Yale Erases History: “A Puritan Has Been Disarmed”

This popped up on Yale’s Alumni Twitter feed, with the triumphant message, “A Puritan has been disarmed.”

At the York Street entrance to @yalelibrary, a Puritan has been disarmed. More at https://t.co/hzyPGKUCg6 pic.twitter.com/aXwLs5eDPi

— Yale Alumni Magazine (@yalealumnimag) August 9, 2017

Apparently, the Sterling Memorial Library had an architectural carving on the building that depicted a Puritan holding a musket and a Native American holding a bow. Here’s what they’ve done:

 When the library decided to reopen the long-disused entrance as the front door of the new Center for Teaching and Learning, says head librarian Susan Gibbons, she and the university’s Committee on Art in Public Spaces decided the carving’s “presence at a major entrance to Sterling was not appropriate.” The Puritan’s musket was covered over with a layer of stone that Gibbons says can be removed in the future without damaging the original carving.

Of course, they did nothing about the Native American’s bow and arrow.  This prompted Kyle Smith over at National Review to sarcastically note:

Although the Puritan was holding a weapon, so was the Indian. Only the Puritan’s musket was plastered over, not the Indian’s bow. Now that only one of the two men is armed, does Yale mean to imply that persons of color are irrationally violent or untrustworthy? Troubling, very troubling. A reasonable interpretation of the work now is that an Indian is sneaking up on an unarmed Puritan with intent to do him harm. Why must Yale perpetuate such harmful stereotypes?

Isn’t it ironic that the left tries to stereotype the Puritans as being uptight…  and now they are more “Puritanical” in their zeal to erase history.

Moreover, although the exigencies of placing two characters and two objects in a small setting meant that each man’s weapon was close to the other’s head, the two principals are not looking at each other. Each is looking away, as though they are working in alliance, perhaps to hunt. Given the two types of weapons being deployed, the chances that any game spotted will be felled to nourish all are increased. Diversity is our strength, indeed! Has an innocent instance of simple multicultural cooperation been frantically blotted out because easily triggered dunderheads misinterpreted the meaning of the carving?

Of course, logic doesn’t mean as much as political correctness to the folks at Yale.  It’s sad when our so-called elite universities don’t know how to effectively deal with our past, so they have to bury their heads in the sand.

Image Credit: Pixabay with Twitter insert