On Aug. 14, the Oberlin Board of Trustees released its decision addressing the April proposal for divestment titled, “Oberlin College Board Response to Student Initiated Proposal for Divestment.” The proposal, submitted in accordance with the divestment resolution published by the Board in 2014, calls for Oberlin’s immediate divestment from 49 companies that have supplied Israel with weapons used in Gaza this past year, thus contributing to the beyond horrific humanitarian crisis there.
‘‘In accordance with Oberlin’s history of action in response to ‘instances of human suffering, natural calamity, and injustice,’ the Board will consider proposals for divestment from entities that contribute to activities that ‘shock the conscience,’’’ the proposal reads, quoting the Board’s divestment resolution. “As you will see in the report below, the conscience of the Oberlin community is shocked.”
The Editorial Board of The Oberlin Review believes that the Board’s response dismissed the emotional charge of the original proposal submitted for review in its misuse of language to describe what we believe to be Israel’s catastrophic assault on innocent civilians in Gaza as well as the Oct. 7 massacre. The Editorial Board is taken aback by the Board’s denotation of the loss of life caused by the war as “events” or “what is occurring.” The Board writes that students discussed their “concerns over events in Israel and Gaza and the perceived connection between these events and Oberlin’s endowment,” and “their concerns about what is occurring in Gaza and Israel.” This language is insensitive to the dialogue on Oberlin’s campus this year, as students on all sides of the war grapple with the grief and frustration that accompany every headline. The “events” they mean to describe are the deaths of 16,000 Palestinian children. “What is occurring” is that 95 hostages are still believed to be held hostage by Hamas. In our opinion, a more empathic board would have considered using language such as “violence,” “suffering,” “loss of life,” “tragedy,” or “pain,” to acknowledge the severe reality that the greater Oberlin community has been invested in for months on end.
The Board rejected the proposal on the grounds that the endowment is not invested in individual companies but rather funds overseen by fund managers unaffiliated with the College, that these fund managers do not often consider “non-financial criteria,” and that the hypothetical liquidation of the endowment’s investments would jeopardize Oberlin’s ability to provide financial aid and scholarships and pay faculty and staff. Beyond these financial reasons, the Board expressed that, by accepting the proposal, it “would be taking a clear institutional stand on one side of a fraught and contested issue that divides the Oberlin community.”
“The Board believes there should be an extremely high bar for deciding to disengage, since Oberlin’s mission is to equip students to be active participants in the struggles to confront the world’s most difficult challenges,” the response reads.
Essentially, the Board believes that divesting from companies invested in the Israeli state is equivalent to disengaging from any critical discourse and discussion regarding Zionism and the Palestinian right to autonomy. This particular attempt to tether financial divestment with critical disengagement is logically fraught and tenuous. The very nature of the Board responding to a divestment proposal — coupled with numerous petitions signed by thousands of Oberlin students and alumni — indicates that the Oberlin community is actively participating in a lively and impassioned critical debate. To provide the community of Oberlin with such a shoddy argument only compounds with the dismissive language detailed above throughout the text. In the attempt to remain neutral, by claiming neutrality — or not “standing on one side of a fraught and contested issue” — they have dismissed both communities. This tactic of unempathetic language leaves us, as students, dissatisfied, as it fails to convey that the Board is truly considering students’ voices, thoughts, and opinions.
One could claim that the divestment proposal was not intended to address the students’ needs fully; rather, it was meant to explain their decision to reject the proposal. But this is a problem in itself. The Board consists of alumni who have all dedicated their time to managing the institution’s welfare. How can they begin to consider our community’s welfare if they cannot address what is happening on campus? To not address the work students put into fundraising and education about the history of Palestine and the state of Israel is a failure to fully engage with the Oberlin community. To ignore the grief and trauma that students have been facing since Oct. 7 and fail to nurture and support or even mention the students whose families have been directly affected showcases the lack of prioritization of student voices by the Board of Trustees. One must then ask who the Board of Trustees has engaged with, if not the community they are meant to serve.
Editorials are the responsibility of the Review Editorial Board — the Editors-in-Chief, Managing Editor, and Opinions Editors — and do not necessarily reflect the views of the staff of the Review.
