There is nothing more obnoxious than that person at a party whose idea of small talk is asking everyone where they went to school, just so you'll ask them back and they can do that obnoxious faux-humble nonsense speech about how they "went to school in Boston. Well not in Boston, but near Boston." Harvard people not only love for you to know they went to Harvard, but they think so highly of the school that it seems as though they think it would be too braggy to just say they went to Harvard. As though we non-Harvarders would simply be too jealous and insecure to hear the name of their school. Well, I have good news for those of us who are sick of this particular party conversation: Harvard is making a bunch of terrible and embarrassing decisions that might just shut up their alumni for a bit!

It was announced earlier this week that the school would be bringing the recently freed Chelsea Manning to the university as a visiting fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government. This means that she would come to the school for a day and talk to students and answer questions. This would be an amazing opportunity for Kennedy School students as, whether or not you agree with Chelsea's decision to leak classified documents to Wikileaks, you can't deny that she's uniquely qualified to speak on the current state of our government and its relation to Wikileaks, and classified leaks in general. But after a day of outrage, including the decision of former deputy director of the CIA Michael J. Morell, to resign his position as a Harvard Fellow, Harvard decided to rescind Manning's invitation.

Now this is crazy, because Harvard Fellowships are not honorifics. They are just titles of people who visit and speak to students. The Kennedy School's dean pointed this out before basically saying, but some people think it's an honorific and people are mad, so nah. Never mind. Chelsea can't come.

We invited Chelsea Manning to spend a day at the Kennedy School. Specifically, we invited her to meet with students and others who are interested in talking with her, and then to give remarks in the Forum where the audience would have ample opportunity—as with all of our speakers—to ask hard questions and challenge what she has said and done. On that basis, we also named Chelsea Manning a Visiting Fellow. We did not intend to honor her in any way or to endorse any of her words or deeds, as we do not honor or endorse any Fellow. However, I now think that designating Chelsea Manning as a Visiting Fellow was a mistake, for which I accept responsibility. I still think that having her speak in the Forum and talk with students is consistent with our longstanding approach, which puts great emphasis on the value of hearing from a diverse collection of people. But I see more clearly now that many people view a Visiting Fellow title as an honorific, so we should weigh that consideration when offering invitations.

This is so dumb for so many reasons, not the least of which is that other members of this class of Harvard Fellows include Sean fucking Spicer, a man whose job it was to lie to the American people on a daily basis in the name of racist and bigoted policies, and Corey Lewandowski, who built up a racist monster of a president. Of course, this isn't to say those people shouldn't speak at Harvard. They should! They have unique insight into what's happening in our world. That's an excellent asset for students. But Chelsea also has a unique insight and the only people hurt by this decision are those students.

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