.... one of these things just doesn't belong.
1. In her best-seller, "Mugged," Ann Coulter presents the idea that it was/is the "help" of Liberals that has decelerated the advances that blacks have made in society. She compares blacks to other groups, not subject to said "help," and shows how blacks have suffered from this "help."
a. " It was the misfortune of black Americans that they were just on the verge of passing through the immigrant experience when damaging ideas about welfare and the lenient attitude about crime took hold. It could have happened to the Italians, Germans, Jews or Irish, but luckily for them, there were no Liberals around to help when they arrived." Coulter, "Mugged," chapter 7.
2. In "Intellectuals and Race," Dr. Thomas Sowell retraces that idea, using the term 'intellectuals' instead of Liberals.
"Whether in Europe, Asia, Africa, or the Western Hemisphere, a common pattern among intellectuals has been to seek, or demand, equality of results without equality of causes- or on sheer presumption of equality of causes. [They] have often discussed statistical differences in incomes and other outcomes as "disparities" and "inequities" that need to be "corrected," as if they were discussing abstract people in a an abstract world. The corrections being urged are seldom corrections within the lagging groups....".
a. "...intelligentsia have demanded an equality of outcomes and of social recognition, irrespective of the skills, behavior, or performance of the group to which they belong, or on whose behalf they spoke....and any claim that intergroup differences in outcomes are results of differences in skills, behavior, or performance are dismissed as false "perceptions," or "prejudices," or "stereotypes," or else are condemned as "blaming the victim."
b. "Seldom are any of these assertion backed up by empirical evidence or logical analysis that would make them anything more than arbitrary assertions that happen to be in vogue among contemporary intellectual elites."
3. An international study of ethnic conflicts found that "The very elites who were thought to be leading their peoples away from ethnic affiliations were commonly found to be in the forefront of ethnic conflict."
Horowitz, "Ethnic Groups in Conflict," p. 97.
a. An example?
"Obama: 'Trayvon Martin could have been me'"
Obama: 'Trayvon Martin could have been me' - CNN.com
This intentional adding of fuel to the fire is not the mark of a smart man....nor of a good man.
4. There are examples of societies in which self-improvement has occurred....but by other means rather than blaming the more socially advanced. In 19th century Japan, and in 18th century Scotland,- counties that set out to change themselves, rather than to blame others- they concentrated on building tangible skills, such as engineering and medicine in the case of Scotland, and science and technology in the case of Japan.
a. Of course, in the 20th century, a whole generation of future Third World leaders went to study in the West, and, rather than concentrating on the science, technology, and entrepreneurship that produced the prosperity of the West, they made the mistake of focusing on the social theories and ideologies that happened to be in vogue among the Western intellectuals in academia and elsewhere.
The result? Economic stagnation and worse: the polarizations that turned group against group, often with lethal effect.
5. Bad enough then the intellectuals control academia, but worst case is when they become armed with the power of government. Now, they set about "correcting" historic and contemporary 'social injustice" through misguided preferential hiring and allowances that seem to favor producing inequality as a step toward some hypothetical 'equality.'
a. In the 1920's, Bohemia saw the events writ large, in the relationship between resident Germans and Czechs. The Germans were more advanced in every way, e.g., literacy, and the Czech government sought to 'level the playing field:" preferential hiring in the civil service, moved capital from German banks to Czech banks, broke up German estates to benefit the Czech peasantry. Protests led to Czech soldiers shooting over 50 Germans, escalating the polarization.
"The Transfer of the Sudeten Germans: A Study of Czech-German Relations, 1933-1962," Radomir Luza, p. 39.
The fault lies with government, and the folks who love government solutions.
They never learned "The road to hell is paved with good intentions."
Saint Bernard of Clairvaux (1091-1153)
1. In her best-seller, "Mugged," Ann Coulter presents the idea that it was/is the "help" of Liberals that has decelerated the advances that blacks have made in society. She compares blacks to other groups, not subject to said "help," and shows how blacks have suffered from this "help."
a. " It was the misfortune of black Americans that they were just on the verge of passing through the immigrant experience when damaging ideas about welfare and the lenient attitude about crime took hold. It could have happened to the Italians, Germans, Jews or Irish, but luckily for them, there were no Liberals around to help when they arrived." Coulter, "Mugged," chapter 7.
2. In "Intellectuals and Race," Dr. Thomas Sowell retraces that idea, using the term 'intellectuals' instead of Liberals.
"Whether in Europe, Asia, Africa, or the Western Hemisphere, a common pattern among intellectuals has been to seek, or demand, equality of results without equality of causes- or on sheer presumption of equality of causes. [They] have often discussed statistical differences in incomes and other outcomes as "disparities" and "inequities" that need to be "corrected," as if they were discussing abstract people in a an abstract world. The corrections being urged are seldom corrections within the lagging groups....".
a. "...intelligentsia have demanded an equality of outcomes and of social recognition, irrespective of the skills, behavior, or performance of the group to which they belong, or on whose behalf they spoke....and any claim that intergroup differences in outcomes are results of differences in skills, behavior, or performance are dismissed as false "perceptions," or "prejudices," or "stereotypes," or else are condemned as "blaming the victim."
b. "Seldom are any of these assertion backed up by empirical evidence or logical analysis that would make them anything more than arbitrary assertions that happen to be in vogue among contemporary intellectual elites."
3. An international study of ethnic conflicts found that "The very elites who were thought to be leading their peoples away from ethnic affiliations were commonly found to be in the forefront of ethnic conflict."
Horowitz, "Ethnic Groups in Conflict," p. 97.
a. An example?
"Obama: 'Trayvon Martin could have been me'"
Obama: 'Trayvon Martin could have been me' - CNN.com
This intentional adding of fuel to the fire is not the mark of a smart man....nor of a good man.
4. There are examples of societies in which self-improvement has occurred....but by other means rather than blaming the more socially advanced. In 19th century Japan, and in 18th century Scotland,- counties that set out to change themselves, rather than to blame others- they concentrated on building tangible skills, such as engineering and medicine in the case of Scotland, and science and technology in the case of Japan.
a. Of course, in the 20th century, a whole generation of future Third World leaders went to study in the West, and, rather than concentrating on the science, technology, and entrepreneurship that produced the prosperity of the West, they made the mistake of focusing on the social theories and ideologies that happened to be in vogue among the Western intellectuals in academia and elsewhere.
The result? Economic stagnation and worse: the polarizations that turned group against group, often with lethal effect.
5. Bad enough then the intellectuals control academia, but worst case is when they become armed with the power of government. Now, they set about "correcting" historic and contemporary 'social injustice" through misguided preferential hiring and allowances that seem to favor producing inequality as a step toward some hypothetical 'equality.'
a. In the 1920's, Bohemia saw the events writ large, in the relationship between resident Germans and Czechs. The Germans were more advanced in every way, e.g., literacy, and the Czech government sought to 'level the playing field:" preferential hiring in the civil service, moved capital from German banks to Czech banks, broke up German estates to benefit the Czech peasantry. Protests led to Czech soldiers shooting over 50 Germans, escalating the polarization.
"The Transfer of the Sudeten Germans: A Study of Czech-German Relations, 1933-1962," Radomir Luza, p. 39.
The fault lies with government, and the folks who love government solutions.
They never learned "The road to hell is paved with good intentions."
Saint Bernard of Clairvaux (1091-1153)
