That’s only good if you look exclusively at what they said, which in a politically charged environment, could be considered tactful.
Wait, what they said when? With their original communication where they lied to everyone and said they had to cancel the show because of a scheduling conflict, or in their internal messages saying “hey, we can’t show art from Muslim people anymore because some assholes who happen to claim the same religion killed and kidnapped a whole bunch of people”?
Because neither is tactful, the first because explicitly lying is wrong and likely to lead to an embarrassing situation where you get caught in your lie, the second because it’s just straight up racism.
My position
Which, again, has nothing to do with anything that actually took place here and is something you just made up for this discussion
implies the local community might be inclined towards bad behavior. Regardless of how true or false that is, it remains potentially insulting, which would be sufficient reason not to publish the position in the local newspaper.
I wouldn’t say that position is potentially insulting, it just is insulting. Plus, that’s the exact kind of cowardice we shouldn’t encourage or tolerate from museum curators (or librarians, publishers, etc. for that matter). When the people who run these institutions allow themselves to be intimidated by what might happen when they feature work from marginalized voices, the bigots succeed in silencing those marginalized voices.
I’m afraid being tactful frequently involves a little bending of the truth. Lying simply being wrong is a little oversimplified, that’s all. And it’s not a lie anyway, when there’s multiple reasons for something and you give one, that is not simply a lie, except by omission if you were expected to thoroughly explain yourself.
I see no such standard here. It’s just politics, which is messy. I’m sorry if it doesn’t live up to your lofty standards for museum curator honesty and disclosure.
Wait, what they said when? With their original communication where they lied to everyone and said they had to cancel the show because of a scheduling conflict, or in their internal messages saying “hey, we can’t show art from Muslim people anymore because some assholes who happen to claim the same religion killed and kidnapped a whole bunch of people”?
Because neither is tactful, the first because explicitly lying is wrong and likely to lead to an embarrassing situation where you get caught in your lie, the second because it’s just straight up racism.
Which, again, has nothing to do with anything that actually took place here and is something you just made up for this discussion
I wouldn’t say that position is potentially insulting, it just is insulting. Plus, that’s the exact kind of cowardice we shouldn’t encourage or tolerate from museum curators (or librarians, publishers, etc. for that matter). When the people who run these institutions allow themselves to be intimidated by what might happen when they feature work from marginalized voices, the bigots succeed in silencing those marginalized voices.
I’m afraid being tactful frequently involves a little bending of the truth. Lying simply being wrong is a little oversimplified, that’s all. And it’s not a lie anyway, when there’s multiple reasons for something and you give one, that is not simply a lie, except by omission if you were expected to thoroughly explain yourself.
I see no such standard here. It’s just politics, which is messy. I’m sorry if it doesn’t live up to your lofty standards for museum curator honesty and disclosure.