• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

The chair withdrew her suggestion.

But I was utterly unprepared for an attack from an entirely different quarter. The new member, Laluna Jackson, chair of the Victim Studies Department, presented a report, as she called it, about the Museum of Man. Her voice emphatic in the style of African Americans, her cornrows tied with things that clacked as she gestured with her head, she read, “Not long ago, I conducted a lengthy examination of the Museum of Man and its exhibits with one of our visiting professors. And I must say that the scales fell from my eyes.

“As my colleague pointed out to me, that institution could just as well be called the Museum of White Male Victimization. Everywhere you look you see the detritus of the white male scourge that has made the planet such a living hell for all other peoples. That museum is a catalog of victimization. Everywhere you look there is nothing but the loot of imperialism. In the most brazen manner, it unapologetically documents how the world peoples had their cultures stolen from them lock, stock, and barrel.”

In listening to this poisonous nonsense, it occurred to me that I remain a member of the committee to remind myself, if reminders were necessary, why I do not want the museum to become an integral part of the university.

I let the woman spew on in this vein until she appeared to have exhausted her venom. Into an uncomfortable silence, I said, “I’m assuming that, even though a white male, I might be allowed to respond.”

Amazingly, Chair Brattle appeared to consider my request as though on its merits. Until, coming to her senses, she said, “Of course. You’re still a member of the committee in good standing.”

“Ex officio, to be exact,” I said. “As you have all heard me say before, this is a Wainscott body and I attend its meetings in order to continue the mutually enriching relations that exist between the two institutions. Among other reasons.”

I turned directly to the dean. “Tell me, Professor Jackson, how long have you been at Wainscott?”

She feigned puzzlement at the question. “Nearly seven years in one capacity or another. What relevance has this?”

“And was this the first time you visited the Museum of Man?”

“Well, yes. What does this …?”

“Let us say that I find your lack of curiosity of a piece with your narrow, ignorant, and mean-spirited view of my museum …”

“Mr. Ratour …,” she began.

“Please. Allow me to respond to the pile of rubbish you have dumped on the table.”

“Here, here,” said the Reverend Lopes, voicing what I hoped to be the general sentiment of the committee members.

I took a breath and calmed down. “I won’t try to rebut the statements of Professor Jackson as they are too absurd to be taken seriously. But I would like to say, as I have on other occasions, that the Museum of Man has and will continue to show the public that human beings everywhere and at all times, through their art and artifacts, are not mere creatures, but creators and as such partake of the godliness that is our common legacy. The exhibits you label as trophies are nothing less than solid testimony that beauty is innate to our species whatever level of formal technology or material culture we happen to occupy.”

“Amen,” said Izzy Landes. “I couldn’t have put it better myself, Norman.”

The chair rapped her gavel. “We need to move on to some pressing matters …”

I subsided into my seat, but continued to fume inwardly. This was what civilized discourse had descended to — cultural correctness gone amok and certified fools elevated to positions of authority. Of course there’s been victimization. The Romans overran the Gauls who became French, who helped overrun the Chinese who stayed Chinese and overran the Tibetans who, given half a chance … Man hands on misery to man …

At the same time, her remarks struck a nerve. Conquest always involves inventory, be it appreciative or dismissive. Papuans do not collect Rembrandts, not yet, anyway. We judge and select because we are, for the nonce, more powerful whether we want to admit