Black Scholars and Spokespersons: Admirable Views on Racism

By Dom Nozzi

The following is my list of black scholars and spokespersons who have heroically taken what I am thoroughly convinced are essential views in the quest to improve problems that continue to be experienced in much of the American black culture.

Tellingly, these people are considered exceptionally “politically incorrect” by those people – who I will hear call the social justice fundamentalists — that have been pushing the “victimhood,” “oppression” and “racism” agenda in America since the 1960s. These fundamentalist zealots – the self-proclaimed enlightened activists – have ironically pushed an ideology that has created severe obstacles to the extremely important need to reduce problems that continue to be experienced in much of the American black community. These activists are also known as “Woke,” “Race Hustlers,” “Black Lives Matter” activists, or “Antifa.”

I am gratified to know that there is a growing number of blacks who are escaping from this highly counterproductive ideology and are instead promoting highly beneficial ideas about how the American black culture can advance.

For most on the authoritarian political left, blaming the dysfunctional aspects of American black culture for ongoing black problems is intolerable and considered “racist.” The cult-like zombies of the authoritarian left insist that problems in the black community can only be blamed on blacks being victimized by racism. See this blog I wrote which describes how I distinguish between the “authoritarian political left” and my own (sometimes political Left) views.

There has developed a significant difference of opinion on how to address problems faced by black Americans. Equality of opportunity is, as Martin Luther King pointed out, an essential part of an equitable, civilized, healthy society. Tragically, MLKs objective has been distorted by well-meaning people to include equality of outcome, which is, I and many others believe, ruinous for society.

It should be self-evident that a larger number of black people are far more likely to succeed in the future if they take more personal responsibility for failures instead of engaging in knee-jerk victimhood (in this case, by blaming racism for individual failures).

When we blame racism and thereby engage in unfair affirmative action or diversity programs that preference skin color (or gender) over competence, we inevitably, understandably, and appropriately increase the amount of resentment felt by whites (and those who are successful or meritorious). I believe when individuals in the black community blame racism less and take more personal responsibility for failures, we will ratchet down the ongoing resentment we are seeing in “white supremacy” groups.

Racism, it must be noted, seems very hard to find since the 1960s, unless we stretch the definition of racism to include classism.

I question classism as a valid way to identify racism.

Ironically, the biggest obstacles to black family advancement, less racial animosity, less violence, and less poverty are the policies and ideas of many black activists and many authoritarian progressives since the 1960s – policies and beliefs that unfortunately remain very much in place today.

An important downside to victimhood, of course, is that many individuals raised within the black culture (and many liberals defending anti-social black behaviors) too often fail to take personal responsibility for failure. Instead, many lazily blame their upbringing or perceived “racism.” We are told that it had nothing to do with not taking schooling seriously, or messing around with drugs or teen sex or petty crimes or promoting “gangsta” rap.

In addition to these problem-inducing characteristics, I agree with many that much of the black culture does not do well in cultivating stable parenting. These traits will predictably lead to a future of adult dysfunction, poverty, and crime. Many blacks and their authoritarian progressive enablers too often excuse the black failures and black crimes by blaming racism – failures and crimes that are inevitable, given the many dysfunctional cultural tendencies of the black community and its enablers. Too rarely do blacks and authoritarian progressive activists call for personal responsibility and reform of the other counterproductive cultural tactics I mention above. Too many black children grow up in single-parent households and this goes a long way toward explaining why young black males are 6 percent of the population yet commit about 50 percent of all violent crimes. It also helps describe school and career problems that many blacks continue to experience.

There is strong evidence this is a cultural problem rather than a problem of “systemic” or “institutional” racism. Consider this: recent black immigrants tend to show success rates far higher than those in black communities where families have lived in America for a considerable period of time. One commentator (Coleman Hughes) notes, for example, an instance in New York City, where two black neighborhoods adjacent to each other showed drastically different rates of success. One a neighborhood of American blacks and another adjacent neighborhood consisting of Jamaican blacks. The latter neighborhood showed far higher rates of success. Since both neighborhoods are black, it seems absurd to claim that the less successful neighborhood was failing due to skin color.

In sum, the problem (as the many black intellectuals I list below repeatedly proclaim) is not racism. It is a cultural and family problem. Similarly, the remedy for alleged discrimination against blacks (or women) is not to discriminate against white males (via affirmative action, diversity programs, etc.). Two wrongs do not make a right. Unfairly preferencing based on skin color or gender has made problems worse over the past 60 years, and has given rise to a great many people now supporting populists such as Trump for president.

Let’s follow MLK: Equal opportunity. Not equal outcome. The latter is ruinous. Equality of outcome is the end of fairness. The end of fairness (i.e., rewarding people via the “identity politics” of skin color or gender, rather than merit) inevitably leads to the end of civility, bitter resentment, the rise of right-wing reactionary politics, and violence. It is an ends-justify-the-means game that has been played by several cruel, genocidal, societies engaged in secular religions such as communism. A game in which cruelty and unfairness are justified to achieve an envisioned “paradise” where, it is claimed by its fundamentalist advocates, no one is oppressed or discriminated against.

Equality of outcome is an idea that wrongly believes that unequal representation of women or blacks is a sure sign of discrimination. It is a belief that unequal outcome must be rectified by including more women and blacks regardless of competency.

This extreme and ruinous unfairness must be ended.

Not ending well-meaning but counterproductive equality of outcome programs is certain to result in more voters voting for populists such as Donald Trump, and supporting white supremacy groups, in the future.

Equality of outcome perpetuates the idea that blacks are inferior.

Equality of outcome perpetuates the problem of too many young black males engaging in a disproportionately large number of violent crimes.

I for one do not want to perpetuate this with equal outcome programs. Or perpetuate the problem by wrongly assuming that the problem is “systemic racism.”

Affirmative action, “diversity” campaigns, and giving preference to minorities not based on merit but based only on skin color or gender is patently unfair and inevitably leads to backlash. A lot of white males are not stupid. They are sick of decades of unfair treatment in the name of “racial justice” or “discrimination against women.”

The only time this nation will see a reduction in anger coming from white males is when everyone is treated equally. We cannot continue to give blacks (or women) an unfair preference to correct historical discrimination.

Since when is it okay to discriminate because the person we discriminate against is a white male?

My List of Admirable Black (and a Few White) Scholars and Spokespersons

John McWhorter

Black scholar John McWhorter is an American academic and associate professor of English and comparative literature at Columbia University, where he teaches linguistics, American studies, philosophy, and music history. He is the author of a number of books on language and on race relations, and his writing has appeared in many prominent magazines. His research specializes in how creole languages form, and how language grammars change as the result of socio-historical phenomena.

McWhorter argues that anti-intellectualism, separatism, and victimhood are strongly embedded within the American black culture since the 1960s. But anyone these days who dares to suggest that these dysfunctional traits of the American black culture are holding back black advance, as McWhorter and many other scholars suggest, is vigorously attacked by the Social Justice Left, antifa, many blacks fighting racism, “wokesters,” Black Lives Matter (BLM) activists – all of whom I call “authoritarian progressives.”

John McWhorter on the question “Has Anti-Racism Become as Harmful as Racism? (and why anti-racism has become a religion)”

Coleman Hughes

Coleman Hughes is an opinion columnist on issues related to race and racism at the online magazine Quillette, a fellow and contributing editor at City Journal, and host of the podcast Conversations with Coleman. He is a graduate of Newark Academy. Hughes is of African American and Puerto Rican descent, and grew up in Montclair, New Jersey. He graduated from Columbia University in 2020 with a B.A. in philosophy.

Hughes on the non-existence of systemic racism

Hughes on why the political left is wrong on racism

Hughes on the empirical problems with systemic racism

Candace Owens

Candace Owens is an American conservative author, commentator, and political activist. While a 17-year-old senior in high school, Owens said she received three racist death threat voicemail messages.

Candace Owens on What Does Black America Want?

Candace Owens

On the meaninglessness of gender studies and failure of education

Anthony Brian Logan

Anthony Brian Logan grew up in Virginia. After college, he started his own business as a graphics designer for goods such as posters, business cards and T-Shirts. He regularly posts commentary on YouTube, and calls himself a “Common Sense Conservative.”

Anthony Brian Logan on how BLM and “critical race theory” perpetuates racism and should be abolished.

Anthony Brian Logan on whyI’m done with empathy for the Floyd protestors

Dr. Carol Swain

Dr. Carol Swain is an award-winning political scientist, and a former professor of political science and professor of law at Vanderbilt University. Before joining Vanderbilt in 1999, Dr. Swain was a tenured associate professor of politics and public policy at Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs.

Dr. Carol Swain on why BLM is Marxism and does not care about blacks

Jason Riley

Jason Riley is an American journalist and pundit. He is a member of The Wall Street Journal editorial board. Riley is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and has appeared on the Journal Editorial Report, other Fox News programs and C-SPAN.

Jason Riley asks liberals to please stop helping us. How liberals make it harder for blacks to succeed

Jason Riley on the destruction of college education by the political left (the loss of diversity of ideas and loss of skepticism)

Josephine Mathias

Josephine Mathias is a content creator on Youtube. She is a freelance columnist and video commentator at National Post.

Josephine Mathias on the truth about political leftists and the black community

Larry Elder

Larry Elder is an American conservative talk radio host, author, attorney, and documentary filmmaker who hosts The Larry Elder Show. Elder has also written nonfiction books and a nationally syndicated column through Creators Syndicate. An honors student who also took advanced courses at Fairfax High School, Elder graduated from Crenshaw High School in 1970 and earned his B.A. in political science in 1974 from Brown University. He then earned his J.D. from University of Michigan Law School in 1977:

Uncle Tom movie trailer with Larry Elder

Larry Elder on the myth of racism

Larry Elder on the myth of racism regarding law enforcement and whether any real, institutional racism still exists in the US (starting at 8:00)

Larry Elder on “systemic racism” and how the “police brutality” narrative is getting people killed

Larry Elder on research showing BLM claims that blacks are disprortionately killed by cops is false: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VM-hsLpMqHY

Denzel Washington

A black American actor, director, and producer. Known for his performances on the screen and stage.

Brandon Tatum

Brandon (“Officer”) Tatum is a former Tucson Police Officer and current host of The Brandon Tatum show on KTAR 92.3. He has become one of the most prolific speakers and exciting personalities on social media after making a Facebook Video that got over 70 million views. Tatum has a following of over one million people spread across various social media platforms. He has been featured on Fox Business, Fox & Friends, Headline News, One America News, Revolt TV to name a few. Tatum has been invited by The President of The United States, President Donald Trump to the White House on several occasions.

Brandon Tatum on “enough with the anti-white rhetoric”

David Webb

David Webb is the host of the David Webb show. He is the October 2015 recipient of the National Police Defense Foundation’s Excellence in Media Award. In January 2015, he debated at the Oxford Union defending against the proposition that America is institutionally racist. In 2012, he appeared in the documentary District of Corruption. In 2012, he appeared in the documentary Runaway Slave. In December 2011, he was selected as a Time Magazine Person of the Year ~ “The Protester,” representing the tea party movement. In November 2010, he was listed in About.com’s Satellite Radio’s New School of Conservative Talk Stars. In September 2010, he was named to the Newsweek Inside The Tea Party Top 10:

David Webb on why the US is not institutionally racist

Shelby Steele

Shelby Steele is an American conservative author, columnist, documentary film maker, and a Robert J. and Marion E. Oster Senior Fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution. He specializes in the study of race relations, multiculturalism, and affirmative action. In 1990, he received the National Book Critics Circle Award in the general nonfiction category for his book The Content of Our Character.

Shelby Steele on white guilt and the identity of innocence

Burgess Owens

Burgess Owens is a former NFL football player and candidate for Congress. These comments address racism in the NFL, failing black schools and the dying black middle class. Burgess Owens discusses how liberal and socialist ideas have infected the black education system for decades. These failing schools teach kids to hate free markets, the main factor in creating the wealth and prosperity that Americans have enjoyed. Teaching kids to hate free markets has resulted in low levels of entrepreneurship in the black community. The lower numbers of black businesses leads to a collapsing black middle class. Burgess shares what the black community needs to do to reverse this, support black business, and rebuild the black middle class.

Burgess Owens on how politically left policies are destroying the black middle class

Glenn Loury

Glenn Loury is an American economist, academic, and author. In 1982, at the age of 33, he became the first black tenured professor of economics in the history of Harvard University. He is the Merton P. Stoltz Professor of the Social Sciences and Professor of Economics at Brown University.

Glenn Loury on how “We’re Being Swept Along by Hysteria” About Racism in America

Jason Riley, Coleman Hughes, Rafael Mangual, Jamil Jivani

Race, Riots, and the Police

Leo Terrell

Leo Terrell is an American civil rights attorney and talk radio host based in Los Angeles. In a July 2020 interview, he declared his support for President Donald Trump—the first time he declared support for a Republican Party presidential candidate. Terrell graduated from Gardena High School of Harbor Gateway, Los Angeles in 1972 and California State University, Dominguez Hills in 1977 with a BA. Terrell taught high school history, geography and economics at Gage Middle School in Huntington Park, CA. He holds a master’s degree in education from Pepperdine University and holds a J.D. degree from the UCLA School of Law.

This is Leo Terrell on why he is “Shocked No Democratic Lawmaker is Standing Up To Criminals Rioting after the Floyd killing”

Jakhary Jackson

Jakhary Jackson is an Officer with the Portland Police Bureau. He offers his perspective as a black officer in the middle of downtown Portland’s nightly protests that occurred for several consecutive months recently.

Jakhary Jackson on what the Portland police were experiencing in the Portland riots

Thomas Sowell

Thomas Sowell is an American economist and social theorist who is currently a senior fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution. He attended night classes at Howard University, a historically black college. His high scores on the College Board exams and recommendations by two professors helped him gain admission to Harvard University, where he graduated magna cum laude in 1958 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in economics. He earned a Master’s degree from Columbia University the following year. Sowell has said that he was a Marxist “during the decade of my 20s;” accordingly, one of his earliest professional publications was a sympathetic examination of Marxist thought vs. Marxist–Leninist practice. However, his experience working as a federal government intern during the summer of 1960 caused him to reject Marxian economics in favor of free market economic theory. During his work, Sowell discovered an association between the rise of mandated minimum wages for workers in the sugar industry of Puerto Rico and the rise of unemployment in that industry. Studying the patterns led Sowell to theorize that the government employees who administered the minimum wage law cared more about their own jobs than the plight of the poor. Sowell received a Doctor of Philosophy degree in economics from the University of Chicago in 1968. His dissertation was titled “Say’s Law and the General Glut Controversy”. Sowell had initially chosen Columbia University to study under George Stigler, who would later receive the Nobel Prize in Economics. When he learned that Stigler had moved to the University of Chicago, he followed him there.

Thomas Sowell on “Three Questions for the Left, and the “Deregulation of Fannie and Freddie just before the 2007 Housing Bubble Crash”

Thomas Sowell on the myths of economic inequality

Thomas Sowell on how the political left wreaks havoc on blacks

The Stupidity of Apologizing for Slavery

Thomas Sowell on Diversity

Thomas Sowell on what fairness advocates get wrong

Thomas Sowell on the counterproductive nature of BLM and the welfare state

An excellent summary of Thomas Sowell’s views on how culture is a far more important explanation for poor black outcomes than racism

Thomas Sowell on the Current Black (redneck) Culture

Kimberly Klacik

Kimberly Klacik for Congress

Vernon Jones

Vernon Jones speaking at the RNC Convention in August 2020

Walter Williams

Walter Edward Williams (March 31, 1936 – December 1, 2020) was an American economist, commentator, and academic. Williams was the John M. Olin Distinguished Professor of Economics at George Mason University, as well as a syndicated columnist and author. Known for his classical liberal and libertarian views.

How much can we blame on slavery

A Tribute to Walter E Williams – Champion of Individual Liberty

John Deberry

John Deberry, a black state representative, speaking against violent protests in 2020 in Tennessee

Morgan Freeman

On “Black History Month”

If you don’t discriminate against white people, here are some politically incorrect views on racism from white scholars:

Jordan Peterson

Jordan Peterson is a Canadian clinical psychologist and a professor of psychology at the University of Toronto. Peterson entered the Grande Prairie Regional College to study political science and English literature. He later transferred to the University of Alberta, where he completed his B.A. in political science in 1982. Afterward, he took a year off to visit Europe, where he began studying the psychological origins of the Cold War; 20th-century European totalitarianism; and the works of Carl Jung, Friedrich Nietzsche, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, and Fyodor Dostoevsky. He then returned to the University of Alberta and received a B.A. in psychology in 1984. In 1985, he moved to Montreal to attend McGill University. He earned his Ph.D. in clinical psychology under the supervision of Robert O. Pihl in 1991, and remained as a post-doctoral fellow at McGill’s Douglas Hospital until June 1993, working with Pihl and Maurice Dongier.

Jordan Peterson on how and why postmodernism must be fought

Jordan Peterson on white privilege and safe spaces

Jordan Peterson on how “diversity” activists are far more racist and sexist in their thinking than those who do not demand “diversity.”

Jordan Peterson on how “oppression” explains all unequal outcomes in society. And the crucial importance of individual sovereignty vs group identity.

Gad Saad

Gad Saad is a Canadian evolutionary psychologist at the John Molson School of Business (Concordia University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada) who applies evolutionary psychology to marketing and consumer behavior. As of 2020, he holds the Concordia University Research Chair in Evolutionary Behavioral Sciences and Darwinian Consumption, writes a blog for Psychology Today titled Homo Consumericus, and hosts a YouTube show named The Saad Truth. He obtained a B.Sc. (Mathematics and Computer Science) and M.B.A. from McGill University, and an M.S. and Ph.D. from Cornell University. Saad’s doctoral adviser was the mathematical and cognitive psychologist and behavioral decision theorist Edward Russo.

Gad Saad on why the “cancel culture” is dangerous and anti-liberal

Sam Harris

Sam Harris is an American author, philosopher, neuroscientist, and podcast host. His work touches on a wide range of topics, including rationality, religion, ethics, free will, neuroscience, meditation, psychedelics, philosophy of mind, politics, terrorism, and artificial intelligence. Harris came to prominence for his criticism of religion, and Islam in particular, and is described as one of the “Four Horsemen of Atheism”, along with Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, and Daniel Dennett. His academic background is in philosophy and cognitive neuroscience. In 1997, at Stanford, he completed a B.A. degree in philosophy in 2000. Harris began writing his first book, The End of Faith, immediately after the September 11 attacks. He received a Ph.D. degree in cognitive neuroscience in 2009 from the University of California, Los Angeles, using functional magnetic resonance imaging to conduct research into the neural basis of belief, disbelief, and uncertainty. His thesis was titled The Moral Landscape: How Science Could Determine Human Values.

Sam Harris critiques Black Lives Matter

Heather Mac Donald

Heather Mac Donald is an American conservative political commentator, essayist and attorney. She is a Thomas W. Smith Fellow of the Manhattan Institute and a contributing editor of the institute’s City Journal. She has written numerous editorials and is the author of several books. She is an American conservative political commentator, essayist and attorney. She is a Thomas W. Smith Fellow of the Manhattan Institute and a contributing editor of the institute’s City Journal. She has written numerous editorials and is the author of several books.

Heather Mac Donald  on how the data proves that police are not racist

Heather Mac Donald on the Delusion of Diversity

Jonathan Haidt

Jonathan Haidt is an American social psychologist, Professor of Ethical Leadership at New York University Stern School of Business, and author. His main areas of study are the psychology of morality and moral emotions. Haidt’s main scientific contributions come from the psychological field of moral foundations theory, which attempts to explain the evolutionary origins of human moral reasoning on the basis of innate, gut feelings rather than logical reason. The theory was later extended to explain the different moral reasoning and how they relate to political ideology, with different political orientations prioritizing different sets of morals. The research served as a foundation for future books on various topics. Haidt has written three books for general audiences, including: The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding Modern Truth in Ancient Wisdom (2006), which explores the relationship between ancient philosophies and modern science; The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion (2012), which examines how morality is shaped by emotion and intuition more than by reasoning, and why differing political groups have different notions of right and wrong; and The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure (2018), co-written with Greg Lukianoff, which explores the rising political polarization and changing culture on college campuses, and its effects on mental health. Haidt has attracted both support and criticism for his critique of the current state of universities and his interpretation of progressive values. He has been named one of the “top global thinkers” by Foreign Policy magazine, and one of the “top world thinkers” by Prospect magazine. He is among the most cited researchers in political and moral psychology, and is considered among the top 25 most influential living psychologists.

Jonathan Haidt on the rise of victimhood

Jonathan Haidt on Social Justice Warriors – Extremism on Diversity Leads to Violent Intolerance. Arguing by smearing people with ad hominem attacks such as “privilege”

Gender, Race, Culture video (not Haidt, but a number who get it):

Charlie Kirk

The myth and racism of “white privilege.”

The argument against socialized medicine or universal health care.

Kara Dansky

A feminist attacks transgender concept and “gender identity” term.

Victor David Hanson

On the reason we should distinguish between legal and illegal immigrants.