Letter to Yale President Levin regarding Abortion "Art"

Marjorie Campbell, marjorie@marjoriecampbell.com

YOU CAN EMAIL THE PRESIDENT OF YALE AT presidents.office@yale.edu. 

April 17 2008

"The entire project is an art piece, a creative fiction designed to draw attention to the ambiguity surrounding form and function of a woman’s body," Yale said.

Dear President Levin,

I write with regard to today's news story regarding senior Aliza Shvarts that appeared at http://yaledailynews.com/story.html, "For Senior, Abortion a Medium for Art, Political Discourse" and, specifically, that this senior student will shortly display with Yale's sponsorship and approval, "video recordings of . . . forced miscarriages as well as preserved collections of the blood from the process [of sperm insemination and self-induced abortions].  Included in the scheduled presentation by Yale, we were told through the media, will be "layers of . . . the blood from Schvarts' self-induced miscarriages mixed with Vaseline" and  "videos [which] . . . show her experiencing miscarriages in her bathroom tub." 

Today, Yale has further announced that the foregoing statements were "creative fiction" released as truth to the press as part of "performance art" which Ms. Shvarts has a "right to express".

President Levin, when did lying to the press become "performance art?"  No, lying about facts and promising alarming displays of blood and fetal tissue product from self-mutilation is not "an art piece" ~ it is gross fabrication and "fraud" and, importantly, social cruelty.  There are children and teenagers that read this "news".  There are women who cannot conceive children, and have lost much wanted children to miscarriages and violence.  There are men who long to be fathers, and cannot.  There are many of us who have suffered genuine concern and worry about a young woman who would treat herself so violently, risking short term, possibly fatal, consequences and certainly long-term emotional trauma. 

And now Yale claims: Oh, it's all a joke.  It's a creative fiction.  Never mind?

"Had these acts been real, they would have violated basic ethical standards and raised serious mental and physical health concerns," Yale added.

Manipulating the media to publish gross falsehoods, raise concerns for the well-being of this student and, then, excuse the fraud as "art" does not violate any ethical standards or raise concern about the mental health of the people involved?  Surely, the media and news consumers like myself have been treated as emotional, human guinea pigs - at best an "art experiment" to determine how the public and media would react to manipulation by lying, fabrication and promises of bloody body product?  I request an opportunity to file a complaint against those involved for unethical human experimentation upon the public.   

What other sorts of assaults on people's goodwill and concern for each other's well-being will Yale sponsor and excuse as "performance art"?  Yale has put itself in the company of the sensational, the callous and the twisted who laugh at others as they manipulate and deride charitable human emotions.

When I was in law school, a first year student told everyone that her family had been killed in a minivan accident on the way home to Thanksgiving.  The whole school came to a standstill and prayed for her and for her grave loss.  A week later, we learned it was a cruel hoax by a struggling young woman desperate for attention.  University of Virginia called the ploy "sick" and disciplined the student, requiring both a public apology to all of us and counseling for her. 

Ms. Shvarts, on the other hand, has received Yale's full approval and support for her lying and can already boast her own entry in Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aliza_Shvarts - an entry posted as Yale reported Ms. Shvarts' factual allegations and insisted they were not "for shock value," as Yale then admitted the falsity of Ms. Shvarts' factual assertions. 

Yale apparently calls such behavior "art" and defends this hoax on the entire world.   I am truly at a loss to understand why Yale would sponsor this type of anti-social, truly destructive behavior.  My opinion of the university has been radically changed by this shame, a grave shame on the reputation of a previously fine university.   You owe the world a sincere apology ~ and perhaps might follow University of Virginia's good example and get some counseling for all of the parties involved, student, faculty and administrators.

Where can I file my complaint for unethical human experimentation against all those involved?

Marjorie Campbell

San Francisco CA

UPDATE, 4/17/08, 11:27 PM:  STUDENT SVARTS CLAIMS THAT HER INITIAL ASSERTIONS ARE TRUE  "But Shvarts reiterated Thursday that she repeatedly use a needleless syringe to insert semen into herself. At the end of her menstrual cycle, she took abortifacient herbs to induce bleeding . . .   Shvarts showed the News footage from tapes she plans to play at the exhibit. The tapes depict Shvarts — sometimes naked, sometimes clothed — alone in a shower stall bleeding into a cup."

Comments

[bill bannon]

The visual arts in the West continue to attract in part many morally disturbed people who notice that other disturbed people previous to them were affirmed in the West either financially or in terms of being known or both. I guess,for some wealthy people, patronizing such art was more a purchase of a ticket into a social circle that otherwise would exclude them...while in other cases, purchase of some radical art was an investment that beat the stock market handsomely.
A saving grace in the modern world is the realistic/romantic..wildlife nature art centered mainly in the Western US and Southwestern US and which acts as a sacramental for God. According to Romans, nature itself testifies to God and His attributes. Wildlife art condenses those mountain ranges and eagles into a picture small enough for a person in the city to view on their wall....a sacramental in modern life. And wildlife art unlike the photo has mixed into the vision...the identity of the artist in his characteristic handwriting.