I grew up in what I’d consider a small town, even by Hanover’s standards. There was never any doubt that my friends were all somewhat provincial. After all, we knew how to chop down trees for firewood, or beat each other with logs in our favorite game (called stick wars - we invented it, blitz me if you want the rules), just a little better than how to maneuver through the mass of pseudo-urban suavity that I’d later see epitomized at SAE parties. So it never really surprised me when my middle school teacher told me, for the first (but not the last) time that I would be going to hell because I’m a Jew. Or, the time I was given the nickname Jew-Boy. Or, eventually when I beat them all, by making Judaism cooler than Surge energy drink.

So I consider myself a sort of expert when it comes crossing the line, at least when it comes to statements that more or less boil down to “if you’re being Jewish, you’re doing the wrong thing.” But even though Noah Riner’s remarks didn’t mention that the Jews killed Jesus, or that I’d be condemned to an eternity of hell-fire and brimstone, I think he exited my comfortable hinterland at convocation. In this case, that invisible boundary which separates an expression of faith from proselytizing needs to be drawn out.

Consider this particular quote from Riner’s speech, that, “People are imperfect, and there are consequences for our actions. He gave His life for our sin so that we wouldn’t have to bear the penalty of the law; so we could see love. The problem is me; the solution is God’s love: Jesus on the cross, for us.”

The first time I heard that remark, I was reminded of a particularly idiosyncratic Jewish tradition. On a major holiday called Passover (yes, the one that features singing of the songs), Jews celebrate the Israelites’ escape from Egypt. In order to drive the message home, in what exemplifies, anthropologically, an attempt to construct group identity, Jewish families tell the story of four sons: the wise, simple, immature, and the wicked. The father’s attempt to explain the idea of liberation from oppression to his sons ultimately climaxes in his explanation to the immature son. He tells his son that we celebrate the holiday because of what the Lord did for me when I went forth from Egypt. The key here is the use of the first-person. I would never try to intone “we went forth from Egypt” to, let’s say, the formerly nearly-all-Indian board of the Dartmouth Independent.

Mr. Riner’s speech (but perhaps not Mr. Riner) had the effect of attempting to construct a group identity through the use of the personal plural pronoun, we. “Jesus on the cross, for us” never happened for me. It is this attempted construction that I take issue with; it reeks of the same elements that missionaries from any ideology use. To attempt to forge a new identity by including those to whom you are speaking, necessarily excludes those who do not believe the premises of your inclusion.

I, for instance, don’t believe that Jesus was any more than a regular man. I therefore don’t believe that he died on the cross for us. If I were an ‘09 listening to Mr. Riner’s convocation speech, I would only have to assume that I was not included in his broad collective. Therefore, the use of the first person plural pronoun we, must mean one of two things: that Mr. Riner’s remarks were meant to exclude me from his intended audience, or that his remark attempts to include me in an audience in which I do not wish to participate.

Noah’s speech thus takes the step beyond an expression of faith. It does more than merely profess hope in the historical Jesus as role model. Rather than raging a little too hard by giving me some delicious vodka-infused powerade, Riner’s speech pushed religion a little too hard by rhetorically forcing an ideologically-infused Jesus on me during convocation.

But my issue with Riner’s speech doesn’t end there. The real is whether Jesus actually serves as a good role model for the children of the Green? In a phone conversation with Editor-in-Chief Emeritus Anoop Rathod, I jokingly suggested that Edgar Allen Poe might be a better role model. After all, he was the sort of maverick-loner-intellectual persona that former President Freedman urged Dartmouth students to adopt in his famous “Creative Loner” speech years ago. And no frat brother can deny that by legendarily dying from a combination of alcoholism and opium overdose, Poe might have just slipped by all previous Dartmouth records for unbelievable raginess.

But let’s be serious. Looters, murders, and rapists aside, I’ve never been one to believe that we can build character through an appeal to universal love. Or an appeal to all that is good and true. Instead, I’ve always believed that we build character through action. If I follow Jesus, I might meet some pretty cool kids in X.Ado or the Navigators, and my social awareness of ‘evils’ might increase, but I have a feeling that Hanover and the rest of the world might just stay the same. My point is that we might be better served by following a small-town activist than the founder of the world’s most successful religion.

Take it from someone who sees the glass as constantly half-empty just so that it can be filled up: there’s a lot that’s messed up about Dartmouth. Recently, two of the school’s most famous professors, Jon Appleton, and Michael Gazzaniga, left for what I see as very legitimate reasons. In other news, the Wright administration has yet to propose to a coherent and consistent vision for the College’s future. And, perhaps even more insidiously, I still hear complaints from students that have been admitted and wish to attend Dartmouth, but are unable to afford the cost, post-financial-aid of a Dartmouth education.

My suggestion is fairly simple. We need to start here, start small, if we want to build an activist student body. That should have been the message Riner’s speech professed at convocation. I agree with Riner’s intentions, probably more than even Riner will realize. We are a damned smart group of people at Dartmouth.

But that just doesn’t cut it.

If we’re going to do the whole save-the-world-schtick by building some character, maybe we should start small. Maybe we should even start with the way some elements of the school are run. Then we might have some idea what good character entails. Then when the legions of embattled Dartmouth ragers enter the real world they might just arrive better equipped to help it. But I honestly think few people here are going to start building character or saving the world because they suddenly understand that Jesus died on the cross, “for us.”

Well, at least, I won’t.