RUBEN NAVARRETTE JR.: Harvard’s president and race, plagiarism and antisemitism

Harvard is teaching us an important lesson: In America, not everything is about race. But some things still are.

Americans can no longer afford to be dense and dishonest about race. Demographers say that, by 2042, white people will be a statistical minority in the United States. Many white people are afraid that they will be “othered” and no longer have as many advantages.

Keep a stiff upper lip, folks. You can get through it. We did.

Because I’m Latino, I’m neither Black nor white. So I see through the racial nonsense peddled by both groups, and I can call it out.

It’s a skill that now comes in handy as we sort through the reasons for the ouster of Harvard President Claudine Gay. In her letter of resignation, the Haitian American — who admits that she made mistakes in her scholarly work — said she has been “subjected to personal attacks and threats fueled by racial animus.” Later, in a newspaper op-ed, Gay said she has “been called the N-word more times than I care to count.”

I believe it. Racism certainly played a role in how this story unfolded.

Gay is accused of having committed — throughout her academic career — dozens of instances of plagiarism. Harvard has been slow to deal with the charges, which stands in contrast to how swiftly it punishes students who steal someone else’s work.

The former president was also hurt by her testimony last month to the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, where she failed to make clear that antisemitic speech violated Harvard’s code of conduct.

So is this story about plagiarism, antisemitism, or that other “-ism” that many Americans like to think is in the rearview mirror: racism? I would say it was a combination of all three.

It certainly looks like the campaign to oust Gay was orchestrated by white people who didn’t want her in that position in the first place and that some of that may have been about the color of her skin.

Speaking of racial nonsense, it’s disingenuous for white people to try to have it both ways. They can’t advance the racist claim that the only reason that Gay was hired as president is because she’s Black and then get offended when some people insist her ouster was about race.

I don’t understand the rules. Are white people the only ones who can bring up race?

This whole story is frustrating for me.

On the one hand, I’m upset with Gay for not being more careful with her scholarship. The first thing that any nonwhite person should learn when they try to make it in a predominantly white industry or institution is that we must be candid about mistakes and above reproach.

On the other hand, I’m just as upset with those white people — like Bill Ackman, a Harvard classmate of mine and hedge fund manager who led the charge to oust the president — who presumptuously claim that Gay only got the gig because of the color of her skin. They never mention the fact that she earned her doctorate at Harvard and spent nearly 20 years there as part of the faculty and administration.

Spare me the malarkey about merit. That seems to apply only to Latinos and African Americans. In my own journalism career, I have seen scores of unqualified or mediocre white men who had a hook to get into the business and then failed up — until they became the big cheese.

Is Ackman outraged by the breaks that white males get? If so, he is keeping it a secret.

Now the billionaire bully says he intends to bring down the entire apparatus of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI). In a 4,000-word screed he posted on the social media platform X, Ackman called DEI programs “inherently a racist and illegal movement in its implementation even if it purports to work on behalf of the so-called oppressed.”

Thanks, Bill, for white-splaining how racism works. For those of us who believe in the existence of white privilege, and who have seen actual racism up close, it’s hard to take seriously a white male who implies that he is being oppressed while assuring the rest of us that we aren’t.

Which brings us to the biggest lesson that Americans should draw from this sad and unfortunate story. As human beings, we’ve all had our own experiences. But none of us has had every experience there is. That’s why the most valuable thing that we can hope to gain as we make our way through life is something they don’t teach at Harvard: humility.

Ruben Navarrette’s email address is crimscribe@icloud.com. His podcast, “Ruben in the Center,” is available through every podcast app.