Well, I certainly encountered Coleman Hughes on his way up when he interviewed me for a YouTube video. Now he’s he’s hit the big time with a gig as a staff writer for The Free Press and an analyst for CNN, a new book, The End of Race Politics: Arguments for a Colorblind America, which is doing very well on Amazon, a podcast called “Conversations with Coleman,” a YouTube channel, and the ultimate achievement, a stint on The View, in which Whoopi Goldberg asks him to explain his thesis. The ten-minute piece is below.
His thesis, which you’ll see, is that we should use class-based categories rather than racial ones to reduce poverty. Another one of The View women (I don’t recognize her) pushes back hard on Coleman, using quotes from Dr. King that seem to have walked back King’s own famous “colorblind” quote from his “I have a dream” speech. Coleman keeps his cool in the face of some hostility, and remains as eloquent as ever. He might be thought of as a younger version of John McWhorter.
He’ll go a lot further, even though what he says doesn’t conform to What Black People Should Be Saying.
On Megyn Kelly’s show, she and 3 guests discuss/deconstruct the exchange with Sunny Hostin (one of the main hosts on The View) and it is absolutely worth watching.
I had not heard of Coleman Hughes, but his views are very similar (at least on first hearing) to those of Isabel Wilkerson, the author of “Caste.” She makes the case that in most societies it is not so much the color of one’s skin that determines whether a group of people is discriminated against as the group’s social class (Jews in the Nazi period, the Dalits in India, etc.). The film about her and her philosophy, “Origin,” is a portrayal of those concepts. Both the film and the book are well worth watching/reading and have made me rethink how societies are built and how groups of people (whether all are of a similar or a different color) become the object of discrimination–which is what Hughes is also saying.
I thought that the Jews of Germany were doing quite well. Better than average.
Did you not see the modifying phrase “in the Nazi period”?
The extreme prejudice began in 1933 when the Nazis came to power. Prior to that they were doing well. It’s not the same as the Dalits of India.
Which is why they were an excellent target about whom to get people who were not doing so well riled up.
They were accused of being too successful. Class and ethnicity were combined factors here, as with many cases of hostility towards middlemen minorities the world over.
I think what Coleman Hughes is trying to convey is that in today’s US, race is too broad a brush to correctly identify socially underprivileged groups or individuals.
I might add that the Jewish is example was to the point in the sense that Nazi racial science textbooks explicitly identify Jews as Whites, so it wasn’t about skin color. But the example was misleading in the sense that Jews (as well as e.g. Italians) were indeed seen as a different race from Germanics.
“… the ultimate achievement, a stint on The View …”
Indeed – it’s Oprah-level visibility – go Coleman! Woo hoo! He’s built quite a name for himself.
Admirable composure in the face of such hostility. I would guess that he’s getting used to being attacked. His arguments make complete sense to me, but then I’m white, so for a lot of people, including some on that show, my opinion doesn’t count. In fact in their view it likely buttresses their criticism of him.
His data about the progress reversing in 2013 is telling. DEI and its corollaries are harming, not helping. Cameron’s views are really the only constructive way forward; DEI is just adding fuel to a fire that was on its way, albeit slowly, to burning out.
I would say he faced ignorance and, honestly, dumbness, which are a lot more difficult to handled than hostility. And he did great.
Coleman is so very clear in addressing both Whoopi’s and Hostin’s attempted points and in Hostin’s case, an actual ad hominem attack. I was so glad to see Whoopi do a Uchicago principles style hosting so that neither bullying nor heckling prevented both sides from being clearly heard…and I think the audience’s responses showed that.
Thanks to Jerry for introducing us to Coleman a few weeks ago!
I agree. Whoopi was very diplomatic and Hughes maintained his cool even when Hostin wagged her finger at him and she’s friends with MLK’s daughter, so there!
Yes. Thank you, Jerry for including this today. That was great.
The View is hilarious. Somehow, the genius producers managed to assemble the stupidest women in America! Like they trolled some hospital’s head injury ward and picked the loudest berserkers, the wettest droolers and set them up with a show.
Marvelous.
D.A.
NYC
Zora Neale Hurston! One of my POC heroes, who never played the victim card.
How do we know [„Western“] liberal democracy is not „racist“?
Look at the model, deliberately identity blind, ALL equal before the democratically fashioned Rules.
The FIRST such model in over 5 millennia of recorded history.
And look at the evidence from its application in practice.
Yes outcomes are still relatively poor for SOME „minorities“.
But that’s not the fault of the model, rather of some policies AND especially, alas, of family /community failure.
How do we know?
Because we do see MANY POC / „indigenous“ people do succeed.
Why? How?
Check their backgrounds, stories and we see they succeed the same way most people of whatever race / ethnic background „succeed“, that is with family / community support in rearing, education, in the vital 0-15 years period.
NONE are racially / ethnically inherently less able [as modern science, post Franz Boas etc demonstrates], rather they are not availed of a conducive socialisation framework.
Ultimately it’s about the relevant people taking responsibility.
“Critical race theory” does not foresee an end to racism: it preserves it in the form of permanent classes of oppressed and oppressors. Only colour-blindness can end racism, by treating all with disregard of their race.
I can only assume that those opposed to colour-blindness are not wanting to see an end to racism, and I have to wonder why?
“those opposed to colour-blindness are not wanting to see an end to racism, and I have to wonder why?”
Job security!