John McWhorter:
https://johnmcwhorter.substack.com/p/so-there-was-a-law-professor-at-georgetown
Me:
Dear Professor McWhorter:
A few points on “So there was a law professor at Georgetown who was a racist.”
In what sense is Sellers’ private conversation with Batson “grimy”? She’s speaking colloquially and informally to a friend. And as I read her, it’s an agony or an anxiety for her that semester after semester her black students are overrepresented at the bottom of the class. And if she’s used an “unideal” word, “Blacks,” so what? It doesn’t hardly deserve a mention. I see no grime. I rather see a bit of a plain spoken cri de couer.
I can see how assigning racism as the cause of that overrepresentation “gets closer to sense.” But that is only to say that that proposition isn’t as off as is a lie—there is no such overrepresentation. I don’t see how citing racism gets any closer to sense than the idea that for her to have spoken so is rude.
Considering that Sellers was speaking privately with an expectation of privacy, to whom could she have conceivably been rude? This isn’t a reason you address. You instead focus on the rightness of being able to speak up about reality. But isn’t the privacy point closer to actuality and, so, more directly salient?
Similarly without sense, how can racism as a cause apply to underperforming students admitted to one of the most prestigious and demanding law schools in America? The very act of admission vouches the law school’s expectation that the admittees will succeed. The law school in principle will admit no one it expects to fail. Moreover, while some may claim and argue for it, the plain fact is that it’s preposterous to see the law school as a racist institution. So from where, how ever, can racism be offered as a reason why, generally, these black students do worse than other students?
Your point about noting black student overrepresentation at class bottoms that “Leaving it there is what makes statements like Sellers’ and Wax’s so repulsive to many, and this is understandable...” isn’t fully clear to me. Are you saying that it’s understandable that many will find what Sellers said repulsive because she didn’t say more, offer a solution? But If so, the contexts were qualitatively different for Wax and Sellers. Wax was in the midst of a public discussion with Glenn Loury. She had no expectation of privacy. (That said, I think it not at all understandable that many people would find what Wax said repulsive by reason of her not saying more. She was stating what she saw as a fact. What more was there for her necessarily to say? What solution could she conceivably have offered? What disavowals was it her duty to make? That she was expected obligatorily to say more is unreasonable.) Sellers, as noted, thought she was in the midst of a private conversation with a sympathetic colleague. So the notion that she needed to say more to save what she said from being seen by many as repulsive doubly makes no sense.
Finally, this is also unclear to me: “Note that what I am saying fully acknowledges the existence of systemic racism, and also points the way towards a better future for black people.” Either you’re saying, that you acknowledge the existence of systemic racism or you’re in effect saying by implication, “Even if I don’t acknowledge the existence of systemic racism, what I’m proposing can be read as acknowledging it exists; in other words, my proposal accommodates that characterization of America regardless of whether that’s so.” If it’s the first, then it seems to me at odds with your conversations with Glenn Loury on Bloggingheads. I stand to be corrected but it’s my firm impression you both disavow that way of seeing America.
Sincerely,
Itzik Basman
No comments:
Post a Comment