Yale Daily News

This was a silly editorial. Yale stole these artifacts -- that has become clear. Anything short of immediate return of total ownership is pathetic. "The ball is in Peru's court"?

If I go to your dorm room and steal your tv, is the ball ever in your court to negotiate its partial release on weekends?

Stay focused young Yalies, don't go all blue in the head. It does not matter where in the process this dispute is, Yale is wrong and disgustingly so.

That Levin has played along with this is a black mark on his presidency. That the YDN writes an editorial like this one makes one think that your journalistic future is confined to Fox News where you will be able to skew even the most obvious failures in favor of the home team.

I have written simply (not confusing you with legalistic international law issues) because sometimes Yalies get an overwhelming sense of self-importance. Yale stole something, and apparently believes it is okay because the people it stole from are poorer, darker, and less powerful. (Honestly, has it made a single argument that does not fit within this paradigm?)

While law is seldom on the side of such people, in this case it clearly is. American journalism, on the other hand, has a proud history of being on such people's sides, though in this case your editorial is not.

Don't get confused because time has passed. The central issue is the same -- Yale stole these items.

With this editorial, your paper perfectly illustrates the superior--and yes, colonial--attitude that Karp-Toledo argues Yale has been acting in.

When one party continues to recognize the right of another to possess the artifacts that were taken from its nation, the onus can only be upon that party to act. It is up to Yale to correct this injustice.

I agree with the previous comment. Yale Daily News's editorial is completely biased. As a respectable institution Yale should clean up its act and return the stolen artifacts immediately. Why insist on keeping something that irrefutably does not belong to Yale? That is not honorable and does not speak well of the institution. Yale should be taking all the steps necessary, and showing good will, to remove this stain from its history and the YDN's should not be spinning the facts to mislead its readers. This is not a big political issue that moves masses and wins elections in Peru, as YDN's recent articles intend to portray. If you inherit stolen property, the ethical course of action is to return the items. You should not be negotiating which items you get to keep, putting conditions to a partial return, and then claiming the ball is on the other guy's court.

The editorial does not seem to reflect an attitude of superiority. The fact is that Yale simply won't return the artifacts. They haven't for nearly a century, yet the agreement more or less achieves the same thing. There are lots of shades of gray here, and the editorial seems to balance all of them well-pragmatism, morality and self-interested dissent.

I'm confused about how you can be covering this as a news story (almost every week) and also have an editorial opinion about the matter...

@Trumbull '08: News and editorials are supposed to be separate departments of the paper. The YDN makes a lot of mistakes, but I'm going to hope that this is how it's actually structured and that articles are not edited to reflect a bias.

That said, this piece was really poorly done, especially bringing in the Olympics reference at the end out of absolutely nowhere.

These artifacts belong to Peru, period. If we had a contract in the first place, it's expired. We've studied them, etc. Why do they need to be here anymore? The people of Peru need them back in their land. It's part of their heritage!

YALE STOLE THE ITEMS FROM THE PERUVIAN PEOPLE. WHICH IS WHAT THE FIRST WORLD COUNTRIES HAVE DONE FOR THE PAST SEVERAL HUNDRED YEARS. SUCH PEOPLE WHO AS THOSE ATTEND OR ARE PART OF SUCH INSTITUTIONS AS YALE, FOLLOW ONLY ONE CREED, I HAVE THE BIGGEST MILITARY, SO I CAN GO ANY PLACE I WISH, AND TAKE WHATEVER I WANT. THEN I MAKE THE LAWS, SO IT IS LEGAL. THEN THEY SIT IN THE FRONT ROW OF THEIR CHURCH ON SUDAY MORNING AND FEEL SO RIGHTOUS, WHILE THEIR ECONOMIC SLAVES TOIL AWAY FOR MEAGER WAGES.

YALE SHOULD NOT ONLY RETURN THE ITEMS TAKEN, BUT BUILD A NEW BUILDING AT MACHU PICCHU TO DISPALY THE ITEMS, FOR ALL TO ENJOY.

AS MY WIFE SAID TO ME ONE DAY,(SHE IS A REAL PERUVIAN LADY). THEY CAME AND TOOK EVERYTHING FROM US( THE SPANISH), THEY TOOK EVERYTHING, THEY LEFT US WITH NOTHING. THEY TOOK OUR LANDS,OUR RELIGION, FORCED OUR CHILDREN TO SPEAK THIER LANGUAGE. HOW CAN SUCH PEOPLE LIVE WITHOUT A HEART?

YALE, GIVE THEM BACK THIER STUFF!!

@RM: Yale should give back the artifacts, but putting a modern building at Macchu Picchu would a worse offense to Incan culture than the artifacts' initial robbery.