Wednesday's edition of the Primary Source, Tufts' journal of conservative thought, contains a controversial spread on its last two pages.
The spread includes seven of the Mohammad cartoons originally published by the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten on the inside of the back cover. The eighth appears on the facing page, accompanying an article about the cartoon-inspired controversy.
Alongside the cartoons, the Source writes that it "must stand in solidarity with the free press of the world, and prints these cartoons as a symbol of defiance against oppression and fear."
According to its Co-Editor-in-Chief, senior Nicole Balkind, the Source "had some good healthy debate about it" before deciding that printing the cartoons was the appropriate thing to do in order to show support for "those who are being repressed for exercising their freedom of speech."
Phil Primack (LA '70), a freelance reporter currently teaching the Ex College course "News from the Inside Out," said that his class recently took on the controversy of whether or not publications should print the cartoons.
Based on the class, Primack said "a majority of students would not, but a distinct number would" support publishing the cartoons.
Primack said that as a journalist, his initial gut reaction to the cartoons "was that every newspaper in the country should have put them on the front page" to show that violence would not curtail freedom of the press.
But "now the story has actually moved beyond the cartoons themselves," he said. "I had to ask myself whether the purpose of publishing is to prove you can... there's no point to offend just because we have the power to do so."
In Primack's view, the publication of the cartoons is "somewhat gratuitous," and the Source and anyone else publishing the cartoons now are "a tad late."
When given the chance to respond to Primack's comment, the co-editors of the Primary Source did not elaborate on their choice, other than to say they "felt that the story was relevant at the time of production."
"We didn't print it immediately after the cartoons became a controversy," Balkind said.
"I feel this is still very relevant," said Primary Source Co-Editor-in-Chief Alison Hoover, a sophomore. "We attempted to address... the issue of freedom of speech."
Senior Rafeya Khan, co-president of the Muslim Students Association (MSA) at Tufts, wrote via e-mail that he and his fellow board members were "greatly disturbed by the Primary Source's printing of the Danish cartoons of the Prophet.
"As students in a liberal American college, we are well aware of the importance of free speech, as it helps facilitate open dialogue and debate, which is essential in an academic environment," Khan wrote. "However, we fail to see how the publishing of such offensive material contributes to the overall atmosphere of the University, especially a
university that is known for its tolerance of racial and religious diversity."
But Khan added that the MSA does not "intend in any way to make a controversy out of this issue, as there is already enough controversy encompassing it. We only wish that the Primary Source would have thought twice before making such an insensitive decision."
So does senior Thomas McDermott, president of the Arab Student Association. "I find the decision to republish these cartoons a sick, misguided attempt to be controversial or simply get a rise out of the Muslim community," Thomas wrote in an e-mail to the Daily.
"I do not expect nor want every group on campus to forget all their differences and disagreements," he wrote. "That said, I do believe that some effort must be made to keep the dialogue intelligent and diplomatic."
McDermott also took issue with the Source's contention that "Muslim groups have a right to be offended, but not a right to censor or threaten," which appeared in the text accompanying the cartoon spread.
"I would love to know when the last time was that any Muslim group on campus even hinted at a threat towards any other group," he wrote. "There is a complete lack of respect towards Muslims and Arabs, and the Source is content to continue publishing articles and images that offend, all in the name of free speech, but not of accurate reporting."
McDermott initially hesitated to comment on the cartoons' republication because he is "tired of reading prejudiced, angry articles about some facet of the Arab world."
When asked for her take on the Source's decision to run the cartoons, Director of the Fares Center for Middle Eastern Studies Leila Fawaz said, "I do not think the Primary Source is very much about appropriateness and that they can do what they want.
"We should not focus on the negative. There [are] a lot of things in common across the divide [between Islam and the West]. I can only emphasize the need for serious, in-depth study," she said, emphasizing that Tufts needs many more courses that deal with the Middle East.
In the Letter From the Editor in the same issue of the Source, Hoover accuses publications that have not published the cartoons - such as the New York Times and the Washington Post - of "censoring themselves" and "show[ing] no support for their brave colleagues who defy oppression in the face of fear."
The public editor of the New York Times, Byron Calame, maintains a Web journal. The Feb. 4 entry quotes Times Executive Editor Bill Keller on the decision not to publish: "To publish them after seeing the outrage and violence across the Islamic world could be perceived as a particularly deliberate insult," Keller writes. "We've had long and vigorous debate in the newsroom and concluded that publishing the cartoons is not essential to telling the story."
In the Feb. 12 edition of the Washington Post, Ombudsman Deborah Howell conveys similar opinions in her piece "Why Not Publish These Cartoons?"
"If it was essential to see them in order to understand the story, then maybe," Editorial Page Editor Fred Hiatt said in the Howell piece. "[But] the cartoons were easily explainable in words. Why reprint something you know will offend many of your readers?"
"We have standards for accuracy, fairness and taste that our readers have come to expect from The Post. We decided that publishing these cartoons would violate our standards," Executive Editor Len Downie said in Howell's piece.
The Philadelphia Inquirer, one of the only major American news outlets to run the cartoons, published this comment on Feb. 6 from Editor Amanda Bennett and Managing Editor Anne Gordon about their decision: "The Inquirer published the image to inform our readers, not to inflame them ... this is what newspapers are in the business to do. We educate people, we inform them, we spark discussion. It is not only our profession, it is our obligation."
In regard to the decisions not to publish the cartoons, Primack said, "I think the official reason was sensitivity, but the unstated reason was fear of reaction."
Primack added that among the publications that have printed the cartoons, "a lot of them have tended to be conservative.
"I'm hoping it represents a new-found consistency for conservatism," he said, especially in regard to previous, mainly conservative objections to the publication of graphic photographs from Iraq, as well as photos of the caskets of dead soldiers being returned to the United States.
