University President Lawrence Bacow's decision to end Naked Quad Run (NQR) is symptomatic of Tufts' widespread failure to address the flourishing drinking problem on campus. The administration's past behavior suggests that Tufts is clueless about how to stifle rampant alcohol abuse and relies on increasing security or canceling events to give the appearance of meaningful action. But buffed−up security and event cancellations don't improve Tufts' drinking culture; it only decreases the opportunities it has to be visible. Perhaps as a PR ploy, Bacow's decision was successful, but otherwise it displays an alarming lack of judgment.
I have no illusions about the problems NQR presents. A bunch of drunk, naked college students running around in sub−freezing weather is almost any school's nightmare. However, President Bacow's — and the Daily's — worry that someone will eventually die is misplaced. Once again, I don't deny that NQR has the potential — often actualized — to be dangerous. But this danger stems primarily from Tufts' drinking culture, not anything inherent to NQR. Bacow's melodramatic line, "no tradition is worth sacrificing a life to preserve," only obscures the reality of the drinking culture on campus. Excessive drinking, not NQR, puts students at risk. Canceling NQR does not remove the danger posed by alcohol poisoning; it merely pushes it further out of sight from administrators and the Tufts University Police Department (TUPD).
We tend to take perverse pride in how much and how often we drink. Binge drinking, while not glorified, is certainly encouraged. My friends and I often come up with occasions to justify binge drinking (celebrating National Punctuation Day comes to mind). As a participant, it is hard for me to frown too intensely on such practices, but from the standpoint of an administrator, such drinking should be anathema. NQR only provides an occasion for such bacchanalian pursuits to be visible. Canceling the event will only force such festive libations into dorm rooms, frats and off−campus houses. Far from preventing eventual student demise, President Bacow seems to be encouraging that it happens away from TUPD, Tufts Emergency Medical Service (TEMS) and anyone else who could help.
Moreover, President Bacow and all who support his decision seem to have a particularly rosy−eyed picture of their ability to end this tradition. The Daily's editorial states "NQR isn't coming back" and Bacow said, "In the end, it's my decision." Though other adjectives to describe such sentiments come to mind, I will stick with "deluded." Since NQR is a student tradition, the school has absolutely no guarantee that students will abide by the president's wishes. Bacow's warning that a student violating his decision will be punished is hardly doing the school a favor. Considering the accusations leveled at TUPD after last fall's NQR, Tufts would best avoid lawsuits by keeping Tufts' finest uninvolved. Pledges made by the university and the Tufts Community Union Senate to come up with an alternative tradition ring of both paternalism and wishful thinking. Tufts seems much more willing to eliminate NQR than to deal with its void.
Even more curious is Bacow's insistence that his decision sprung from "responsibility to an institution." President Bacow, who is leaving this particular institution in June, will not be the authority overseeing next year's possible rebellious reassertion of NQR. I understand that the difficulties a school president faces are monumental, but the responsibility of enforcing Bacow's decision lies with his successor. This decision seems rooted more in the determined pursuance of a failed policy. More cops and fewer events do not control drinking. Tufts does have a drinking problem, but the fact that Tufts students run around naked when drunk is an eccentricity, not the cause of the campus−wide drinking problem. The endemic drinking culture, unfortunately, is much less simple to remedy than the decisive cancelation of NQR and any solution is less likely to impress Tufts' trustees. Regardless, for a president who ostensibly promotes doing "what is right, not what is easy," (a particularly Spiderman−esque phrase), this decision marks a serious failure in both policy and judgment. I suspect that Tufts' love of binge drinking, and perhaps NQR, will outlive Bacow's tenure, no matter what his decision may be.
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