[Tolik]

Thomas Sowell:

 ...Teachers are not supposed to correct black youngsters who speak "black English" and no one is supposed to be judgmental about the whole lifestyle of black rednecks. In that culture, belligerence is considered being manly and crudity is considered cool, while being civilized is regarded as "acting white."

 These are devastating, self-imposed handicaps that prevent many young ghetto blacks from getting a decent education or an opportunity to rise to higher levels.

 Multiculturalism today celebrates all cultures but it is the poor who ultimately pay the price of that celebration in stunted development, missed opportunities and blighted lives.

 No one today would dare to do what Northern missionaries did after the Civil War, set up schools for newly freed black children in the South with the explicit purpose of removing them from the redneck culture that was holding back both races there.

 A wholly disproportionate number of future black leaders and pioneers in many fields came out of the relatively few and small enclaves of Northern culture deliberately planted in the post-Civil War South. What they did worked and what the multiculturalists are doing today repeatedly fails.

 But results are no longer the test. The test is whether what you say makes you feel good as someone who is a "friend" of blacks. But friends like that can do more damage than enemies.

Nailed It!

This ping list is not author-specific for articles I'd like to share. Some for perfect moral clarity, some for provocative thoughts; or simply interesting articles I'd hate to miss myself. (I don't have to agree with the author 100% to feel the need to share an article.) I will try not to abuse the ping list and not to annoy you too much, but on some days there is more of good stuff that is worthy attention. I keep separate PING lists for my favorite authors Victor Davis Hanson, Lee Harris, David Warren, Orson Scott Card. You are welcome in or out, just freepmail me (and note which PING list you are talking about).

[Cornpone]

"But this way of talking was common centuries ago in those regions of Britain from which white Southerners came."

It would have been nice to know what part of Britain Mr. Sowell believes these cultural characteristics emerged. I can only imagine it must be Scotland as that was where my family and a significant number of those who settled North and South Carolina came from.

[GodBlessRonaldReagan]

I'm not a redneck, I'm an Appalachian-American.

[cyborg]

I get asked a lot where I'm from. Even after I tell people, people still ask (esp. black people) what are you? A label can mean a lot to people, a label can also doom a person. As soon as you figure out your identity someone else will come along to challenge it. I've lived around black folks a while and while it's good to know where you're from, I see a lot of people limiting themselves based on what they THINK black people are/should do.

[Jeffery T.]

Very Aldus Huxleyian. Seems blacks--Epsilon Minus-- are invariably nurtured to belong to the bottom rung of society by lack of proper upbringing, education and general awareness of the world around them. Only thing I really have to say about this article is that where does black responsibility come in in raising blacks and breaking the cycle of degredation that they find themselves. I tired of blacks blaming white southerners, northern liberals, the Republican party and other "nerfarious" conspiratorial groups for their shortcomings. I say assign blame where it belongs if necessary, but also see your role in your own degredation.

[Mercat]

I've been working on my family history for several years now. I know that most of my ancestors were from England. They came over in the 17th century and settled in Virginia. Most of them then moved to Kentucky, then Missouri and some of them to Texas. At each stage they acquired more education and gradually went from being dirt farmers to preachers, wage earners, etc. To my knowledge, my mother is the first woman in her family to have a college degree and I'm the first to have an advanced degree.

[Cornpone]

Ping...

[Drawsing]

Black Rednecks

I use the term "trash". There are white trash and black trash cultures. They are both characterized by high crime, absent fathers...and loud TVs blaring 24/7.

[BJClinton]

Bump for later purchase of book.

[untenured]

I don't know if it makes its way into the book, but a scholar at Yale claimed several years ago that there are great similarities between gospel and Ulster-Scots hymns. The Scotsman had a report on it here.

This whole concept of cultural exchange and persistence is fascinating.

[Zionist Conspirator]

Bravo! The whole point is that white liberals praise and excuse in Blacks what they stridently and loudly condemn in poor whites. Is there a better formula for creating bitterness and jealousy than condemning one party for something and then turning right around and praising that same quality in another???

Violence, "pirate English" ("I be"), emotional Fundamentalist religion (nothing wrong with that, btw!), dysfunctional families, and whacked out Birch Society-type conspiracy theories ("Jewish doctors invented AIDS!") are all considered "revolutionary" and "leftist" among Blacks while being labelled the exact opposite among poor whites.

Blacks and poor Southern whites are two people divided by a single culture.

[Unknown Freeper]

bump for later

[OKIEDOC]

I guess all the liberal hypocrites are doing flip flops over this article. I can see them now doing the John Kerry fish flop while ringing their hands and shouting indecent obscenities.


I like the way Thomas Sowell writes. However, he will surely be branded by left wing hand wringers such as Sharpton, Jackson, Farakan, Shabazz, Rangel, Congressional Black Caucus, NAACP and other Black RACISTS as being hokey.

[sandydipper]

How about "I'm fitten to go!" or "Who dat" or "wha cha wan".

IMO your verbage has more to do with education that your heritage.

[Xenalyte]

Saying "acrost" for "across" or "ax" for "ask" are today considered to be part of black English.

As much as I love the man, Dr. Sowell is dead wrong here.

There IS no such animal as "black English."

The only kinds of English are standard and incorrect. Some of my students chose to disregard this fact, and their paper grades showed it.

Oddly enough, every single one of 'em began writing more or less correctly after only one failed paper.

[freedumb2003]

ping

[jordan8]

Who's to blame for black behavior? Why those nasty white southerners, of course. Utter nonsense, bigoted scapegoating of people on the officially approved target list.

[Lorianne]

There was a movie about the roots of Appalachian gospel and folk music from England/Scotland/Wales

Songcatcher
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0210299/