Well, all of these things could be measured although in some cases it might be difficult to set up control groups, etc.
What I’ve been saying is that despite the demonstrable truth of the things that Derb said it seems he went out of his way to say them as offensively as possible.
So, the message:
that whites fear, or should fear, associating with blacks
that this is for good reason and
that there isn’t much one can do about that except avoid black people as much as reasonably possible
is going to get lost in all the outrageous outrage that he had to know his article would provoke.
Many of the comments on the various threads here provide a contrast. Yours is a good example of how these same unfortunate facts (let’s just call them facts because I don’t think anyone who has lived in a mixed race city at least would dispute them regardless of any statistical proof that may be lacking at this time) can be stated in a less inflammatory way.
And, at the risk of repeating myself some of what he wrote was really just needless. The bit about no blacks winning the Fields Medal (only 50 people have ever won it!), the idea that you should seek out some high end black friends, even dragging your teenage children into such a rant in the first place, stuff like that takes away from whatever serious points you are trying to make.
If he was trying to be serious and not, you know, just seeking to get a rise out of people. Which he certainly did.
Rich Lowry fired him, but I’m pretty sure both his kids probably want to strangle him right now!
That’s what struck me first. He just made life very difficult for his kids. This story will live forever in cyberspace.
In his partial defense, he has written several times in recent weeks of his fight against cancer and the odd effects some of the drugs have had on him. IMO the drugs may very well have blurred his judgment of what was appropriate to say and what was needlessly offensive. His role on NRO has often been to get a rise out of people.
He isn’t really like that, most of the time. Although he’s become an atheist, he still shows respect for people who are believers, unlike so many.
He got into a major kerfuffle a few years back for stating that he finds male homosexuality disgusting and that most people have throughout human history. As with (most of) this screed, those are I think objective facts
Despite major disagreements, I generally enjoyed his articles. It’s all very sad.
BTW. Taki magazine, where this was published, leans towards racist and anti-semitic stuff, especially in the comments. There is a difference between facing reality squarely and true racism. John was still (mostly) on the realist side in this essay, but plenty of his readers at Taki had gone far beyond it.
As always, this will be used to try to tamp the recognition of reality back down for a while. But it will eventually escape. It always does.
Well, J, let me ask you this, all empirical tests set aside for a moment. Since you’re so objective, would you — who begged your daughter not to go to Mexico — advise her to go hang out in Harlem, with a group of her white friends, after the sun goes down? If she was inclined to do that, would you have any feelings about that whatsoever? Or are you just a tad afraid that as a white girl, she’d be slightly more prone to harassment than a black girl her age? Just askin’...