Whitman College’s mission statement concludes: “We help each student translate their deep local, regional and global experiences into ethical and meaningful lives of purpose.” In their reply to the Whitman chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine, the Board of Trustees gave the following explanation for their decision not to form a committee considering divestment: “We share your deep care for both this institution and for the suffering happening, not only in Gaza and Israel, but in war-torn countries across the globe. We have carefully considered the points discussed in our conversation over the summer. Ultimately, we, as a Board, have decided not to establish a committee to work toward divestment as proposed by the group.” As College faculty, we struggle to see how those two concepts square with one another. Is this not a singular opportunity to fulfill our own statement of purpose, in which the making of “ethical and meaningful lives” is grounded?

The Board’s decision disappoints. In ruling out the formation of a committee made up of students, faculty and trustees to consider divesting from military manufacturers, the Board has taken even the exploration of such an idea off the table. This contravenes the claim to a “supportive scholarly community that prioritizes student learning within and beyond our classrooms” in the College’s mission statement. The Board provided no new information or reasoning for its decision, offering instead platitudes about deeply caring about the suffering taking place in Gaza, Israel and in war-torn regions across the world, suggesting that all wars are alike–regrettable, but regrettably beyond our responsibility. Yet, when companies that the College invests in are directly contributing to the first live-streamed genocide—or what UN Special Rapporteur on Palestine, Francesca Albanese, called “colonial erasure”—we are not sure how the College’s commitment to social justice, domestic and global, can be reconciled with a reaffirmation of the status quo. How do we as a College imagine that we can make good on our efforts to educate our community “relative to antisemitism, anti-Muslim bias and dedicating ourselves to creating a supportive environment for students from the Middle East” while at the same time investing in the very military manufacturers exacerbating global volatility, sowing death indiscriminately for profit and imperiling the health and livelihoods of millions of others? The Board turned down an opportunity not only to learn together, but also to unlearn the framing narratives circulating in corporate media and Washington and ushering in a new McCarthyism.    

We remain fully committed to our students’ desire for a just Whitman, a Whitman that not only talks of the value of a liberal arts education in meeting the world’s current and future challenges, but enacts this shared ideal by critically engaging, rather than hastily dismissing, our students’ demands and aspirations. Profiting from wars, scholasticide and genocide is obscene.

Whitman can take the lead among liberal arts colleges by divesting from companies who are in the business of destroying lives and environments and propping up apartheid regimes. It starts with translating our new buzzwords into action. Social change-making means ending genocide or it means nothing at all.

Signatories 

Zahi Zalloua

Nicole Simek

Robert Flahive

Daniel C. Smith 

Denise Fernandes

Shampa Biswas

Libby Miller

Tarik Ahmed Elseewi

M Acuff

Eunice Blavascunas

Jack Jackson

Lauren Osborne

Xiaobo Yuan 

Daniel Schultz

Gaurav Majumdar

Chetna Chopra

Yukiko Shigeto

Özge Serin

Jason Pribilsky 

Kathryn Frank

Matt Reynolds

Camilo Lund-Montaño

Andrea Sempertegui

Catherine ‘Imaikalani Ulep 

Jonathan Walters

Sarah Davies

Bruce Magnusson

Michelle Jenkins

Michael LeFevre

Giramata

Wakako Suzuki

Brian Dott

Matthew Bost

Kaitlyn Patia

Lisa Uddin

Lynn Sharp

Krista Gulbransen