Brown University professor Glenn Loury is mad as hell and he’s not going to take it any more. What’s he mad about? The protestors and their running dogs who are calling for defunding the police. And that, he argues—probably correctly—has reduced the amount of policing, which is “costing black lives.” Further, he’s angry at Nikole Hannah-Jones for being proud that someone called the riots after the George Floyd killing “the 1619 riots.”
Here’s part of his recent Patreon discussion with John McWhorter (the whole discussion is behind a paywall but will soon be up for free) about the 1619 Project and its leader, the often-unhinged Nikole Hannah-Jones. McWhorter isn’t a fan of Hannah-Jones, either, but shows a little more empathy for her because he thinks that she really believes she’s changing America for the better and isn’t just engaged in moral preening. McWhorter recalls an incident from his youth, when he knocked down a ten-year-old girl and “broke her,” as leading to his reluctance to “break” Hannah-Jones.
My own view is that you don’t need to “break” any of your opponents (after all, that’s what Woke people do): just break their arguments. On another note, I can’t wait for McWhorter’s upcoming book on social-justice activism and DiAngelo-style anti-racism as forms of religion.
Here’s Loury, in another clip from the same show, really heated up about the death of black children in drive-by shootings, and how, he thinks, the media ignores that compared to the death of people like George Floyd.
John McWhorter and I at The Glenn Show getting down to cases re. reporting on urban violence: pic.twitter.com/1z1CQrn9hZ
— Glenn Loury (@GlennLoury) December 10, 2020
Apparently, Dr. Loury invited Ms. Nikole Hannah-Jones on his show and there is a twitter thread with her response. (I found this through Andrew Sullivan’s twitter feed, which is really good for capturing these kinds of back-and-forths.)
https://twitter.com/ZaidJilani/status/1337170925284958211/photo/1
Coleman Hughes has repeatedly invited Ibram X. Kendi to debate him, as well.
Holy sh1t, that Twitter thread is unbelievable! Hannah -Jones /Ida Bae Wells should hang her head in shame.
“McWhorter isn’t a fan of Hannah-Jones, either, but shows a little more empathy for her because he think that she really believes she’s changing America for the better and isn’tjust engaged in moral preening.”
Two typos here.
The professor has indicated that he prefers direct emails citing typos. That may be why only one of yours has been corrected as of the moment.
I’ve been following WEIT and commenting for some years, and I don’t need your condescending remonstrations. The Professor (whom some call Jerry, as I do at times, though I usually refer to him as PCC(E), (which surely isn’t deferential enough for you) may prefer to be contacted privately, and I do that sometimes. However, respondents frequently make corrections online, in case you haven’t noticed; but they’re male. Do you correct them in such a supercilious tone, or at all? Please provide citations. He’
Herr Professor Doctor Jerry has mucho cojones and doesn’t need a beard to defend his honor.
I think it is nice to provide typos by email for another reason. The mistakes get fixed with no trace of them left in the comments. Our host could delete the typo comments but that’s more work and seems disrespectful to the commenter.
Sure. I’ve no problem with that.
It’s the tone of the comment I object to, and though your comment is more temperate, I don’t need this sort of instruction unless both of you are prepared to chastise and issue this instruction to every person who, hereafter, publishes a correction as a comment on this site; and 99% (perhaps 99%44/100th%) of those are males. And I don’t consider that to be a captious tu tuque argument, rather it’s illuminating statement of fact, and a valid comparison.
Further, MK’s assumption is that I’m either ignorant or willfully heedless of this preference; yet neither of you know whether it’s my habit to send corrections directly to the source, or routinely make corrections online, and why. I’m not obliged to justify my actions to anyone but the proprietor of this site.
Jeeez! I didn’t think of it as chastising or giving instruction. It was simply a matter of offering opinions as we usually do in our comments to this website. Your skin is a bit thin here, IMHO. I certainly didn’t ask you to justify your actions, though with this latest reaction, I’m sorely tempted.
I’ve seen many in-thread comments noting typos, and Jerry’s most common response is “thanks – fixed”.
Edited to add: and I wrote that before reading Jerry’s response below!
Has he? I have frequently seen typo corrections in the comments and I have never seen him admonish anybody for doing so, unless the correction is worded in an uncivil way.
I’ve also just reread Da Roolz and if it’s in there, I can’t see it.
I believe he has said it but I couldn’t point you to it.
He did say, in his recent “Notes to Readers” post, “Of course, if I make errors, typos, or the like, you’re invited to email me immediately.” Pretty close to expressing the preference.
https://whyevolutionistrue.com/2020/10/30/notes-to-readers/
No, I think in the context, it was just stated as an exception to the “do not email me every day” guideline.
Yes, fixed, thanks.
I have enormous respect for McWhorter and I even had the privilege of meeting him and driving him around Salt Lake City when my wife, a librarian, was the organizer of a Dewey Decimal Lecture Series (one speaker for each “century” in the Dewey Decimal classification system used by many public libraries).
I generally like what McWhorter has to say but the idea that we shouldn’t take away Hannah-Jones’s pet project because it would destroy her is silly. I don’t know her and can’t assess what losing the argument would do to her but, whatever it is, it can’t stop people from telling her the truth about her project. This would be like going along with Trump’s bad ideas because he seems like he really, really believes in them and he’d be so sad if he were to fail. We can’t and shouldn’t enable this kind of behavior. Any ideas that are thrown out into the public square must be addressed without regard to its effect on the speaker.
I should add that I find McWhorter’s story about when he hit a 9 year old girl to be ridiculous. I am pretty sure, having once been a 9 year old boy, that he felt bad afterwards because he remembered that boys aren’t supposed to hit girls and he probably thought about what punishment he would receive. It also seems very doubtful that he “broke” the girl. Sure, their relationship was never the same but how is that surprising?
On the one hand I respect McWhorter for his charitable sentiments, but I agree with Loury. We can’t just stand by and let people burn everything down just so we don’t hurt their feelings.
I was reminded of the 1619 theory a while ago when reading a book called Friends Divided, John Adams & Thomas Jefferson by Gordon S. Wood. Much of the early action by the first and second continental congress was covered because early on John Adams was heavily involved in this build up to revolution. A guy who is almost forgotten today but was right in the middle of it before Jefferson, before Washington and from Massachusetts. Adams never owned slaves and generally was against the institution that I know of. His most direct involvement on the way to revolution had absolutely nothing to do with slavery that I know of.
I get a kick outta ol’ Glenn, and almost always find him thought-provoking. But he’s known for getting het up easily. Part of his charm, I suppose, albeit “his charm” being a bit of an acquired taste. 🙂
Oops, just deleted a comment mistakenly saying that McWhorter claimed that the View-Master was invented by a black guy – in fact, he correctly credited him with remodelling the gadget into the version remembered today. Apologies!
Wonderful dialogue between Loury and McWhorter. Wish my email or WordPress would allow me to fwd it to friends. Grrrrr. Been waiting for 9 days to hear back properly from email provider.