I know that this Blog is starting to look like a collection of book reviews, but I cannot resist sharing some of the things that I have found. If you want to know about ALL of the books I am reading, drop me a note. I keep a running list and notes on what I think about them. I have found that essential because I occasionally read the same book twice! Old Age I guess. My wife says that she can determine how close a friend you are if you tell her how many books I have suggested that you read.
I have been listening to a few podcasts by Sam Harris. He is a very bright guy, and he is interested in many things that strike me as of immense importance in this day and age. This one is an interview with Coleman Hughes, author of The End of Race Politics: Arguments for a Colorblind America. I found the book very insightful. It also totally changed my view of a couple of other books that I have read. You should be aware that the author is black, since that just might affect how you think about these comments - although it should not - and that is the VERY point he wants to make.
If you are of an oral learning sort, you might want to just listen to the podcast.
This is the fee-based version.
https://www.samharris.org/podcasts/making-sense-episodes/353-race-reason
You can listen to a shorter free version here:
https://youtu.be/xQJq9nVSa4E?si=NWUpMH6QDG6Hwfvq
I highly recommend that. But, if you insist, here’s a few more words.
Neo-Racism
This book was significant for me because I almost went down the rabbit hole of “neo-racism” that he is describing. I read a fine book by Ibram X. Kendi, How to Be an Antiracist. I enjoyed the book. I think of myself as an AntiRacist. Kendi tells it in a kind of autobiographical story of how he overcame his own racism about his heritage. I empathized with his plight and made the journey with him.
But he ends up in a framework that actually advocates a new form of racism. The root idea is that our society and culture have racism as a systemic problem. To overcome this we need to take a more active role in suppressing “white power”- creating a whole new form of racism. This approach declares that all whites have inherent racial power, that they are evil, racist, and need to be cordoned off somehow because of their power over blacks. Blacks suffer “microaggressions” when questioned by Whites. Blacks need safe areas where they can avoid Whites. Whites that express concerns or tears about being charged as racists are imposing pain on their Black brethren - etc.
As noted by many others, these are the “trigger” words: “Critical Race Theory,” “White fragility,” “White Supremacy,” and “Systemic Racism.” Prior to reading the book, I thought that these were a bit over the top, but not dangerous. The author changed my mind, as this neo-racism seems to have had considerable inroads in the elite universities on both coasts. Some of the “diversity” programs in these institutions have been co-opted by these folk.
Our Family
One practice recommended by this movement is to separate grade school kids by race, and then have them discuss their power or lack thereof as a race. That sounds like a terrible idea. We raised children of mixed racial backgrounds, and when they were growing up, we NEVER talked about race. If someone approached them with a racial bias, we wanted them to think , “What is wrong with that person?” We had a few black friends, and friends with similar multi-racial families, and many Asian friends.
As they got older, we sometimes thought that we should have alerted them just a bit to the racism they might encounter - but it worked out. Once, my daughter was followed around a drug store by some idiot. She presented herself at the checkout and delivered her items, saying: “I was going to buy all of these, but since this idiot has been following me, I decided not to. Ask him to put them back where they belong.” My other daughter was hired by a firm to be a test case for discrimination. She would apply for an apartment, or shop for a new car. They would send in a young white girl with a similar background and credit history, and then my daughter. When I heard what she had to put up with, I wanted to pay a personal visit to those firms. The good thing is that the firms were actually paying for this research, and I am hopeful they took advantage of it.
On another occasion my daughter applied for a job at a local very well known coffee shop. She was told they were not hiring. Her good friend went the very same day and they gave her an application. It DOES still happen. I called the ACLU and they said that the problem was too widespread for them to do anything with a single case.
Color Blindness
The author advocates “color blindness.” We think our kids may actually operate this way intuitively since they were raised in a multiracial family and exposed to several others among our friends! Once when their grandfather was talking with them about our friend’s family, he asked them about their two boys. They had two sons - John and David. He asked them which one was which. The kids all chimed in - David is a bit larger and has curly hair, John is thinner and has straight hair - and things like that. In fact, the first thing that came to my mind was that John was Vietnamese and David was black - but they did not go there.
On another occasion, when four of our kids were all in high school, they came home and announced that our daughter had a “new boyfriend.” We knew that she had been dating a nice kid from a different school - and he happened to be white. The kids said, you would like him dad. He plays basketball and is from Chicago. I asked what his name was - they said “Calvin.” I can let you guess what went through my mind. They did not offer his racial heritage, and I would be damned if I would ask them.
I know I am not colorblind in any sense of the word. I see race and cultural differences ALL the time. I can FEEL my insides reacting to the race of everyone I meet, but I do my damndest to not ACT on that feeling - positive or negative! Skin color should be like hair color - interesting but not that important.
I am going to stop with that. The author does a much better job of explaining this than I can.
Some Quotes from the book
Page 35
The animating feeling behind this neo racism. Is that people of color or morally superior to white people – that people of color are better at being good people. That’s at the core. The truth, which should be obvious, is that no race is morally superior to any other.
Page 59 ff.
Many of our most celebrated anti-racist heroes believed reverse racism was real and was a cause for concern. Dr. King, for instance, said that "black supremacy would be equally evil as white supremacy," and that the cry “black power,” whether they mean it or not, falls on the ear as racism in reverse. Roy Wilkins, the executive director of the NAACP, was even more critical. He called the Black Power movement, "a reverse Mississippi, a reverse Hitler, a reverse Ku Klux Klan."
Think about how this principle applies in a domain like professional sports. Is anyone suspicious about 75 percent of NBA players being black? Does anyone accuse the NBA recruitment system of anti-white racism? No. Most people feel confident that the system is not racist. They feel confident that the system is broadly meritocratic. If it turns out that most of the best players are black, then so be it. People become suspicious of the results only when they suspect that there's unfairness in producing those results.
Imagine that we instituted a "racial equity" policy in the NBA, whereby the NBA had to be 13 percent black. We could achieve the racial equity for which people like Kendi advocate, but we would clearly have to discriminate against individual black players to get there. Racist processes can produce equal outcomes, and colorblind processes can produce unequal outcomes. In other words, there is a perfect dissociation between the fairness of a process and the equality of the result. So if you're going to accuse a system of being unfair, it's not enough simply to look at the outcomes. You need to look at the process that produced them.
You really should read the book. I will stop here and let you do that.
Thanks, as always. And remember, we are all in this together, and I’m pulling for you (Red Green)
