PERSPECTIVE: Harvard put President Gay in the crosshairs of a culture war without a shield

By Ivory Toldson
For NABJ Black News & Views

President Claudine Gay’s resignation is a thunderclap echoing from the halls of Harvard, leaving a bitter taste of injustice and a deafening silence from those who should be howling in outrage. The president, the first Black woman to lead the institution, stands cast aside, not by her own hand, but by the very forces Harvard claims to oppose: prejudice, cowardice, and a grotesque disregard for basic fairness.

President Gay, a woman of singular brilliance and grace, was thrown into a political firestorm without a shield. Three presidents called to testify, all women in a field dominated by men, dragged into a partisan spectacle disguised as a congressional hearing. President Gay faced the partisan gauntlet without a subpoena, and without the full armor of the most prominent university in the nation.

Let us be clear: the accusations against President Gay are a farce, a cynical ploy by those who thrive on division and seek to undermine the progress of novel voices. Plagiarism, in its true form, is an act of theft, a deliberate attempt to claim another’s work as one’s own. Yet, the flimsy charges leveled against her were nothing but a web of nitpicking, fueled by cherry-picked quotes and twisted interpretations. To call this anything but slander is a disservice to the truth. Yet, Harvard stood silent, its resources and influence strangely unavailable to defend its president.

However, this is not about President Gay’s specific case; it is about the larger canvas it paints – A chilling tableau where anti-Blackness and misogyny find fertile ground even in the progressive halls of academia. Where whispers can become weapons, and accusations, however baseless, can topple giants. Where the burden of proof seems to shift depending on melanin and chromosomes.

Harvard, and by extension, the entire higher education community, needs to do more than issue platitudinous statements. Harvard, and the higher education community, must confront the ugly truth laid bare by this debacle – our rhetoric does not protect us from the insidious structures that perpetuate prejudice. We must demand accountability, not only from those who spew hate and misinformation, but also from those who stand idly by while it happens.

President Gay’s resignation is not just a loss for the university; it is a public indictment. It is a stark reminder that even in the hallowed halls of learning, the path for a Black woman, however accomplished, is still paved with barbed wire. It is about every woman who aspires to lead and every scholar of color who dares to challenge the status quo. It is about the very soul of higher education and its professed commitment to truth, justice, and the unfettered pursuit of knowledge.

Let President Gay’s departure be the catalyst for a seismic shift, a revolution of conscience that shakes the very foundations of academia and forces it to confront its uncomfortable truths. Let it be the spark that ignites a fire of inclusivity and equity, so bright that it banishes the shadows of discrimination.

Because silence, in the face of such injustice, is not neutrality; it is complicity. And Harvard, and the entire academic community, can no longer afford to be complicit. As Elie Wiesel noted, ‘Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim.”

Ivory Toldson is director, education, innovation and research at the NAACP, a professor at Howard University and editor-in-chief of the Journal of Negro Education