IT'S A testament to how awful the consensus clause is that despite numerous columns, editorials and letters that have appeared on these very pages, I was still able to hammer out an entire column with still more arguments against the consensus clause. It was supposed to be a short letter to the editor, but an idea this dangerous should not be lightly "peppered" by scrutiny but, rather, shot down and destroyed by the silver bullet of reason.
First and foremost, I want to reject and completely eliminate any idea that detractors of the consensus clause are somehow against both honor (the subjective ideal) and Honor (the institution). Honor never has and never should be defined solely by its sanction. The true meaning and value of honor is the community of trust, which everyone at the University wants to preserve. Those of us against the consensus clause fear that removing the single sanction from debate will exacerbate student apathy toward the Committee, worsen already poor faculty-Honor relations (possibly even leading to a faculty boycott) and disenchant students who believe in student self-governance. A vote against the consensus clause is a vote to preserve honor (and Honor), not to destroy it.
If the consensus clause as an idea is bad enough, the deception defenders of the consensus clause are willing to employ to eliminate single sanction from public debate is even more striking. According to their interpretation, students in the School of Continuing and Professional Studies who vote, have elected representatives and are enrolled in University courses are somehow counted toward the total of the student body in every calculation except for figuring out voter turnout for the consensus clause. Nowhere in the Honor Committee constitution or the University Board of Elections constitution does it state that members of the School of Continuing and Professional Studies are not counted toward the "student body."
Do you have to be in Charlottesville to be considered a student? Do you give up your voting rights if you study abroad? Or is there a minimum age requirement that's written in invisible ink in the Honor constitution? I don't know what standard supporters of the consensus clause are using, but any person who believes the absurd position that students who vote are not counted as voters needs a light refresher in common sense.
The University Board of Elections, the University authority on the matter, recognizes that the most obvious definition of the student body is those currently enrolled through ISIS, yet these radicals prefer to bend statistics and use Clintonian parsing of words to achieve their goals. The thick irony of using dishonorable and deceptive statistics to allegedly "save honor" is reason alone to vote against the consensus clause.
Supporters of the consensus clause don't shy away from telling a perverted version of history, either. To them, a dangerous and radical minority can change the sanction, yet it's already incredibly difficult to remove the single sanction. Despite a proposal by an ad hoc sanction reform committee and a referendum that said nearly 60 percent of students want the Committee to seek alternatives to the single sanction, as a fourth year I will have never voted on an amendment to change the sanction. The Committee, ignoring the referendum, did not propose a change to the sanction or even actively seek to present an alternative.
If recent history suggests anything, it is that there is plenty of inertia to preserve the single sanction rather than eliminate it. The real danger is the power of a radical minority of University students to arbitrarily set too high a bar to disenfranchise future students.
Defenders of the consensus clause use scare tactics by pointing to the so-called forgiveness clause fiasco, the proposal by the sanction reform committee in 2005. With or without the consensus clause, however, the misguided proposal ended exactly as it should have: It was scrutinized by the Committee, the press and students and was eventually destroyed. Absent a complete breakdown and failure of the marketplace of ideas, a radical minority cannot end the single sanction. If ideas are no longer scrutinized at the University, we have much larger problems than the single sanction.
If honor, student self-governance and the community of trust stand for anything, it's that the single sanction, or any policy, cannot become a fiat from the students of 2006. Whether for or against the single sanction, vote against the consensus clause for the sake of honor at the University.
Patrick Harvey is a Cavalier Daily contributor. He is a former editor-in-chief of the Cavalier Daily
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