Yesterday a the New York Times published an opinion piece by a black academic, one Ekow Yankah. The essay is called Can My Children Be Friends with White People?
Professor Yankah’s answer is no, for the reason that black people must assume that every white person is, unless proven otherwise, such a virulent racist as to pose a direct and immediate threat of “rending, violent, often fatal betrayal.” (That this is certain is, apparently, demonstrated by the fact that Hillary Clinton did not win the last election.)
I considered putting up a post about this yesterday, but didn’t, as a familiar kind of fatigue quickly set in. I did offer a Tweet suggesting that John Derbyshire might have an opinion about the publication of this item, and noted that a chorus of voices were asking online about how it would seem if a white person wrote such an article, but beyond that I felt I had nothing much to add. This is where we’ve got to, and it isn’t going to get any better.
Today my friend Bill Vallicella sent me an email with a link to a response by Rod Dreher. It says, pretty much, what needs saying. For example:
So, let me get this straight: The New York Times published an op-ed by a black man who says that all white people look alike, and seem like they are a threat, even if they treat him kindly. If a white man wrote a column saying that all black people look alike, and seem like a threat to him, even if they treat him kindly, do you think The New York Times would publish it? The question is absurd.
Well, right. But again: this is where we’ve got to (and where the New York Times has got to).
Dreher quotes this passage, in which the author of the article tries to make sure that he’s just a big-hearted guy who’s trying to do his best:
We can still all pretend we are friends. If meaningful civic friendship is impossible, we can make do with mere civility ”” sharing drinks and watching the game. Indeed, even in Donald Trump’s America, I have not given up on being friends with all white people.
Thanks but no thanks, replies Dreher:
What a jerk. Why would any white person want to spend time with a guy who thinks he’s doing them a favor by granting them the absolution of his friendship? “If [particular whites] are not clearly allies, they will seem unsafe to me,’ he writes. How does a white person signal clear allyship? Why should any white person take the risk of being friends with this guy, knowing that if she says something that offends him politically, he will immediately consider her a racist threat, and withdraw friendship?
… You know what? Many white people who might have been Prof. Yankah’s friend will now choose to keep away from him, because they feel judged by him, or they will be afraid to speak around him. He will take that as a further sign of racism. And if white children shun the Yankah children because their father has taught them that whites are not to be trusted or befriended, the Yankah kids will understandably take that as a sign that their father was right. Well done, Dad, well done.
Yes, well done. And so: what do we do now? I think it’s fair to say that civil society, to function at all, requires at minimum a default presumption that we all have enough in common with our fellow citizens to make it at least possible that we could somehow be friends. If, as Professor Yankah insists, even this (very) low bar is too high, then social cohesion is impossible, and the nation is doomed. And when it comes to cohesion, if a faction insists that comity with them is impossible, then it is. When white people suggest that the races are better off not trying to get along, they are called, nowadays, “white supremacists”. What, then, should we say about Ekow Yankah?
An exercise for the reader: what do you think the New York Times expects to accomplish by publishing something like this?
26 Comments
Maybe this is either an intentional or a even a sub-conscious way of preparing people for the fact that Whites and Black are going to live separate lives (mostly)in the American that is to come.
…what do you think the New York Times expect to accomplish by publishing something like this?
Maybe something scandalous is happening behind the scenes at the Times and they are laying down some virtue signaling markers as prep.
New York Times is looking for a reaction from white people which they plan to stop using government which will be staffed by their type of people.
I think Dean Baquet, the very light skinned “black” editor-in -chief at the NYT, wants to rub salt in the open wound that is American race relations.
He reports directly to Sulz, so they probably tag teamed on this piece, which can only be called a blatant provocation to white people, including most slightly left of center normies who voted for Barack in the hopes it would prove their bona fides towards black America.
Sometimes, no, make that most of the time, black people are their own worst enemies. It’s like watching children, in adult bodies, playacting as adults in a 50 year temper tantrum. The most prestigious paper in North America provides a platform for black narcissists to spit in our collective eye, and all we can do about it is fume.
Dave,
What the Left can never allow:
http://maverickphilosopher.typepad.com/maverick_philosopher/2017/11/race-and-americas-soul.html
“…what do you think the New York Times expects to accomplish by publishing something like this?”
It’s so they can feel like this:
It all ends in guns.
Vanderleun,
Not something to wish for.
Yeah, it’s a bit much Malcolm. You almost have to think the NYT is just deliberately trolling, so desperate they are for readers.
And good heavens, this Ekow Yankah is something else. One should be cautious here, but it does seem that his biography tells everything you need to know. As far as I can tell by perusing the Net, Yankah is an Ethiopian? Israeli? Jewish? 1.5 generation immigrant who studied at UofM, Oxford, and Columbia, teaches law at Yeshiva University where he is involved with quintessential liberal/progressive causes, and is married to a mixed, white-looking (shiksa?) wife. Tom Wolfe could not have done better.
Incidentally Yankah, unitentially no doubt, provides an excellent argument for limiting immigration. America cannot endlessly absorb such ingrates as this clearly very intelligent yet also rather stupid fellow, who displays a disgustingly myopic contempt for a flawed but fundamentally decent nation that apparently has treated him and his family very well.
What’s this guy “Professor” of?
JC,
Law.
Loki,
Thanks. A picture is worth a thousand words, and I think that one sums it up perfectly.
(I resized it for you, though.)
As infrequently happens, these latest days, I happened to be somewhere I could catch a little TV; J Clivas to answer[?] your question:
http://insider.foxnews.com/2017/11/13/tucker-takes-nyt-op-ed-professor-who-said-black-people-should-distrust-white-people
I had a few thoughts as I watched that. Derb for one and then MLK’s “… by the content of their character.”
And now I see Malcolm’s put up a post.
JK, I just watched this interview. Professor Yankah sought to make an equivalence between his telling his sons to distrust white people and whether Tucker Carlson might reasonably tell his daughters to be wary around men they didn’t know.
Carlson made a safe rejoinder: that we acknowledge differences between the sexes, but that the discussion at hand was about race.
More effectively, he might have asked Professor Yankah “Do you mean black men?”, followed by pointing out that there are thousands of black-on-white rapes every year, while the number of white-on-black rapes is very close to zero.
That’s too much “edge” even for Tucker Carlson, but it would have been a sharp (and factually defensible) riposte.
I saw the interview last night. Tucker was so ineffective. He keep saying “would it be okay if I told my kids not to trust black people?” He was silly.
If I wasn’t typing on a phone I go into details. The professor is a jerk. Trucker went lower than necessary and blew a great opportunity.
I submit, Joyfully, he [Tucker] could not.
I don’t know Tucker’s children’s ages but, I suspect he’s in need of employment.
(I notice Wiki gives his birthdate, “May 16, 1969, got married in 1991, four children, three girls and one boy.”
He may well have “blew a great opportunity” but I for one, cut him some slack.
Po po tweet.)
Agreed, JK. Tucker Carlson has mouths to feed.
It would have been nice if Mr. Carlson had been free to counter propaganda with truth (or, we might say, “speak truth to power”), but the playing field is not a level one. (Since the world is run by the New York Times, of course, the playing field tilts in exactly the opposite of the direction Mr. Yankah would have us believe.)
Appropriate Malcolm you employ the word tilts; given the field of combat.
Malcolm I should not have written that above. Very very dumb. I’m sorry to anybody I offended.
Jason…
There is nothing wrong with what you wrote “above”. No apology needed. In addition, your comment also lets us know that this Professor may well be educated beyond his intelligence.
Jason, I agree with Whitewall that no apology is needed. But if you would like me to, I will take your comments down.
Why does Dreher use the PC she instead of he in his example? Whom is he trying to score PokÁ©mon points with that PC sleight of hand? Ugh…
Sadly, I agree with Vanderluen (whose site brought me here.) His pithy comment hits the bullseye, and to my mind the only question is how long until it happens.
The post & comments here are excellent. As a certain cyborg said, “I’ll be back.”
There has been mention of Derbyshire in relation to this, so if anyone hasn’t read it, The Talk: Nonblack Version is here:
http://takimag.com/article/the_talk_nonblack_version_john_derbyshire/print#axzz4yXqI7y90
Oh, one last thing: the comment box was indeed populated with a previous commenter’s name and email when I arrived here, which I thought was odd.
Now I’ve just seen your request in an earlier thread to be notified when that happens: it just did.
Thanks for visiting, Eskyman. I’m sorry to hear about that comment-box issue; it means I am going to have to harangue Bluehost again about this.
Ekow spelled backwards is “woke”.
Is this some kind of joke?
I cant believe
They would purposely deceive
Is the Times just blowing smoke?