Letter to the editor

I’ve never been so ashamed and embarrassed to be a Calvin alum. 

It’s likely that there will always be an influx of privileged teens that act deplorable on campus. When I was a student, it was someone drawing swastikas on cars “as a joke.”It’s horrible, but it happens. 

That said, I was floored when I read Le Roy’s response to the most recent controversy. President Le Roy, as the president of Calvin you are held to a higher standard than college students. How can your very public response be so blatantly bigoted? You can’t just slap an asterisk onto to these students’ homophobic meme. “Calvin affirms that sexual intimacy is a gift from God to be celebrated in marriage between a man and a woman” — my God. Who exactly affirms that sex between LGBT spouses is wrong? That’s certainly not what my professors taught. As the president of Calvin your statements reflect on all of us, including tens of thousands of alumni, many of whom have left the CRC bubble and have careers to uphold.

I implore you to avoid making statements about what Calvin as a whole affirms when it makes everyone associated with the college look like bigots. When recruiters google my school, they’re going to see Calvin’s public statements like this and wonder if I’m going to harass Pam from accounting for sleeping with her wife. It’s 2021 and, outside of the CRC bubble, gay marriage is normal. You have unique access to so many incredibly educated people, so for the love of God, please take advantage of that by talking to them in an effort to “unlearn” before you harm your students mentally, socially, and professionally any more than you already have.