Who is Sharen Bobe?

I've never met Ms. Bobe personally, but like most undergraduate students, I am familiar with her e-mails. She works for the Center for Career Education. Among the many notices and job announcements, the e-mails often include several scholarship and internship opportunities. Interestingly, a good percentage of these are race-based programs. From the Mercer "Diversity" Scholarship to Microsoft's call for "groups underrepresented in the software field: African American, Hispanic, or Native American," these particular opportunities take many different forms, but all share their racial and gender preferences. Simply put, the Columbia administration actively promotes outside organizations that actively discriminate. Frankly, I don't care.

These opportunities serve only the interests of my fellow Columbians; while I might disagree with the premise, I'm in no position to demand that they stop. Now, try to reverse these roles with the progressives in my shoes. Instead of talking about race-based scholarships, consider ROTC. The Reserve Officer Training Corps allows interested students, of their own volition, both to serve their country and provide themselves with an education. Progressives, however, could care less about their peers. Their opposition to ROTC stems only from their hatred of the military.

They will, of course, object and say, "No, the anti-homosexual policy of the army violates Columbia discrimination policy." Well, so do scholarships that reject certain individuals because of the color of their skin. For that matter, our co-institution is one of the few remaining all-women schools in the country. It is the prerogative of Mercer, Columbia, and Barnard to allow these practices, and it is their choice. To sweep these issues under the rug and claim that ROTC is the only such case, however, is blatant hypocrisy.

Their second anti-argument claims that "the army takes advantage of minority students." Do they legitimately believe this? Last year, in all my freshman naivety, I attempted to find out. It was the week of the anti-ROTC rallies; the University Senate vote was only a few days away. On College Walk, two students had set up a table to collect signatures for a petition, calling out to passers-by. I took the bait and walked over. Two 20-something hipsters, clad in black, overpriced, fashionable, nonconformist clothing were kind enough to enlighten me: "The racist military," they barked, "takes advantage of minority students; they aren't able to understand what exactly they're getting into." I stopped, taken slightly aback, and responded, "Well, isn't it racist in itself to assume that minorities don't have the ability to understand what it means to join the military?" They looked at me and laughed. "That's ridiculous," they said, "just get out of here, you're one of 'those.' There's nothing we can do for you."

When the majority of Columbia students, including some of the most liberal and progressive people I know, support the return of ROTC, the arguments against it are clearly weak and self-interested. For most, it's "just another" scholarship, just another way for a student to advance his own interests, just another choice. Yet, these self-proscribed defenders of choice will have none of it when it comes to the military. They loathe the institution and, like their '68 brethren, would rather try to "starve" the military than allow the proverbial person down the hall, or even a friend, the opportunity to better himself and his family.

The acceptance of ROTC by the Columbia student body is not a referendum on "Don't Ask, Don't Tell." There are both conservatives and liberals who take issue with the Clinton-era policy; it was Mr. Conservative himself, Barry Goldwater, who supposedly said, "You don't have to be straight to be in the military; you just have to be able to shoot straight." While the students might disagree, their right to choose rightly trumps personal considerations. Again, there are parallels to the acceptance of "diversity" scholarships promoted by the administration (with one notable exception, of course-it's impossible to have a "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy for race and gender). Actually, by all logical conventions, the military policy is more inclusive than Barnard, or most of these scholarships. Still, we must not ignore the failure of liberals to recognize the military as one of the most progressive and integrating institutions in American history. All told, there is no legitimate reason to ban ROTC from campus.

While the ROTC vote is behind us, the campus military/recruiting issue is not. The Supreme Court, in a recent 8-0 ruling, upheld the Solomon amendment (which demands that schools receiving federal funding must allow access to recruiters or have their funds withdrawn) despite the objection of these particular law school faculty members and students. Again we hear the cries of progressives tired of the military "forcing" itself onto campuses. Yet, they fail to recognize that in the real world, their anti-military crusades don't matter. As an independent institution, Columbia could forever ban recruiters if willing to turn down millions in subsidies and aid. The progressive mentality of entitlement, however, wants both and scoffs at the notion of giving something in return. They are so driven by blind rage and hatred for America's military that their aims come before anything and everyone else.

Chris Kulawik is a Columbia College sophomore. Chris Shrugged runs alternate Wednesdays.