The past week saw Oxford’s extensive collection of beclosetted skeletons grow slightly lighter, as prospective appointees and candidates across the university became victim to their respective sordid pasts. As the Saïd Business school comes under fire for hiring figures with somewhat questionable professional histories to advise on ‘corporate reputation,’ Derek Walcott has been driven from his campaign to become Professor of Poetry by a smear campaign focusing on decades old sexual harassment allegations. Cherwell would argue that our obsession with airing dirty laundry is an unfortunate habit, one that we would do well to shed.
Walcott’s story is a particular example. After weeks of pressure, he has finally bowed out. So, are we proud of ourselves? In typical tabloid furore, the man has been labelled a ‘sex pest,’ and many are glad to see the back of him. Yet it’s hard to view Walcott’s withdrawal as anything but a bad thing.
What exactly is our problem with Derek Walcott? As far as we are aware, he may or may not have propositioned a student in 1982, a student who following the supposed incident was then graded poorly. A further incident was settled out of court in 1996. In other words, Derek Walcott has never been convicted of any crime whatsoever-he might have sexually harassed two women, but that hardly puts him at the top of the list of Oxford perverts: Your average Park End attendee probably gets through that in a single night. There is a great deal of hypocrisy in our manufactured outrage. Certainly, Walcott’s alleged actions are more serious given the context-he had more responsibility in his role as a tutor. It might even be fair to rule him out for any one on one teaching jobs, despite the absence of decisive evidence. However, it is a serious error to rule out his candidacy based on allegations against his character that firstly bear no relation to what is essentially a lecturing post, and secondly have never been proven. Perhaps we don’t care that there seems to be little in the smears against him that indicate he is unsuitable for the role; perhaps we simply object to his character point blank. But this doesn’t seem credible-Oxford seeks, craves and encourages controversy. Half the speakers on an average union term card are more contentious than Derek Walcott.
Even if we are to accept all the negative things that are said about him, it is clear that graduates of the university have been denied the opportunity to properly exercise their democratic rights. Perhaps Walcott’s detractors are right. Perhaps he is inappropriate for the role. In which case, he should be denied it by an electorate that choose to reject him. As it is, he isn’t getting the job because he doesn’t want to have anything to do with us.
The Saïd Business School is another case in point. Admittedly, it is rather ironic to be appointing the ex-chief of HBOS and the former director of the FSA to advise a ‘Centre For Corporate Reputation,’ but looking beyond the pithy humour, there seems little reason to deny them the jobs. The pair, Andy Hornby and John Tiner, were indeed featured in The Guardian’s ‘twenty-five people at the heart of the meltdown’ this January. But if we ruled out every businessman ever criticised by The Guardian, we’d probably be rather short of prospective applicants. Moreover, anyone with any credibility in economic matters will heavily hedge their bets in ascribing blame for our current economic woes-it’s rather presumptuous of The Guardian to suggest that they can so definitively characterise a recession that they, like everyone else, failed to see coming. Even if they’re right, it doesn’t seem like such a bad idea to take advice on corporate reputation from those who have experienced losing it.
It’s fairly obvious why we buy into this stuff. It’s entertaining. It appeals to the sensationalist side of us all. However, sensationalism is just that, and we shouldn’t be making important choices based upon it.
