Damn, McWhorter…you’re a respected, tenured linguist, a columnist for the NYT, AND you teach music classes at Columbia? While demoing on the piano? Too much, man. I’m continually impressed. Keep it up. Loury, I love your work. And nobody summarizes an opposing argument like you do. That’s a thing of beauty. I just had to give McWhorter props for this new side of him I learned about….
You both seem to feel compelled to dismiss ideas of racism and Black culture. I appreciate the intellectual exercise but it is very damaging I have had to end some relationships because the believe you both represent how Black people should think.
I'm Brazilian, 50, have a PhD in theoretical physics and I am a professor at a Brazilian university. Oh, do I really need to add that I'm also male and white?! Gosh, I hate this! Thank you. I love your show. Your conversations are always insightful and thought provoking.
@@julianfischer2341 Opa, bacana encontrar um canadense que esteve por aqui e que sabe bem português! Já não sei dizer bem como encontrei esses dois. Faz alguns anos que estou acompanhando o que está acontecendo em termos de infiltração ideológica em vários setores, principalmente em países como os EUA, o Canadá e o Reino Unido. Presto particular atenção a isso no mundo acadêmico - por exemplo, o caso da universidade de Evergreen, no estado de Washington.
@@Doutsoldome Interessante. Esse tipo de drama da Evergreen nunca aconteceria no Brasil. Acho interessante comparar a cultura da america do norte e a cultura do Brasil. Morei no Rio, Manaus, Campinas, tenho conhecido varias outras cidades tambem. Eu fazia jiu-jitsu ali e participava de campeonatos e cheguei a dar aula de ingles em escola de idioma, fiz 3 periodos do curso de letras em uma faculdade particular. Identifico com as historias pessoais do Glenn Loury por eu tambem ter vivido um pouco no lado escuro na juventude. Se nao tiver maturidade no Brasil, é facil morrer por tiro ou se envolver com prostitutas, bandidos, "vagabundagem", etc. Morei em um bairro em Manaus que tem muitas semelhanças com o que o Loury fala do lado sul do Chicago. Jovens se matando por coisas fútis, querendo mostrar o carrão e as roupas de marca para as gatinhas, não valorizando a educação. Sendo jovem na epoca, eu inicialmente puxava mais para o lado esquerdo politicamente, querendo culpar o sistema ou retratar esses jovens como apenas vitimas. Com a experiencia que tive ali eu entendo bem que é tambem problema de valores, cultura, e é guerra espiritual. Tem que cobrar o individuo tambem e valorizar a responsabilidade de cada pessoa. Boa noite!
You probably wouldn't qualify as "white" from the perspective of a lot of Trump supporters here in the US. There's been a strong push to make all "hispanics" non-white over the past few decades up here, and I suspect that would include individuals of Brazilian descent as well.
That was truly epic. Just know that for every shriek of condenmation you might get, there are others who thank you for your intellectual honesty and courage. I wish it was a one-to-one ratio, and for now it isnt, but it is worth knowing.
@@richardbicker640 If the black community (for want of s better term) implemented any one of John or Glenn's recommendations I believe we would see very definite progress. Don't you think?
@@richardbicker640 You wouldn't need to though. You would just have an equal standard. No one would need to spell out the facts about gaps in IQ on average. One hopes that in time those gaps , created by special treatment, tokenism and "positive discrimination " etc , were no longer a thing, would dissappear.
This is just what the doctor ordered “Glenn and John”. Thank you kindly for your collective courage, tenacity, endurance, integrity, vulnerability, compassion and devotion.
I am a 60 y/o white guy, born in Wash DC and grew up just outside. Lived with Black people my whole life. I have had 3 jobs in my life, construction, auto mechanic, and fishing guide. In all three, there was no way to BS your way through. Color did not matter, you could either do the job or not. You had to work with and get along with all races and even the few females in those fields. There were no "adjustments" for race. Iron sharpens iron, remove the competition and everyone will suffer. To a large degree, the university system created this, and I think that it is not sustainable, the snake eventually eats it's tail.
That's the whole issue though. You were a fishing guide. They don't give two shits if anyone ever catches a fish as long as at least 50 percent of the staff is whatever race/sexuality they are screaming about that week. And if we are being honest, the overly educated types, who have never done a days worth of real labor in their lives, want that number a lot closer to 100 percent. The people like you and me, I am also a mechanic, who have real obligations that depend on a vibrant economy, that play the game of hard work and competence equal reward, have no influence on the matters at a national level. The leftist activists have it all. We have comment sections. If we group up to talk about things we are concerned about we are white supremacist terrorizers no matter our race. Things are screwy and a supreme court decision is not gonna fix it. It's societal rot. Sorry I guess I needed to rant a bit. Good luck out there.
@@joelanderson5285 Fair enough. I guess we have to make sure we're not too negative about things. I agree with Glenn, it shouldn't be an all or nothing situation. A lot of people in America have had their prosperity and opportunity ripped away from them over the last fifty years. I think we could do a lot more for everyone.
I love how pleased Glen is to know someone who lectures from a piano on top of producing a prolific body of work so interesting that he never thought to mention the music class until it is relevant to a point in a conversation.
Once again when I listen to you both speak, I feel incredible nostalgia for an era of excellence I experienced in my youth that seems scoffed at in today's world. I find your perspectives comforting. On a different topic, and mention of your wife early in this episode prompted this thought to resurface, I bring up Bernie Sanders. I lived in Burlington, VT when Bernie was their celebrated 'Socialist Mayor' and being satirized in Doonesbury and viewed in many a Sunday morning comics nationwide. As the middle class has disappeared over the past 50 years and no other politician has seemed to care about people in a manner I could trace to bring me understanding that connected the dots for me, I grew more and more fond of Mr. Sanders. I left Vermont, but a nephew still there once campaigned for him, even getting to the first name level. I felt Bernie could possibly beat Donald Trump in 2016 and supported him for that reason, and I'm still sour at the Democratic party for bestowing their full favor onto Hilary and she didn't have the charisma to overcome the life force of Mr. Trump. Now I live in Seattle, WA where crime has been decriminalized and this city is falling apart more each week because of the extreme progressive beliefs in our City and government, the tipping balance brought in by the tech industry here. Well, Bernie Sanders sent out a very large postcard in early December 2021, urging me to "Vote 'NO' on the right-wing Recall by Dec. 7th" of Council Member Kshama Sawant, calling it a "baseless power grab" by Seattle's 1% and stand with the 99% who are against the Recall. I am far from the 1%, I voted for Kshama in her first election and have regretted it ever since. Her ideas, policies and manner of governing are polarizing at best and in general, have little to do with governing the City but trying to advance national level socialist interests, not to mention social justice issues as well. I have no idea what politician will replace Bernie for me, but it is really disarming to have Bernie shot down. He represents my youth and life politically, I've been following him for so long. But, I have first hand experience now to evaluate his message, and from my perspective, Bernie is trying to soft soap his agenda at my expense, and my trust in him has dissolved to the point that I question what he knows about governing real people at any level. His message has not changed in over 40 years, and maybe that's part of the problem.
Conservative-libertarian here…conservatarian a la Charlie Cooke. I appreciate your story…and can’t help but observe that Trump (idiot that he is) and Bernie had a lot in common. Much of Bernie’s belief system.. is simply social conservatism… absent government mandates. Social conservatism asks those with many talents to share the wealth on a voluntary basis. It believes voluntary charity is where the giver deserves honor and the receiver is necessarily grateful. When the giving is forced through taxes… there is no honor. When benefits are received via entitlements… there is no gratefulness. Yet, what happens when people don’t voluntary give? The poor suffer. Yet, what happens when given is forced? Community organizations (e.g. Rotary, Kiwanis, Church, etc) become less important and social fabric declines (i.e. Read ‘Bowling Alone’ by Putnam). This is the conundrum society faces…because both sides are right… and both sides are wrong.
I think, unfortunately, that Bernie lost control of his own organisation. Look at the campaigns in 2020 vs 2016. They were VERY different. In 2016 Bernie was a beast: laser-focused on class and presenting a series of popular initiatives to the American public. In 2020 that clear message was watered down by a lot more wishy-washy language that sounds more like your modern DSA/idpol word salad rather than white-hot class warfare (in the good sense of the term). My estimation is that Bernie couldn't find enough old-style socialists (like myself and, seemingly, yourself) to staff his campaign and office, and so had to turn to people willing to do the work....which is mostly a fairly elite, young, and more often than not identitarian sort of character. Bernie was the last of the old guard to fall, but in the end no one can withstand the hostage-taking arguments of the idpol left right now. The costs of standing up are too high....even for a sitting senator.
I’m a huge fan of you two, but had no idea John was such a music fan and musician!!!! Would love for John to do a podcast or video about music, classical and jazz!
Now that I'm aware John is a musical connoisseur and pianist, I would love to hear his take on the work of Phillip Ewell and the supposed "white supremacy" of music theory.
It is hard to find any other two people that evoke such depth, truth and brilliance during conversation. National treasures, the both of you. I'm so happy and humbled to have your words and perspectives bouncing around my head. Please continue to do what you do. I'll continually be here, listening and waiting for the next one.
I got my bachelors degree in Art History in 1983. My first encounter with the second wave feminist lens on 19th century art came in the form of a super liberal female professor who claimed that all of the Impressionist artists were misogynists. Due to my contrarian nature, I shared my viewpoint and wrote a paper arguing against her thesis. Needless to say, I became the class pariah. Thinking that she was an outlier in the department ( my focus was classical art history), I went on to take some graduate classes......which then demonstrated I wasn't made for academia.......mostly because I lacked the desire and ability to challenge the woke. Its acceptable now to conflate popular identities and public opinion for quality, merit and innovative ideas......and the continued finding of dragons demands the continued redefinition of what a dragon is. Scary stuff
Correct me if I'm wrong here, but it seems like the postmodern influence ruined art institutions. The political message became more relevant than the quality. I have always preferred the defining feature of art to be excellence in that which it is. I could agree with the message or not, it could be something utilitarian or from a high art school,, but for me to call it art it must have excellent craftsmanship.
@@KingRyanoles I actually found the historical/sociopolitical/cultural information interesting and necessary.....if opinion wasn't misconstrued as fact.......like my feminist prof calling all late 19th century male artists misogynists. I didn't see evidence of this as she claimed there was and most of all it stoked a hate for the artist
@@richardbicker640 strong disagree, and Glenn does the same. They’re both still extremely articulate in these discussions. Both of them always seem to ask a question or prod their conversation partner in the direction that I’m attentive to.
Why can’t we have both? Just asking but in the history of the Supreme Court do you really believe all the white men who sat on the bench were the best qualified??
@@jaklinhyde If race is a determining criterion over and above acumen, it is not equity. We will have both when they emerge organically from the available candidates-- which is inevitable, and has been happening increasingly over the last half century. Your whataboutism with regards to white justices is a reflexive display of the same pressured ideological demand that Glenn and John contest. It is a disservice to blacks, and fosters racial resentment. Equality of opportunity exists for qualified individuals. Equality of outcome or perfect demographic representation in all fields at all times is naive, absurd, unattainable and unnecessary. Ethics, like epistemology are not color-coded.
Why don't questions of "qualifications" come up0 when the nominees are WHITE MEN? President Biden's nominee Judge Kintangi Brown Jackson is a DOUBLE HARVARD grad (Bachelors & Law School) plus has MORE YEARS EXPEREINCE as a Judge as CURRENT SCOTUS Justices Roberts, Thomas, Kavenaugh & Barret COMBINED. She sounds pretty damn qualfi8ed.
Wading through daily the suffocatingly mind bending insanity currently circulating, I turn to you two gentlemen for the relief of the fresh air of clear thinking. You are not losing the struggle. You represent what is so obvious to the majority of people. Thank you for disregarding the opportunists of mindfuck and holding on to your sanity and courage. History will prove you the heroes of this era.
Wow, John. Your point about how feel-good professors aren’t good for black progress is dead on. Im an admirer of all things rational and serious-minded, so it is hard to sit through a lecture that’s so opposed to the spirit of exploration, and knowledge.
John and Glenn, I love listening to you both. Regarding the dismantling of affirmative action, why can’t we focus on improving the school systems where many black communities are and help prepare them get into Harvard and the like? No one can get in to an Ivy League school without a proper education. I never hear anyone talking about improving the education. Handouts are not the only way of helping black Americans to thrive. Why is this concept so frowned upon? Booker T Washington dedicated his life to education because he knew how important it was. We are not selling that same message today. Would love your thoughts on a better path forward.
Have we forgotten that both Steven Sondheim and Leonard Bernstein, the creators of West Side Story, are from Jewish immigrant families? They're not exactly from the group of privileged white anglo-saxon men. Love your stuff Glenn and John! Thanks for being examples of, and speaking up for, black excellence.
@@evastephan9441 yep, when i think oppressed, I definitely first think of 2% of the population making up 75% of all billionaires. So oppressed. Think of the hoilabolunga!!1
Removing standardized mechanisms of evaluating candidates will prove to be catastrophic. The thought of Adcoms/dept chairs/attendings etc using terms such as "passion" or "fit" when determining my admission to med school/residency would have been terrifying! Had I been disproportionately subjected to qualitative assessments instead of standardized exams during my medical education, as an objective 5 with no charisma, I'd probably be taking your order through a talking clown right now. But fortunately, I was able to protect myself with my standardized test scores. When this pendulum swings back- away from all of this woke nonsense there will be no recourse when your upper middle class black granddaughter who scored in the 90th percentile gets turned away because she had a perceived "attitude" during her interview
@@canopeaz Here's where your Masters degree in Classical English will serve you well without the nuisance of standardized testing. "Dost thou desire fries with thine Big Mac?"
Stockholm (me) travelled 4000 km to Costa del Sol i southern Spain...By car through a hurricane...Here I am in the sun listening to my favorite two guys...😘
Professors: A while ago a former regent of the University of California, Ward Connerly, stated, "We have used affirmative action to prop up a system of artificial diversity while ignoring the heavy lifting needed to bring about real equality in this country." I think his statement was accurate then and is even more appropriate now. And I think it is the essence of what you have both set forth on the subject on this podcast as well as in other settings. Of course, what goes into the "heavy lifting" would be fertile material for a lively discussion, but that would be another discussion. Both of you are insightful and cogent and your podcasts are a breath of fresh air.
Would be better if US Blacks filed a class action lawsuit against US government. Also class action lawsuits against US corporations that profited off slavery labor. Blacks should qualify for tax exempt status. Given the enormous effort by US institutions to keep them in system of inequality.
You guys have to keep teaching untill you drop! Keep The window open for kids like my nephew and nieces who want to think for themselfes and be tought by inspiring teachers. Please hold out. You have massiv support slowly organising itself. 👍💪😘
I've become a big John McWhorter fan based on his NY Time3s columnist & am now reading his books as well. What I'd give to take his music history class! What delightful WELL-FOUNDED human being he is--and we should ALL aspire to be so well-rounded.
California’s black college graduation rates went up after affirmative programs were abolished. Enrollment rates at Berkeley and UCLA dropped, but more black students graduated in absolute numbers and with degrees in the STEM fields. Black college graduates produce more black college graduates. It’s better to have a degree from a California Riverside than an acceptance letter from Berkeley! In Baltimore (a school district that spend $15,000 per year on education) a high school student was in the top 50 percent in his class with a .1307 GPA. Ending affirmative action will force a change in Urban education. A change resisted by the black professional educators. It is refreshing to hear both John and Glenn like Justice Thomas express pride in one’s own academic achievement. This being last day of black history month. I believe this, improve the K-12 education system and black will be in elite institution. Our history proves this.
There's something that nobody's talking about with regard to college admissions. I was in college myself when pressure began to be applied to colleges and universities to be non-discriminating racially in their admissions. One or two heads of admissions complained that most Afro-Americans went to K-12 schools where students did not excel. Those administrators quickly went silent, I don't know what happened to them. But I remember thinking the university is the tail-end of a long educational pipeline, and it isn't only the universities fault that they get so few academically qualified applicants. But perhaps it is. The great majority of educators, administrators, teachers, even the union leaders of the NEA and the AFT got education degrees at colleges and universities. But the graduates of those departments are producing students not ready to enter either the work force or universities. This isn't just teachers, it's the principals, school district administrators, curriculum designers, district superintendents as well that contribute to this failure. It seems to me that those people most involved in teaching and educating came out of those colleges and universities, the colleges and universities need to acknowledge that they have allowed failure and dramatically revise their departments of education.
Thank you gentlemen, for your candor and intelligent exchanges. It's not simply that you are both black, and for that reason your perspectives are often not consistent with where a majority might think they should be. But that you are both brilliant in your accomplishments and your ideations IRRESPECTIVE of your melanin content; qualities which any discerning mind can clearly see. Your voices are important. And they, I think, are essential contributions to the progress which our nation needs to pursue. Good guys, Messrs. Loury and McWhorton are. And smart too.
When I perceive that someone thinks I have achieved my position due to affirmative action it demoralizes me, depresses me, and demotivates me. It really does.
I wish we were seeing Glenn on as many podcasts and media appearances as John. Rogan, Chris Williams, more with Coleman and Bill Maher need to invite him!
Word. Down with affirmative action and its descendants: diversity, equity and inclusion! The DEI movement will disintegrate eventually, the question is how much damage will be done before this happens.
I hear you. But pray tell, besides the 20 blacks & 7 Hispanics who get into each of the 8 Ivy League schools, where else in America is Affirmative Action even actualized? I certainly cannot tell by my friends or even the Black community. Where is all this advantage for Blacks? I just don't see it.
@@richardbicker640 Yea! Black men are over represented at the Museum... Hilarious! The only place Black men are over represented is in the criminal justice system and 3 or for sports...and NOWHERE else. White people, especially the Irish, like Heather, are just playing the VICTIM card. Read "How the Irish Became White". There is typically a Hannity, McDonald, O'Reilly, Murphy and McConnell complaining about Black people taking "THEIR" jobs. The Irish have been playing the VICTIM card since 1850 when Blacks in the North East were free for over 100 years and speaking articulate King's English, leading the trade industry as Masons, Carpenters, Black Smiths, Textile experts, Maritime workers and Printers, all while the just arriving Irish could not speak English and came from an impoverished agrarian class. Wherever you find racism and complaining...you will almost always find an Irish person leading loudly! I kid you not! If the Irish Catholics left and returned Europe, America's poor racial climate would seek to exist...overnight. I'm a Bostonian. Trust I know! The Irish, like Heather, just hide behind their white skinned privilege to make everything about race, which in turn makes Black Americans do similar.
@@richardbicker640 Yes all the isms! My family has been here (America) since the 1670s. They were freed from servitude in 1694. They helped settle towns in MA until the revolution....and fought in the revolution. Interesting is that America become more racist after the revolution. Blacks, even after 150 years, never got to play the Nativism card. On the contrary. Massachusetts form of Jim Crow was created soon after 1783 when slavery was abolished in the state. In fact, legal Jim Crow was created in Boston and normalized w/ Plessy V. Ferguson. Plessy/Ferguson was decided upon Boston case law where the words "Separate but Equal" we're first uttered (Roberts vs. City of Boston). In truth Slavery was a burden, but Jim Crow was the true savagery. The Irish used Segregation to JUMP ahead of the line, even as they were less prepared to work. Hurt people Hurt people! The Irish were a hurt people and they still are hurting other people to this very day under the guise of being "white". As stated, if the Irish can get their racist head out of their racist bum bums, this country will clean itself up quickly! It is the not Scandinavians, French, Spanish or even Italians that lead being racists. It's the Heathers of the world who think "America is Ours". Last, as a young man I worked in the trades. (Scored highest on the test). The Irish guys hated when I came. The Italians treated me kindly. Bu the racism that the Irish showed toward the Italians was so savage! Behind the Irish's back the Italians would always say: The Irish are "F'ng Jerks". Think on this! It's just more Irish ethnocentrism cloaked in whiteness. Have a good day!
@@TrillEverything " Where is all this advantage for Blacks? " It exists all across the creative class. Academia, especially, but also journalism, publishing (at least on the authoring side, seemingly less so on the actual publisher side), increasingly also in finance, etc.. The problem is that the domain of explicit Black advantage is very narrow, and almost exclusively elite. It does nothing to help that vast, vast majority of Black Americans who are, of course, working class (like the majority of every other demographic). So when elites complain about positive discrimination, they're right. Same as when non-elite Black Americans complain about discrimination in their lives...they're also right! That's what makes the situation so hard to unravel and address.
I remember watching a women's conference (in the 2000s, so not ancient history) on leadership in business. A speaker at this conference was talking about how one of the aspects required for successful leadership is technical skill in your field, but how when men mentor women for leadership, they tend to focus on people skills. I thought at the time this was a strange default because if there would be a stereotype or bias, it would be that women are better at soft skills. I could only account for that by either 1) assuming that people are so aware of biases that they are overcorrecting or 2) that they are assuming that the major impediment to women are personal biases, so they need extra interpersonal skill to compensate. The speaker pointed out that whatever the intention, by lowering technical standards, these mentors where handicapping women... and that women mentoring should be cognizant of the technical requirements of leadership. I think the same thing applies here to the black community. It's much like the old joke about the guy looking for keys under street lamp when he lost them in an alley. Lowering standards is easier to do, but it's never going to yield the same results as more directly addressing technical, financial, and other tangible disparities. Nor is this problem unique to women in business or black people in higher education. There are reflections of this over and over. Self-help that focuses entirely on mindset. Feels good, can drive a thriving industry where people consume book, after course, after expensive consultant training... and still have no tangible outcomes. Same with televangelists and the gospel of wealth. At the end of the day, this approach of mindset (or bias) only approaches proliferate because they never work themselves out of a job, because they can always claim your mindset wasn't good enough. At a certain point, if you want tangible change, you have to recognize that your mindset is never going to be perfect enough to compensate for a lack of well-researched action and developing technical skills.
@@newmediarules that is a long complicated story that spans my whole life. I think what it boils down to is me being more honest about reality and not having sound data on my side whenever my beliefs were challenged in the past. Over time I was forced to be more mature. Kind of like when Thomas Sowell gave up Marxist ideals, “I grew up”
I so look forward to hearing what both of you have to say. Having said that, I do feel that Glenn is more willing to dispense with emotional arguments as opposed to John. IMHO, Glenn bases his arguments almost solely upon reason and logic.
It’s called Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)….it is real and I have some advice as a retired physiology professor, and as a Doctor of the Soul as my vocation. You can move to Arizona where we have sunshine 300 days a year without the humidity of Florida….or, you can sit in front of an incandescent light of a 60 Watt minimum…you gotta give yourself 14 hours of light per day….so, compute sunrise (it’s above the clouds) and sunset….a la June 21. In your eye you have photoreceptors that connect to a little gland called the pineal gland. Anyway, you guys are PhD’s and have assistants to help you discover this syndrome. I respect you as brothers in our humanity, our roles as educators, and commentators to our culture. I am a practitioner of soul care, by God’s grace..
The surgeon comment reminded me of an experience I had in Kenya. I broke my leg very badly & needed surgery, and the doctor talking to me about the surgery was stumbling over an awkward question which I finally realized was basically "which colour of surgeon would you prefer?" I assume they asked me this because I'm white. Anyway, I said I want the *best* surgeon, who turned out to be black. I felt really bad for the person asking me the question.
What about the proliferation of academic majors? It seems to me that we added places for people who have no desire or aptitude for quantitative methods, which gets replaced by an ideology such as anti-racism, leading to the hammer/nail paradigm. Having spent my life in physics research, it's nuts that NSF, NIH, etc funding becomes another nail for the hammer. *John's music appreciation course sound excellent...but he didn't get to hip-hop and rap. lol. My daughter called me from an early year of college, and I asked about her course, specifically, gen. ed since she was a physics major. She said she was taking music app, and I asked if they started with Brahms, and the fugue, etc. She laughed and said no, the course only covered rap and hip/hop...Thanks you guys!
Culturally we're now experiencing an aesthetic broadly resembling Soviet Socialist Realism, but without the government edicts. The prose of '30s cultural criticism both in the Soviet Union and Western socialist media is remarkably similar (the term "privilege" a constant refrain), today we've simply substituted "non-white" for "working class." And both the art in galleries and new plays produced (off-broadway) are increasingly taking up the form and language of agitprop, with suspicion directed at abstraction and interest in the ambiguities of language.
I've largely reconciled myself to Biden's supreme court choice by concluding that his actual choice was made by the same criteria as all other supreme court justices. It was a political choice. There is a competence floor which W Bush demonstrated when he tried to nominate his family lawyer to the court, but beyond that it's all patronage and political payoffs. So, I tell myself that Biden's specific choice was chosen not so much for her race, but rather because she's sufficiently competent in the law and her edge is that she is very well-connected to the right politically-significant people. This same criteria can be applied to all those white guys too, whether the ones who thought themselves elite and were never chosen, or those who were not seen as the best-of-the-best and yet were chosen. There is a skill level beyond which back-scratching becomes more important than skill.
As a Latino graduate student in psychology, I have to say I really get angry that media and democrats seems to care only about black folks and doesn’t care about us. Much much less Asians or Native American People. And we’re about 25% of the population. And Latin American is next door to us. It pisses me off.
How about if we stop being sorted according to degrees of privilege and victimhood, race and ethnicity, sex and gender, and all of the other boutique identity buckets used to keep us angry and distracted, frightened and righteous, and think of ourselves as individuals who share a common cause: human flourishing.
The Democratic party (meaning, the leadership and institution), contrary to popular belief, is almost exclusively a part of the Atlantic North East. It is also very white. While the West Coast may be a major zone of influence for the party the real power will always be in the East (it doesn't matter how much money Pelosi raises from her rich friends....). In the East there are simply far fewer Latinos and Hispanics. The party leadership literally doesn't know them/us (I'm mixed, myself). You can see it in how they talk about Latino voters.....like they've never met a Latino in their life! They also don't understand how fuzzy the line between 'white/Anglo' and 'Latino' is....especially in the Southwest. What does it mean to be Latino in a community where virtually everyone you know has at least SOME Latino family? What does it mean to be Latino in a region where they/we are, if not an outright majority, very near it? They have no idea. We don't fit their model (no one really does, but the closest they can come to is Black Americans), so they don't know how to respond to us. It's as simple as that.
@@rustedgreen5916 Well, we White's are 60%, and we want to maintain control over the countries we have built. Are you willing to live under a Caste system, as is the case already in much of Latin & South America?
58:41, Glenn is wrong. John *IS* doing something to try to change how his daughters will be treated and so is Glenn. They are both speaking out against regressive, racist nonsense, and we’re lucky to have them!
We have mentors in DK, if you have smart understimulated students it shouldn't take long to bring them up to par, and teach them how to be an University student, wich is an art unto it self.🤗
Can't we make appointments to the Supreme Court based on who is the best person for the job regardless of race, sex, and all the other things that have really nothing to do with competence? I love Glenn's surgery analysis and like him, I want the BEST person no matter who they are.
I don't care how much truth and context people like Loury & McWhorter put behind their words, the haters will nevertheless come out of the wood work w/"thoughts" like "Did you say anything about O'Connor's or Thomas' qualifications???"
@26:00 Um, I seriously doubt that not valuing your education or school is a "reaction" from the 60s or 70s. I mean you're not getting "better" results in "all black" schools taught by an all-black staff.
Here's the thing people forget about West Side Story: Leonard Bernstein, who composed it, was a big supporter of the civil rights movement. (So was Irving Berlin, for example, but he wasn't involved in West Side Story and wasn't as supportive of other "liberal" or "left wing" causes of the time as Bernstein was.) Honestly, given all the brouhaha over black animated characters being played by white actors not so long ago, I'm surprised people aren't complaining that Spielberg cast a black woman, Ariana Dubose, in the female lead for the new movie instead of a Puerto Rican (or at least Hispanic). That said, I probably won't see it because I'd rather see the original movie. As an aside, John's description of it being written by "Jewish white men smoking cigarettes in the 50s" is spot on. Leonard Bernstein did in fact write it in the 50s and was in fact a heavy smoker. (The original film, however was released in the early 60s.)
The conversations at the Loury family dinner table must be interesting to say the least. I have similar family members that share the same democratic socialist ideals and I must say my patience runs thin. Not because of their views but their lack of curiosity to examine facts with an objectivity that fosters discourse. It's like talking to a spoiled child at times... But I digress.. Keep up the good work gentlemen.
I mean Loury doesn’t present facts or research on this issues. I find the crowd that follows him to be the group that ignores the data on these issues. Seriously how many studies or books by blk academics have you read on this topic?
Just set a minimum threshold . Score above, you are o.k. for admission here. You can make it here. Then randomly select applicants above the threshold. Don't rank applicants.
Have either of you met, spoken with or debated Christopher Hitchens? I’d love to hear your thoughts on the late great Hitchens, and also would love to see the two of you debate god/religion. I ask because (imo), belief in god/religion are central to the issues we face today. Believers are essentially unhinged and can allow for the most pervasive ideas, worse they hand those awful and inaccurate ideas down to their children.
Lol, I remember saying "despite the fact that I'm wearing a cashmere cardigan..." 30 years ago on the corner of Christopher and Gay. PS Everything is stupid and we're all doomed.
I listen to old white folks and apparently old black folks, old farmers, old musicians, old folks in gereral. Why you ask? cause with age comes wisdom and that's why I listen to learn something.
Another great talk. John - when you're talking about your little girls - I felt that. I have 3 white sons and feel the same way. I give them every opportunity, our house if full of books, they get technology in their hands to learn and we do everything we can to teach them about real US history. They are in the 99%+ percentile for their ages and test above their grades. Yet I cant help but feel by time they're adults they're doomed because the color of their skin.
No one is doomed anymore, world is so wealthy and still capitalist so someone will pay for good worker, at worst person might be disfavored in small ways so not get fairness in tests or applications. I am white but that ll suck, then I gotta admit women and minorities struggled w same pre1960 and many like 50% of women still had jobs and more for others, , , I just disagree w "doomed", maybe things will seem "harder". US humans are weird, capitalism keeps us honest, the bad part of govt and govt subsidies it allows stupid orgs to keep being stupid, so less govt is good... Luckily the big majority of people will prob vote to limit crazy to medium crazy... The silent heroes to me are Asians, spreaking hard languages and getting no respect and then shrugging that off and thinking I'll find a way to win and then laugh as.my kids inherit more power what a healthy way... Yes unfairness is bad, but man in ancient history work was show unfair except for nobles often of a minority who oppressed the Welsh farmers etc ....
@@richardbicker640 ... We are all Prejudged a bit, ugly people, fat people, minorities even, sweaty nerds who are geniuses, , , blacks pre70 women pre60 anyone w accent pre50 (Ricky Ricardo was trailblazer an accent on US TV on I Love Lucy)... Luckily capitalism punishes not hiring the best so helps fight bias and that's how Jews and Asians do well no one loves them, , , humans dislike so easily and I don't like it but stop saying other groups didn't face dislike too and they fought thru it,. ,. , Try being a Catholic in N Minnesota and boy hard to get a job, ,. Or a Catholic in England till 1910.... Humans often face unfairness it is a Lie to freak out and act like us whites are the first or worst, , ,. We should close all govt schools so private schools run education and over time the crazier schools lose respect and donations if too crazy, ,.
There is a danger of introducing a kind of branding where you get wheeled into the emergency room, and you hear, "Dr. Chen from Harvard will do the surgery." And you think - thank heavens - they tried everything they possibly could to keep that person out of medical school, they must be good.
The best thing I ever saw were m7usic instrument auditions behind an opaque screen, obscuring the judging panel from the candidates. Wonder what identity politics would say about that.
as a visual artist i wish that were the case for art competitions, and it should be. i sigh when i submit my work to an open competition because i know that my bio as old white male will be n automatic deduction in the eyes of the judges
Drearest teacher and friend hard edged excellent in any subjects will allow us to shine this has always been present in the black community remember pressure makes diamonds
Is the ration of Black male to Black female students at Harvard a concern, for affirmative action reasons? Does race trump gender or vice versa, affirmative action wise?
Damn, McWhorter…you’re a respected, tenured linguist, a columnist for the NYT, AND you teach music classes at Columbia? While demoing on the piano? Too much, man. I’m continually impressed. Keep it up.
Loury, I love your work. And nobody summarizes an opposing argument like you do. That’s a thing of beauty. I just had to give McWhorter props for this new side of him I learned about….
Pretty high achiever huh? Makes me wonder what I have been doing all these years
'Respected'.
I need the transcripts of these conversations to be printed in every textbook in our schools. This is the critical race theory we actually need.
No, this isn't critical race theory. This is Critical Race FACT.
It is not.
Get lost.
@@KAZVorpal 🤡
You both seem to feel compelled to dismiss ideas of racism and Black culture. I appreciate the intellectual exercise but it is very damaging I have had to end some relationships because the believe you both represent how Black people should think.
I'm Brazilian, 50, have a PhD in theoretical physics and I am a professor at a Brazilian university. Oh, do I really need to add that I'm also male and white?! Gosh, I hate this! Thank you. I love your show. Your conversations are always insightful and thought provoking.
Legal cara! Como que vc começou a curtir esse canal? Eu sou canadense mas morei no Brasil depois do ensino medio durante alguns anos.
@@julianfischer2341 Opa, bacana encontrar um canadense que esteve por aqui e que sabe bem português!
Já não sei dizer bem como encontrei esses dois. Faz alguns anos que estou acompanhando o que está acontecendo em termos de infiltração ideológica em vários setores, principalmente em países como os EUA, o Canadá e o Reino Unido. Presto particular atenção a isso no mundo acadêmico - por exemplo, o caso da universidade de Evergreen, no estado de Washington.
@@Doutsoldome Interessante. Esse tipo de drama da Evergreen nunca aconteceria no Brasil. Acho interessante comparar a cultura da america do norte e a cultura do Brasil.
Morei no Rio, Manaus, Campinas, tenho conhecido varias outras cidades tambem. Eu fazia jiu-jitsu ali e participava de campeonatos e cheguei a dar aula de ingles em escola de idioma, fiz 3 periodos do curso de letras em uma faculdade particular.
Identifico com as historias pessoais do Glenn Loury por eu tambem ter vivido um pouco no lado escuro na juventude. Se nao tiver maturidade no Brasil, é facil morrer por tiro ou se envolver com prostitutas, bandidos, "vagabundagem", etc. Morei em um bairro em Manaus que tem muitas semelhanças com o que o Loury fala do lado sul do Chicago. Jovens se matando por coisas fútis, querendo mostrar o carrão e as roupas de marca para as gatinhas, não valorizando a educação.
Sendo jovem na epoca, eu inicialmente puxava mais para o lado esquerdo politicamente, querendo culpar o sistema ou retratar esses jovens como apenas vitimas.
Com a experiencia que tive ali eu entendo bem que é tambem problema de valores, cultura, e é guerra espiritual. Tem que cobrar o individuo tambem e valorizar a responsabilidade de cada pessoa.
Boa noite!
You probably wouldn't qualify as "white" from the perspective of a lot of Trump supporters here in the US. There's been a strong push to make all "hispanics" non-white over the past few decades up here, and I suspect that would include individuals of Brazilian descent as well.
@@ngrovotny I couldn't care less.
Absolutely love you guys. Voices of logic and reason with a healthy dose of nuance. Thank you
💯 you are a shortdik.
That was truly epic.
Just know that for every shriek of condenmation you might get, there are others who thank you for your intellectual honesty and courage. I wish it was a one-to-one ratio, and for now it isnt, but it is worth knowing.
@@richardbicker640 If the black community (for want of s better term) implemented any one of John or Glenn's recommendations I believe we would see very definite progress. Don't you think?
@@richardbicker640 You wouldn't need to though. You would just have an equal standard.
No one would need to spell out the facts about gaps in IQ on average. One hopes that in time those gaps , created by special treatment, tokenism and "positive discrimination " etc , were no longer a thing, would dissappear.
@@richardbicker640 Well it's on the table now and when AA goes it'll be the main course
@@richardbicker640 Your view of Europe is waaaayyyyyyyy too rosy.
This is just what the doctor ordered “Glenn and John”. Thank you kindly for your collective courage, tenacity, endurance, integrity, vulnerability, compassion and devotion.
I am a 60 y/o white guy, born in Wash DC and grew up just outside. Lived with Black people my whole life. I have had 3 jobs in my life, construction, auto mechanic, and fishing guide. In all three, there was no way to BS your way through. Color did not matter, you could either do the job or not. You had to work with and get along with all races and even the few females in those fields. There were no "adjustments" for race. Iron sharpens iron, remove the competition and everyone will suffer. To a large degree, the university system created this, and I think that it is not sustainable, the snake eventually eats it's tail.
That's the whole issue though. You were a fishing guide. They don't give two shits if anyone ever catches a fish as long as at least 50 percent of the staff is whatever race/sexuality they are screaming about that week. And if we are being honest, the overly educated types, who have never done a days worth of real labor in their lives, want that number a lot closer to 100 percent. The people like you and me, I am also a mechanic, who have real obligations that depend on a vibrant economy, that play the game of hard work and competence equal reward, have no influence on the matters at a national level. The leftist activists have it all. We have comment sections. If we group up to talk about things we are concerned about we are white supremacist terrorizers no matter our race. Things are screwy and a supreme court decision is not gonna fix it. It's societal rot.
Sorry I guess I needed to rant a bit. Good luck out there.
@@mikedodson4595 A supreme court ruling will help, don't underestimate the power of symbolism. They have warped peoples moral compasses.
@@joelanderson5285 Fair enough. I guess we have to make sure we're not too negative about things. I agree with Glenn, it shouldn't be an all or nothing situation. A lot of people in America have had their prosperity and opportunity ripped away from them over the last fifty years. I think we could do a lot more for everyone.
@@mikedodson4595 All statements that are hard to dispute.
@@richardbicker640 Well a supreme court ruling will still help the majority of citizens who are not brainwashed see that somethings up.
I love how pleased Glen is to know someone who lectures from a piano on top of producing a prolific body of work so interesting that he never thought to mention the music class until it is relevant to a point in a conversation.
Once again when I listen to you both speak, I feel incredible nostalgia for an era of excellence I experienced in my youth that seems scoffed at in today's world. I find your perspectives comforting.
On a different topic, and mention of your wife early in this episode prompted this thought to resurface, I bring up Bernie Sanders. I lived in Burlington, VT when Bernie was their celebrated 'Socialist Mayor' and being satirized in Doonesbury and viewed in many a Sunday morning comics nationwide. As the middle class has disappeared over the past 50 years and no other politician has seemed to care about people in a manner I could trace to bring me understanding that connected the dots for me, I grew more and more fond of Mr. Sanders. I left Vermont, but a nephew still there once campaigned for him, even getting to the first name level. I felt Bernie could possibly beat Donald Trump in 2016 and supported him for that reason, and I'm still sour at the Democratic party for bestowing their full favor onto Hilary and she didn't have the charisma to overcome the life force of Mr. Trump.
Now I live in Seattle, WA where crime has been decriminalized and this city is falling apart more each week because of the extreme progressive beliefs in our City and government, the tipping balance brought in by the tech industry here. Well, Bernie Sanders sent out a very large postcard in early December 2021, urging me to "Vote 'NO' on the right-wing Recall by Dec. 7th" of Council Member Kshama Sawant, calling it a "baseless power grab" by Seattle's 1% and stand with the 99% who are against the Recall. I am far from the 1%, I voted for Kshama in her first election and have regretted it ever since. Her ideas, policies and manner of governing are polarizing at best and in general, have little to do with governing the City but trying to advance national level socialist interests, not to mention social justice issues as well.
I have no idea what politician will replace Bernie for me, but it is really disarming to have Bernie shot down. He represents my youth and life politically, I've been following him for so long. But, I have first hand experience now to evaluate his message, and from my perspective, Bernie is trying to soft soap his agenda at my expense, and my trust in him has dissolved to the point that I question what he knows about governing real people at any level. His message has not changed in over 40 years, and maybe that's part of the problem.
Agree, Eve!!
Conservative-libertarian here…conservatarian a la Charlie Cooke. I appreciate your story…and can’t help but observe that Trump (idiot that he is) and Bernie had a lot in common.
Much of Bernie’s belief system.. is simply social conservatism… absent government mandates. Social conservatism asks those with many talents to share the wealth on a voluntary basis. It believes voluntary charity is where the giver deserves honor and the receiver is necessarily grateful. When the giving is forced through taxes… there is no honor. When benefits are received via entitlements… there is no gratefulness. Yet, what happens when people don’t voluntary give? The poor suffer. Yet, what happens when given is forced? Community organizations (e.g. Rotary, Kiwanis, Church, etc) become less important and social fabric declines (i.e. Read ‘Bowling Alone’ by Putnam). This is the conundrum society faces…because both sides are right… and both sides are wrong.
I'm sure you can find another Communist New York Jew Carpetbagger.
I think, unfortunately, that Bernie lost control of his own organisation. Look at the campaigns in 2020 vs 2016. They were VERY different. In 2016 Bernie was a beast: laser-focused on class and presenting a series of popular initiatives to the American public. In 2020 that clear message was watered down by a lot more wishy-washy language that sounds more like your modern DSA/idpol word salad rather than white-hot class warfare (in the good sense of the term).
My estimation is that Bernie couldn't find enough old-style socialists (like myself and, seemingly, yourself) to staff his campaign and office, and so had to turn to people willing to do the work....which is mostly a fairly elite, young, and more often than not identitarian sort of character. Bernie was the last of the old guard to fall, but in the end no one can withstand the hostage-taking arguments of the idpol left right now. The costs of standing up are too high....even for a sitting senator.
I’m a huge fan of you two, but had no idea John was such a music fan and musician!!!! Would love for John to do a podcast or video about music, classical and jazz!
Now that I'm aware John is a musical connoisseur and pianist, I would love to hear his take on the work of Phillip Ewell and the supposed "white supremacy" of music theory.
It is hard to find any other two people that evoke such depth, truth and brilliance during conversation. National treasures, the both of you. I'm so happy and humbled to have your words and perspectives bouncing around my head. Please continue to do what you do. I'll continually be here, listening and waiting for the next one.
Love these 2 intelligent gentlemen. Cheers from Toronto
I am grateful for how carefully you both think and how deeply you care. Fine episode.
Another fantastic conversation. Thanks guys!
I got my bachelors degree in Art History in 1983. My first encounter with the second wave feminist lens on 19th century art came in the form of a super liberal female professor who claimed that all of the Impressionist artists were misogynists. Due to my contrarian nature, I shared my viewpoint and wrote a paper arguing against her thesis. Needless to say, I became the class pariah. Thinking that she was an outlier in the department ( my focus was classical art history), I went on to take some graduate classes......which then demonstrated I wasn't made for academia.......mostly because I lacked the desire and ability to challenge the woke.
Its acceptable now to conflate popular identities and public opinion for quality, merit and innovative ideas......and the continued finding of dragons demands the continued redefinition of what a dragon is. Scary stuff
Just write a paper called 'I'm a Gender Unicorn'.
@@mariussielcken I'd probably be able to get it published
Correct me if I'm wrong here, but it seems like the postmodern influence ruined art institutions. The political message became more relevant than the quality. I have always preferred the defining feature of art to be excellence in that which it is. I could agree with the message or not, it could be something utilitarian or from a high art school,, but for me to call it art it must have excellent craftsmanship.
@@KingRyanoles I actually found the historical/sociopolitical/cultural information interesting and necessary.....if opinion wasn't misconstrued as fact.......like my feminist prof calling all late 19th century male artists misogynists. I didn't see evidence of this as she claimed there was and most of all it stoked a hate for the artist
I would love to take John McWhorter's Music History course. Ever think about doing a series?
My mind is blown by his singing! I had no idea!
I would too! Although it seems I like Schoenberg more than he does 🙂
@@kevinsavo718 John McWhorter singing? Where?
@@botticelli728 12:00 he sings one note!
@@kevinsavo718 Okay; I saw that. I was laughing at his imitation of an opera singer, but you're right, there's some talent there.
Thank you both of you for the courage that you display. Take heart only the courageous shall win in the end.
Would love to hear you two discuss how the western world's political sphere is sliding fast towards authoritarianism
Agreed, if anyone can approach this carefully it’s these guys. And pulling Robert Wright into it would be amazing.
ENFORCED. HOMOSEXUALITY.
@@richardbicker640 strong disagree, and Glenn does the same. They’re both still extremely articulate in these discussions. Both of them always seem to ask a question or prod their conversation partner in the direction that I’m attentive to.
Amen!! Amen!!! Preach GLENN!!! Preach it!!!
I agree with you Glenn, that we should be appointing the best qualified person to the Supreme Court, instead of pushing racial equity.
Why can’t we have both? Just asking but in the history of the Supreme Court do you really believe all the white men who sat on the bench were the best qualified??
@@jaklinhyde If race is a determining criterion over and above acumen, it is not equity. We will have both when they emerge organically from the available candidates-- which is inevitable, and has been happening increasingly over the last half century. Your whataboutism with regards to white justices is a reflexive display of the same pressured ideological demand that Glenn and John contest. It is a disservice to blacks, and fosters racial resentment. Equality of opportunity exists for qualified individuals. Equality of outcome or perfect demographic representation in all fields at all times is naive, absurd, unattainable and unnecessary. Ethics, like epistemology are not color-coded.
Why don't questions of "qualifications" come up0 when the nominees are WHITE MEN? President Biden's nominee Judge Kintangi Brown Jackson is a DOUBLE HARVARD grad (Bachelors & Law School) plus has MORE YEARS EXPEREINCE as a Judge as CURRENT SCOTUS Justices Roberts, Thomas, Kavenaugh & Barret COMBINED. She sounds pretty damn qualfi8ed.
“the currency of the realm”
love that phrase
Regardless of the topic, these two gentlemen make each video worth watching! Well done! Again!
Wading through daily the suffocatingly mind bending insanity currently circulating, I turn to you two gentlemen for the relief of the fresh air of clear thinking. You are not losing the struggle. You represent what is so obvious to the majority of people. Thank you for disregarding the opportunists of mindfuck and holding on to your sanity and courage. History will prove you the heroes of this era.
As always, an enlightening conversation.
Glenn and John are getting ever closer to the truth and fighting ever harder to avoid arriving.
Wow, John. Your point about how feel-good professors aren’t good for black progress is dead on. Im an admirer of all things rational and serious-minded, so it is hard to sit through a lecture that’s so opposed to the spirit of exploration, and knowledge.
John and Glenn, I love listening to you both. Regarding the dismantling of affirmative action, why can’t we focus on improving the school systems where many black communities are and help prepare them get into Harvard and the like? No one can get in to an Ivy League school without a proper education. I never hear anyone talking about improving the education. Handouts are not the only way of helping black Americans to thrive. Why is this concept so frowned upon? Booker T Washington dedicated his life to education because he knew how important it was. We are not selling that same message today. Would love your thoughts on a better path forward.
Research the amount of funding that goes into black community schools. Start with Baltimore. And then look at the average GPA.
YES!!!! Welcome back. I almost couldn't hold out.
Phenomenal conversation.
Have we forgotten that both Steven Sondheim and Leonard Bernstein, the creators of West Side Story, are from Jewish immigrant families? They're not exactly from the group of privileged white anglo-saxon men. Love your stuff Glenn and John! Thanks for being examples of, and speaking up for, black excellence.
They’re also gay men
Don’t forget about Jerome Robbins and Arthur Laurents, also gay Jews.
They are particularly hated: oppressed and nevertheless successful.
Yes....Gay and Socialists.....2 awesome Leftys!!!
@@evastephan9441 yep, when i think oppressed, I definitely first think of 2% of the population making up 75% of all billionaires. So oppressed. Think of the hoilabolunga!!1
Removing standardized mechanisms of evaluating candidates will prove to be catastrophic. The thought of Adcoms/dept chairs/attendings etc using terms such as "passion" or "fit" when determining my admission to med school/residency would have been terrifying! Had I been disproportionately subjected to qualitative assessments instead of standardized exams during my medical education, as an objective 5 with no charisma, I'd probably be taking your order through a talking clown right now. But fortunately, I was able to protect myself with my standardized test scores.
When this pendulum swings back- away from all of this woke nonsense there will be no recourse when your upper middle class black granddaughter who scored in the 90th percentile gets turned away because she had a perceived "attitude" during her interview
"Yes I'd like a Chicken Club Sandwich with Jack Sauce --- STAT!"
@@canopeaz Here's where your Masters degree in Classical English will serve you well without the nuisance of standardized testing. "Dost thou desire fries with thine Big Mac?"
😂
A new subscriber who appreciates your viewpoints and plan on watching and learning more!
Excellent conversation. Thank you.
Stockholm (me) travelled 4000 km to Costa del Sol i southern Spain...By car through a hurricane...Here I am in the sun listening to my favorite two guys...😘
I really appreciate how these two anticipate and address their critics' objections.
So sorry for your heartbreak John.
Professors: A while ago a former regent of the University of California, Ward Connerly, stated, "We have used affirmative action to prop up a system of artificial diversity while ignoring the heavy lifting needed to bring about real equality in this country." I think his statement was accurate then and is even more appropriate now. And I think it is the essence of what you have both set forth on the subject on this podcast as well as in other settings. Of course, what goes into the "heavy lifting" would be fertile material for a lively discussion, but that would be another discussion. Both of you are insightful and cogent and your podcasts are a breath of fresh air.
Would be better if US Blacks filed a class action lawsuit against US government. Also class action lawsuits against US corporations that profited off slavery labor. Blacks should qualify for tax exempt status. Given the enormous effort by US institutions to keep them in system of inequality.
@@paulhester489 Now this (your reply) is an example of what would go into a "lively discussion!"
You guys have to keep teaching untill you drop! Keep The window open for kids like my nephew and nieces who want to think for themselfes and be tought by inspiring teachers. Please hold out. You have massiv support slowly organising itself. 👍💪😘
Amazingly objective discussion by two amazing individuals!
Thank you both.
I've become a big John McWhorter fan based on his NY Time3s columnist & am now reading his books as well. What I'd give to take his music history class! What delightful WELL-FOUNDED human being he is--and we should ALL aspire to be so well-rounded.
great, smart conversation - as always
These two have so much to teach us! And, thank God they are natural-born teachers!
I love you guys
California’s black college graduation rates went up after affirmative programs were abolished. Enrollment rates at Berkeley and UCLA dropped, but more black students graduated in absolute numbers and with degrees in the STEM fields. Black college graduates produce more black college graduates. It’s better to have a degree from a California Riverside than an acceptance letter from Berkeley!
In Baltimore (a school district that spend $15,000 per year on education) a high school student was in the top 50 percent in his class with a .1307 GPA. Ending affirmative action will force a change in Urban education. A change resisted by the black professional educators.
It is refreshing to hear both John and Glenn like Justice Thomas express pride in one’s own academic achievement.
This being last day of black history month. I believe this, improve the K-12 education system and black will be in elite institution. Our history proves this.
There's something that nobody's talking about with regard to college admissions. I was in college myself when pressure began to be applied to colleges and universities to be non-discriminating racially in their admissions. One or two heads of admissions complained that most Afro-Americans went to K-12 schools where students did not excel. Those administrators quickly went silent, I don't know what happened to them. But I remember thinking the university is the tail-end of a long educational pipeline, and it isn't only the universities fault that they get so few academically qualified applicants.
But perhaps it is. The great majority of educators, administrators, teachers, even the union leaders of the NEA and the AFT got education degrees at colleges and universities. But the graduates of those departments are producing students not ready to enter either the work force or universities. This isn't just teachers, it's the principals, school district administrators, curriculum designers, district superintendents as well that contribute to this failure. It seems to me that those people most involved in teaching and educating came out of those colleges and universities, the colleges and universities need to acknowledge that they have allowed failure and dramatically revise their departments of education.
Thank you gentlemen, for your candor and intelligent exchanges.
It's not simply that you are both black, and for that reason your perspectives
are often not consistent with where a majority might think they should be. But that you
are both brilliant in your accomplishments and your ideations IRRESPECTIVE of your melanin content; qualities which any discerning mind can clearly see.
Your voices are important. And they, I think, are essential contributions to the progress which our nation needs to pursue.
Good guys, Messrs. Loury and McWhorton are. And smart too.
When I perceive that someone thinks I have achieved my position due to affirmative action it demoralizes me, depresses me, and demotivates me. It really does.
don’t worry bro - I see you :)
@S He. You're not Black and as a white person it never bothered people that white people were given opportunity Black people were not given.
@@halbleavy9900 how did you infer this persons ethnicity through the comment?
@@halbleavy9900 aside from that though, what the hell are you saying?😂
Why would it demotivate you?
I wish we were seeing Glenn on as many podcasts and media appearances as John. Rogan, Chris Williams, more with Coleman and Bill Maher need to invite him!
Word. Down with affirmative action and its descendants: diversity, equity and inclusion! The DEI movement will disintegrate eventually, the question is how much damage will be done before this happens.
I hear you. But pray tell, besides the 20 blacks & 7 Hispanics who get into each of the 8 Ivy League schools, where else in America is Affirmative Action even actualized? I certainly cannot tell by my friends or even the Black community. Where is all this advantage for Blacks? I just don't see it.
@@richardbicker640 Yea! Black men are over represented at the Museum... Hilarious! The only place Black men are over represented is in the criminal justice system and 3 or for sports...and NOWHERE else. White people, especially the Irish, like Heather, are just playing the VICTIM card. Read "How the Irish Became White". There is typically a Hannity, McDonald, O'Reilly, Murphy and McConnell complaining about Black people taking "THEIR" jobs. The Irish have been playing the VICTIM card since 1850 when Blacks in the North East were free for over 100 years and speaking articulate King's English, leading the trade industry as Masons, Carpenters, Black Smiths, Textile experts, Maritime workers and Printers, all while the just arriving Irish could not speak English and came from an impoverished agrarian class. Wherever you find racism and complaining...you will almost always find an Irish person leading loudly! I kid you not! If the Irish Catholics left and returned Europe, America's poor racial climate would seek to exist...overnight. I'm a Bostonian. Trust I know! The Irish, like Heather, just hide behind their white skinned privilege to make everything about race, which in turn makes Black Americans do similar.
@@richardbicker640 Yes all the isms! My family has been here (America) since the 1670s. They were freed from servitude in 1694. They helped settle towns in MA until the revolution....and fought in the revolution. Interesting is that America become more racist after the revolution. Blacks, even after 150 years, never got to play the Nativism card. On the contrary. Massachusetts form of Jim Crow was created soon after 1783 when slavery was abolished in the state. In fact, legal Jim Crow was created in Boston and normalized w/ Plessy V. Ferguson. Plessy/Ferguson was decided upon Boston case law where the words "Separate but Equal" we're first uttered (Roberts vs. City of Boston). In truth Slavery was a burden, but Jim Crow was the true savagery. The Irish used Segregation to JUMP ahead of the line, even as they were less prepared to work. Hurt people Hurt people! The Irish were a hurt people and they still are hurting other people to this very day under the guise of being "white". As stated, if the Irish can get their racist head out of their racist bum bums, this country will clean itself up quickly! It is the not Scandinavians, French, Spanish or even Italians that lead being racists. It's the Heathers of the world who think "America is Ours".
Last, as a young man I worked in the trades. (Scored highest on the test). The Irish guys hated when I came. The Italians treated me kindly. Bu the racism that the Irish showed toward the Italians was so savage! Behind the Irish's back the Italians would always say: The Irish are "F'ng Jerks". Think on this! It's just more Irish ethnocentrism cloaked in whiteness.
Have a good day!
@@TrillEverything " Where is all this advantage for Blacks? "
It exists all across the creative class. Academia, especially, but also journalism, publishing (at least on the authoring side, seemingly less so on the actual publisher side), increasingly also in finance, etc..
The problem is that the domain of explicit Black advantage is very narrow, and almost exclusively elite. It does nothing to help that vast, vast majority of Black Americans who are, of course, working class (like the majority of every other demographic). So when elites complain about positive discrimination, they're right. Same as when non-elite Black Americans complain about discrimination in their lives...they're also right!
That's what makes the situation so hard to unravel and address.
I remember watching a women's conference (in the 2000s, so not ancient history) on leadership in business. A speaker at this conference was talking about how one of the aspects required for successful leadership is technical skill in your field, but how when men mentor women for leadership, they tend to focus on people skills. I thought at the time this was a strange default because if there would be a stereotype or bias, it would be that women are better at soft skills. I could only account for that by either 1) assuming that people are so aware of biases that they are overcorrecting or 2) that they are assuming that the major impediment to women are personal biases, so they need extra interpersonal skill to compensate. The speaker pointed out that whatever the intention, by lowering technical standards, these mentors where handicapping women... and that women mentoring should be cognizant of the technical requirements of leadership.
I think the same thing applies here to the black community. It's much like the old joke about the guy looking for keys under street lamp when he lost them in an alley. Lowering standards is easier to do, but it's never going to yield the same results as more directly addressing technical, financial, and other tangible disparities.
Nor is this problem unique to women in business or black people in higher education. There are reflections of this over and over. Self-help that focuses entirely on mindset. Feels good, can drive a thriving industry where people consume book, after course, after expensive consultant training... and still have no tangible outcomes. Same with televangelists and the gospel of wealth. At the end of the day, this approach of mindset (or bias) only approaches proliferate because they never work themselves out of a job, because they can always claim your mindset wasn't good enough.
At a certain point, if you want tangible change, you have to recognize that your mindset is never going to be perfect enough to compensate for a lack of well-researched action and developing technical skills.
Not totally losing. I’m on your side but I wouldn’t have been two years ago. People are waking up, it will take time.
"I’m on your side but I wouldn’t have been two years ago."
If I may ask, what changed you?
@@newmediarules that is a long complicated story that spans my whole life. I think what it boils down to is me being more honest about reality and not having sound data on my side whenever my beliefs were challenged in the past. Over time I was forced to be more mature. Kind of like when Thomas Sowell gave up Marxist ideals, “I grew up”
I so look forward to hearing what both of you have to say. Having said that, I do feel that Glenn is more willing to dispense with emotional arguments as opposed to John. IMHO, Glenn bases his arguments almost solely upon reason and logic.
Conservative here from the Bronx. Enjoyed the new west side story.
It’s called Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)….it is real and I have some advice as a retired physiology professor, and as a Doctor of the Soul as my vocation.
You can move to Arizona where we have sunshine 300 days a year without the humidity of Florida….or, you can sit in front of an incandescent light of a 60 Watt minimum…you gotta give yourself 14 hours of light per day….so, compute sunrise (it’s above the clouds) and sunset….a la June 21. In your eye you have photoreceptors that connect to a little gland called the pineal gland. Anyway, you guys are PhD’s and have assistants to help you discover this syndrome.
I respect you as brothers in our humanity, our roles as educators, and commentators to our culture. I am a practitioner of soul care, by God’s grace..
Truth!
My two favorite movies are Dr. Strangelove and West Side Story, 1961.
John, you should turn your music/piano lectures into an online class! I'd be the first to sign up!
I think I know exactly who John is describing and that someone instantly comes to mind is I think indicative of how widespread this phenomenon is
What a crazy world!!! The world has went off the rails. Great to hear logic being spoken in a loony world.
Should I retire from listening to these guys speak? Do they have anything important to say anymore? I'm trying to maintain maximum honesty.
They always say the same things.
Try listening to Jimmy Dore
The are resigned to the fact that they will never be able to compete. And I agree
John, if I ever meet you in my travels, the drinks are on me.
1:00:08 Bingo! Such persons on the frontlines will not work themselves out of a job.....they can't or they'll be unemployed.
The surgeon comment reminded me of an experience I had in Kenya. I broke my leg very badly & needed surgery, and the doctor talking to me about the surgery was stumbling over an awkward question which I finally realized was basically "which colour of surgeon would you prefer?" I assume they asked me this because I'm white. Anyway, I said I want the *best* surgeon, who turned out to be black. I felt really bad for the person asking me the question.
What about the proliferation of academic majors? It seems to me that we added places for people who have no desire or aptitude for quantitative methods, which gets replaced by an ideology such as anti-racism, leading to the hammer/nail paradigm. Having spent my life in physics research, it's nuts that NSF, NIH, etc funding becomes another nail for the hammer.
*John's music appreciation course sound excellent...but he didn't get to hip-hop and rap. lol. My daughter called me from an early year of college, and I asked about her course, specifically, gen. ed since she was a physics major. She said she was taking music app, and I asked if they started with Brahms, and the fugue, etc. She laughed and said no, the course only covered rap and hip/hop...Thanks you guys!
Culturally we're now experiencing an aesthetic broadly resembling Soviet Socialist Realism, but without the government edicts. The prose of '30s cultural criticism both in the Soviet Union and Western socialist media is remarkably similar (the term "privilege" a constant refrain), today we've simply substituted "non-white" for "working class." And both the art in galleries and new plays produced (off-broadway) are increasingly taking up the form and language of agitprop, with suspicion directed at abstraction and interest in the ambiguities of language.
Can you do a talk about racial prejudices/preferences in dating/sexual attraction?
I've largely reconciled myself to Biden's supreme court choice by concluding that his actual choice was made by the same criteria as all other supreme court justices. It was a political choice. There is a competence floor which W Bush demonstrated when he tried to nominate his family lawyer to the court, but beyond that it's all patronage and political payoffs. So, I tell myself that Biden's specific choice was chosen not so much for her race, but rather because she's sufficiently competent in the law and her edge is that she is very well-connected to the right politically-significant people. This same criteria can be applied to all those white guys too, whether the ones who thought themselves elite and were never chosen, or those who were not seen as the best-of-the-best and yet were chosen. There is a skill level beyond which back-scratching becomes more important than skill.
As a Latino graduate student in psychology, I have to say I really get angry that media and democrats seems to care only about black folks and doesn’t care about us. Much much less Asians or Native American People. And we’re about 25% of the population. And Latin American is next door to us. It pisses me off.
How about if we stop being sorted according to degrees of privilege and victimhood, race and ethnicity, sex and gender, and all of the other boutique identity buckets used to keep us angry and distracted, frightened and righteous, and think of ourselves as individuals who share a common cause: human flourishing.
@@willmercury I agree, but since utopia isn’t possible- I want my slice of the pie too. We Latinos are about 25% and want more than we have.
The Democratic party (meaning, the leadership and institution), contrary to popular belief, is almost exclusively a part of the Atlantic North East. It is also very white. While the West Coast may be a major zone of influence for the party the real power will always be in the East (it doesn't matter how much money Pelosi raises from her rich friends....).
In the East there are simply far fewer Latinos and Hispanics. The party leadership literally doesn't know them/us (I'm mixed, myself). You can see it in how they talk about Latino voters.....like they've never met a Latino in their life! They also don't understand how fuzzy the line between 'white/Anglo' and 'Latino' is....especially in the Southwest.
What does it mean to be Latino in a community where virtually everyone you know has at least SOME Latino family? What does it mean to be Latino in a region where they/we are, if not an outright majority, very near it? They have no idea. We don't fit their model (no one really does, but the closest they can come to is Black Americans), so they don't know how to respond to us. It's as simple as that.
@@rustedgreen5916 Well, we White's are 60%, and we want to maintain control over the countries we have built. Are you willing to live under a Caste system, as is the case already in much of Latin & South America?
I had no idea McWhorter was a classical music aficionado.
He knows a BROAD range of music. He's a music nut. Goes with linguistics
Appreciated John's synopsis of Cornel West 😉
58:41, Glenn is wrong. John *IS* doing something to try to change how his daughters will be treated and so is Glenn. They are both speaking out against regressive, racist nonsense, and we’re lucky to have them!
Truth is this was a sad conversation, a conundrum at best, diversity would be great, but can not be achieved by merit.
nice job guys. Sadly re "old white guy from Connecticut" i resemble that remark
We have mentors in DK, if you have smart understimulated students it shouldn't take long to bring them up to par, and teach them how to be an University student, wich is an art unto it self.🤗
Can't we make appointments to the Supreme Court based on who is the best person for the job regardless of race, sex, and all the other things that have really nothing to do with competence? I love Glenn's surgery analysis and like him, I want the BEST person no matter who they are.
@@richardbicker640 Ha! "Sorry y'all. Ya just ain't got the chops."
Maybe someday. Not in 2022. Identity trumps competence.
I don't care how much truth and context people like Loury & McWhorter put behind their words, the haters will nevertheless come out of the wood work w/"thoughts" like "Did you say anything about O'Connor's or Thomas' qualifications???"
@36:42. John, we all know you are talking about Ibram Kendi.
@49:06 Cornell West
Oops maybe not
We love u John!!
0:37 There IS a three letter answer to the wintertime blues......N....H....L !!! Game on fellas. Really, it works.
@26:00 Um, I seriously doubt that not valuing your education or school is a "reaction" from the 60s or 70s. I mean you're not getting "better" results in "all black" schools taught by an all-black staff.
They don’t get better results even with optimal resources.
Here's the thing people forget about West Side Story: Leonard Bernstein, who composed it, was a big supporter of the civil rights movement. (So was Irving Berlin, for example, but he wasn't involved in West Side Story and wasn't as supportive of other "liberal" or "left wing" causes of the time as Bernstein was.) Honestly, given all the brouhaha over black animated characters being played by white actors not so long ago, I'm surprised people aren't complaining that Spielberg cast a black woman, Ariana Dubose, in the female lead for the new movie instead of a Puerto Rican (or at least Hispanic). That said, I probably won't see it because I'd rather see the original movie.
As an aside, John's description of it being written by "Jewish white men smoking cigarettes in the 50s" is spot on. Leonard Bernstein did in fact write it in the 50s and was in fact a heavy smoker. (The original film, however was released in the early 60s.)
The conversations at the Loury family dinner table must be interesting to say the least. I have similar family members that share the same democratic socialist ideals and I must say my patience runs thin. Not because of their views but their lack of curiosity to examine facts with an objectivity that fosters discourse. It's like talking to a spoiled child at times... But I digress..
Keep up the good work gentlemen.
I mean Loury doesn’t present facts or research on this issues. I find the crowd that follows him to be the group that ignores the data on these issues. Seriously how many studies or books by blk academics have you read on this topic?
Just set a minimum threshold . Score above, you are o.k. for admission here. You can make it here. Then randomly select applicants above the threshold. Don't rank applicants.
Have either of you met, spoken with or debated Christopher Hitchens? I’d love to hear your thoughts on the late great Hitchens, and also would love to see the two of you debate god/religion. I ask because (imo), belief in god/religion are central to the issues we face today. Believers are essentially unhinged and can allow for the most pervasive ideas, worse they hand those awful and inaccurate ideas down to their children.
I debated Hitchens 23 years ago -- and won! t.co/q7tLFrgIBJ
If you can dismiss West Side Story for racial reasons, you can then dismiss Hamilton the play.
Lol, I remember saying "despite the fact that I'm wearing a cashmere cardigan..." 30 years ago on the corner of Christopher and Gay. PS Everything is stupid and we're all doomed.
I listen to old white folks and apparently old black folks, old farmers, old musicians, old folks in gereral. Why you ask? cause with age comes wisdom and that's why I listen to learn something.
47:20 He's talking about Michael Eric Dyson or Cornell West?
i thought he might be talking about neil degrasse tyson
Dignity and gravitas. That got a little moving at the end.
Another great talk. John - when you're talking about your little girls - I felt that. I have 3 white sons and feel the same way. I give them every opportunity, our house if full of books, they get technology in their hands to learn and we do everything we can to teach them about real US history. They are in the 99%+ percentile for their ages and test above their grades. Yet I cant help but feel by time they're adults they're doomed because the color of their skin.
No one is doomed anymore, world is so wealthy and still capitalist so someone will pay for good worker, at worst person might be disfavored in small ways so not get fairness in tests or applications. I am white but that ll suck, then I gotta admit women and minorities struggled w same pre1960 and many like 50% of women still had jobs and more for others, , , I just disagree w "doomed", maybe things will seem "harder". US humans are weird, capitalism keeps us honest, the bad part of govt and govt subsidies it allows stupid orgs to keep being stupid, so less govt is good... Luckily the big majority of people will prob vote to limit crazy to medium crazy... The silent heroes to me are Asians, spreaking hard languages and getting no respect and then shrugging that off and thinking I'll find a way to win and then laugh as.my kids inherit more power what a healthy way... Yes unfairness is bad, but man in ancient history work was show unfair except for nobles often of a minority who oppressed the Welsh farmers etc ....
@@richardbicker640 ... We are all Prejudged a bit, ugly people, fat people, minorities even, sweaty nerds who are geniuses, , , blacks pre70 women pre60 anyone w accent pre50 (Ricky Ricardo was trailblazer an accent on US TV on I Love Lucy)... Luckily capitalism punishes not hiring the best so helps fight bias and that's how Jews and Asians do well no one loves them, , , humans dislike so easily and I don't like it but stop saying other groups didn't face dislike too and they fought thru it,. ,. , Try being a Catholic in N Minnesota and boy hard to get a job, ,. Or a Catholic in England till 1910.... Humans often face unfairness it is a Lie to freak out and act like us whites are the first or worst, , ,. We should close all govt schools so private schools run education and over time the crazier schools lose respect and donations if too crazy, ,.
There is a danger of introducing a kind of branding where you get wheeled into the emergency room, and you hear, "Dr. Chen from Harvard will do the surgery." And you think - thank heavens - they tried everything they possibly could to keep that person out of medical school, they must be good.
Dr Glenn wants black excellence but unwilling to debate Dr Darity on reparations and 150 years after the Emacipation Proclaimation?
The best thing I ever saw were m7usic instrument auditions behind an opaque screen, obscuring the judging panel from the candidates. Wonder what identity politics would say about that.
as a visual artist i wish that were the case for art competitions, and it should be. i sigh when i submit my work to an open competition because i know that my bio as old white male will be n automatic deduction in the eyes of the judges
Glenn, you know damn well, that College education is overpriced . . . Stop it.
We know you're talking about Cornel West, brother man! @47:24
Drearest teacher and friend hard edged excellent in any subjects will allow us to shine this has always been present in the black community remember pressure makes diamonds
Is the ration of Black male to Black female students at Harvard a concern, for affirmative action reasons? Does race trump gender or vice versa, affirmative action wise?