV way as possible. Like I said above and you failed to respond to, the issue here is the clause it should be noted, which clearly intends to discredit any claims of anti-Semitism. (For the record, I'm not saying they are anti-Semitic, I'm just saying that, for example, it's entirely possible for an organization to include members of color and still be responsible for racist actions.) Above, I had suggested (and you had again not responded to) replacing the current sentence with "In response to Freedman's and others' accusations of racial bias, Hart pointed out that the Review staff included black, Jewish, and Indian staffers." I think this provides appropriate attribution and context to the claim. Also, perhaps I need some remedial grammar courses, but the sentence (It should be noted that many of the senior staffers at the Review at this time were, in fact, Jewish, as had a previous editor-in-chief.) does not strike me as grammatical.
This "unnaming" conspiracy hypothesis you've raised is very interesting (although not actually something George Orwell himself would have supported, but of course, your use of Orwellian here is totally accepted these days) — however, like I said before, I googled "hitler quote scandal" and the only hit I got was the James Freedman article, so I remain unconvinced that that's what people call it. Perhaps this is just proof that the conspiracy is truly working. You need to find a source that supports your claim that this is "what it came to be known".
Finally, generally, WP:A: give it a read. schi talk 08:03, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

I've just realized something: You both have so far failed to win a single point.

  • You were wrong about the ownership of the Green.
  • You were wrong about the Student Handbook requirements for non-spontaneous assemblies and rallies.
  • You were wrong about the relevance of Jewish staffers prior to and at the time of the scandal.
  • And insofar as it being called the "Hitler Quote Scandal". you're right, there are no Google references to that name. There are, however, several about the "Hitler Quote" Incident.[6][7]

Finally, for your future reference, you know you're losing when you're trying to question the grammatical accuracy of the writer, rather than her points. Bad form, boys, which is the worst sin of all. --TallulahBelle 12:36, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

I don't particularly like the idea of this talk page being seen as a competitive debate -- we're trying to better the project, not "win points" against one another.
I made edits to help the article conform closer to WP:V and WP:NPOV. Thank you for the sources you provided, the second clearly stated that the incident was widely known thereafter as the "Hitler Quote" incident, which works fine as a citation.
I removed the wording "It should be noted" as suggested by Schi, because s/he is correct that such a phrase lacks agency, imparts POV, and is in fact listed as a phrase to avoid as a weasel word. As, it seems, we three all agree, the claim itself is certainly relevant and needs only to be properly sourced and described in a POV manner (it is now both) to be included. Neither of us have proposed removing it altogether.
Finally, please simply keep WP:V / WP:OR in mind when you edit. If you want to make a claim -- like that the Freedman administration organized the rally -- it will be welcomed with open arms here if you can attribute it to a reliable source. Dylan 13:05, 24 February 2007 (UTC)
TallulahBelle, it seems that you don't actually read and comprehend what Dylan and I have been writing, but for your future reference, check out the list of Wikipedia policies, as you appear to not be familiar with them. I agree with Dylan - this isn't a competitive debate, and I wish that you would engage in discussion rather than trying to win points. I had commented above that I was unsure about the ownership of the Green, and I have said multiple times that I agree it's relevant if there were Jewish Review staffers. I only mentioned grammaticality because above, you had presented yourself as the expert on such things. I really don't understand your antagonistic attitude and the gendered condescension ("bad form, boys") — it's all really unnecessary. schi talk 20:54, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

I have a question: Which one of you is the middle-schooler, and which one of you the sock puppet? --TallulahBelle 21:32, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

As a third-party here, I'm just going to chime in briefly. I watch most of the edits on most of the Dartmouth College-related articles, and I've seen both Dylan and Schi contribute frequently and quite well to numerous articles. I have also seen The Dartmouth Review article not infrequently become a hotspot for debate as well as edit wars, and I've been watching this current debate unfold. TallulahBelle, the most recent edits by Dylan and Schi seem to leave most of what you've added intact; they have only sought to edit the wording and a couple of the facts such that they obey Wikipedia's policies about contributions. If you still feel uncomfortable with their edits, might I suggest that you seek a neutral third-party to take a look at things. I can try to do that if you'd like, but you may also want to take a look at Wikipedia:Dispute_resolution for all of your options and other suggestions. And all of you, please try and stay away from insulting each other's grammar or attitude or anything else - it not only violates WP:CIVIL/WP:NPA, but is also just makes things harder for everyone. Also, one side doing something inappropriate does not give permission to the other to do the same thing back - it is still just as wrong. --└ Smith120bh/TALK ┐ 01:54, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

You're right Smith120bh, it's my bad for responding to uncivil behavior with uncivil behavior. I'm going to step out on this one for a bit and hope things blow over. schi talk 02:50, 25 February 2007 (UTC)


Smith, let me explain why the Hitler Quote incident gets everyone very hot-under-the-collar.

I was on campus when it happened, and far from being sympathetic to the Review, I considered them obnoxious jerks. Though I wrote for the Daily D and co-edited the academic journal Gnosis, I neither wrote for nor contributed to the Review; at most I read it sporadically if I happened upon a copy on my dorm-room doorstep. Yet the behavior of the Freedman administration, which up until that time I had been indifferent to, was so atrocious, and so blatantly opportunistic and cynical, and so against the spirit of Dartmouth, and indeed, the spirit of democratic discourse, that it is hard for me and a lot of other then-undergraduates to forget it.

During the Rally Against Hate, Review staffers were literally persecuted. Review staffers—Dartmouth students—were chased across the Green, running from very real threats of bodily harm, threats made by students who were known toadies of the administration. None of these bullies received any College disciplinary measures. Dean Dan Nelson openly invited persecution of those deemed to be "sympathizers" of the Review. Dean Sylvia Langford called them "worms who should be ground to dust"—that's not something I read her say, it's something I heard and saw her say. Aside from the official persecution of Review staffers, there was a very obvious chilling effect insofar as public discourse was concerned. All in all, it wasn't the Review or the Hitler quote that made Dartmouth an ugly place—it was the Administration, and their destructive Rally Against Hate which made the place sour.

Since then, the only people who have written about the incident are Review people, or people involved with them, such as Jeffrey Hart. Because Hart and his ilk have obvious axes to grind, their accounts tend to be discounted. However, in this case, the Review people aren't crying wolf. Though there is no question as to the seriousness of the originating incident, the way Pritchett handled it—pulling the copies of the Review, issuing a letter of explanation and apology without prodding (indeed, before most people even knew what was going on), calling on B'nai B'rith to monitor the internal investigation—was actually one of the few times Pritchett acted in a responsible, measured way. But because the Review over the years has burned so many bridges, no-one believes them when a wolf is actually coming—they've cried wolf too many times.

It is no accident that people sympathetic to Freedman and his adminsitration, or antagonistic to the Review, have rarely mentioned the Fall '90 Rally Against Hate. Notice how no-one mentioned it when Freedman died last year, or if it was mentioned, it was mentioned only briefly and in passing, with all blame being casually tossed at the Review but with no real analysis, much less a recapitulation of all the relevant facts. The reason for this willful ignoring of the Rally Against Hate is obvious: No matter how you cut it, the Rally Against Hate was a low point of civility at Dartmouth, and it was entirely created by the Freedman administration.

What galls a lot of students was that, just a couple of weeks before the Rally Against Hate, Derek Bok, the then-President of Harvard, had let it be known that he would be stepping down, and everyone knew that Freedman was on the short list of possible replacements. Many students at the time, and even more alums today, believe that Freedman seized on the Hitler Quote incident as an excuse to mount the Rally Against Hate and thus raise his profile in the Harvard presidential horse race.

As I said, I was there—I saw how the Buildings & Grounds crews set up the stands and podiums and public address systems. I saw Freedman and the Deans buttering up members of the press corps, and I saw how they all freaked out when the Rally Against Hate got out of hand and turned ugly. I saw it, and so did a lot of other students—two thousand, in fact. So when people try—from my perspective—to white-wash the incident, or try to finesse it away, or try to deny the existence of the very name "Hitler Quote scandal", it really gets my goat. To casually dismiss verifiable—indeed, crucial—facts about this very serious incident is something that I and a lot of other alums find blatantly offensive. --TallulahBelle 03:38, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

TallulahBelle, I definitely understand your concerns here. The issue is that Wikipedia needs to be able to cite reliable sources. (In the old days, there used to be revert wars of "I remember this happening. ... But I remember it happening differently!", which obviously doesn't work). That said, one of the stipulations of citing reliable sources is that they *should* be available to the general public to view. However, in the absence of reliable, public sources, you may use reliable sources that aren't publicly available, such as archives of the New York Times, etc. As a current Dartmouth student myself, I have access to most of these archives. I just did a quick search, and found a couple New York Times articles which do support some of your points, such as the rally being organized by Freedman. I see that you don't have an e-mail address activated on your account. However, if you e-mail me, I can send you the text of some of these articles (go to my user page, and click "e-mail this user" in the left column). Schi and Dylan, if you want to see these articles as well, I can point you to the link or end you the text as well. In a Google search, I did find a couple other sources which are publicly viewable which may help: [8] [9] [10]. So, it looks like getting this information into the article appropriately will be possible, just will take a bit more work. TallulahBelle, I know alumni have access to some databases - I'm not sure which - and perhaps through your library you can dig up some of these sources. It would be great to get some of this information out there for more of the public to know about (and for people to see sources which they can trust to be right). Just be patient, though, as digging up information like this takes time. --└ Smith120bh/TALK ┐ 07:47, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

I do see at least one factual inaccuracy here. The claim that Jack Kemp withdrew support for the Review over alleged anti-Semitism is false. Mr. Kemp withdrew support because of an earlier incident: the “Dis Sho Ain’t no Jive” article by Keeney Jones which occurred well before any of the Hitler Quote mess. There was never any suggestion that Mr. Kemp had any choice but to do what he did. To the Review’s credit they did publish the article in their anthology and distanced themselves from the content. SPCGuru 14:05, 25 May 2007 (UTC)SPCGuru

[edit] Rallies

I would be mildly astounded if student rallies at Dartmouth routinely obtain explicit permission in advance, or if this has been true at any time in the last four decades. If so, it would be close to unique among institutions in its class. - Jmabel | Talk 06:36, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Recent visitor to this page

Hmmm... I was there for the rally and would have easiliy noticed Review staffers being chased on the Green. It sure would have been more interesting than hearing everybody speak for their 15 minutes of fame. In retrospect, I think the entire situation was handled poorly by all sides. Student government was grandstanding, college administration was seeing this as another opportunity to bury The Review, the paper itself tried to make itself out to be a martyr, and everybody else went along for the ride.

As far as knowing who actually started the whole Hitler mess, is there credible evidence other than what right-leaning sources have postulated? I think it would be unfair to label somebody with a hate crime without credible evidence. I knew enough Review staffers at that time to know that there were many keys to the office, the office itself was hardly secure,... and knowing Dartmouth's computing department well enough, I can assure they wouldn't (knowingly) let the Dartmouth Review maintain a connection to the Appletalk network.

Centerfield13 19:59, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Reverted vandalism

I have just reverted some vandalism done by User:Ccccnash. However, I was only able to revert the vandalism through 01:07, 6 October 2007. When I tried to revert farther back than then, there was some error. I need to leave soon, so if someone else could pleas clean that up, that would be great. Thanks. -- Imperator3733 06:42, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

Since I posted this, User:Ccccnash has made several other edits that look like vandalism to me. Imperator3733 06:43, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

I did what I could and I think I got all of it. Czechthetechnique 15:17, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

User:Ccccprescott (likely sockpuppet of User:Ccccnash, given the similarity of names and edits) is continuing to resists reverts. I've reported this at WP:ANI. Dylan 04:15, 7 October 2007 (UTC)


[edit] POV issue

This article is absolutely littered with POV issues on a scale I didn't think was possible on here; from flat-out asserting (with no in-text citations) that it is xenophobic to statements like "diseased movement of so-called politically conservative but actually fascistic-minded"***, the whole thing is like a monument to everything that WP:NPOV doesn't stand for. There's so many issues in there I don't even know where to start; I'm tempted to rewrite the whole thing (making it a stub if necessary). In the meantime I'll just remove terribly POV sentences. Ours18 04:32, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

      • emphasis added by me. Ours18 04:32, 7 October 2007 (UTC)
All that's necessary is a revert to the last edit not by User:Ccccprescott. It's POV editing that to this point is vandalism. I just can't do much because of WP:3RR. Dylan 04:36, 7 October 2007 (UTC)
I didn't realize that it was the work of one editor; anyway, I just edited roughly the first half of the article, that's enough for now. By Cthulhu, there's too much nonsense here to rid the article of in one sitting....I think I'm going to wash my hands, reading all that makes me feel dirty. Ours18 04:42, 7 October 2007 (UTC)