It's About Liberty: A Conservative Forum
Topics => General Board => Topic started by: AlanS on October 29, 2013, 07:44:51 PM
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http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/oct/22/sowell-the-race-hustlers-among-us/ (http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/oct/22/sowell-the-race-hustlers-among-us/)
Years ago, someone said that according to the laws of aerodynamics, bumblebees cannot fly. But the bumblebees, not knowing the laws of aerodynamics, go ahead and fly anyway.
Something like that happens among people. There have been many ponderous academic writings and dour editorials in the mainstream media lamenting that most people born poor cannot rise in American society anymore. Meanwhile, many poor immigrants arrive here from various parts of Asia, and rise on up the ladder anyway.
Often these Asian immigrants arrive not only with very little money, but also very little knowledge of English. They start out working at low-paid jobs but working so many hours, often at more than one job, that they are able to put a little money aside.
After a few years, they have enough money to open some little shop, where they still work long hours, and still save their money so that they can afford to send their children to college. Meanwhile, these children know that their parents not only expect, but demand, that they make good grades.
Some people try to explain why Asians and Asian-Americans succeed so well in education and in the economy by some special characteristics that they have. That may be true, but their success may also be a result of what they do not have; namely, “leaders” who tell them that the deck is so stacked against them that they cannot rise, or at least not without depending on “leaders.”
Such “leaders” are like the people who said that the laws of aerodynamics showed that the bumblebee cannot fly. Those who have believed such “leaders” have, in fact, stayed grounded, unlike the bumblebees.
A painful moment came for me years ago, when I was on the lecture circuit, after a talk at Marquette University, when a young black student rose and asked: “Even though I am graduating from Marquette University, what hope is there for me?”
Back in the 1950s when I was a student, I never encountered any fellow black student who expressed such hopelessness, even though there was far more racial discrimination then. We knew that there were obstacles for us to overcome, and we intended to overcome them.
PHOTOS: Surfer breaks wave-riding record, then saves drowning friend
The memory of that Marquette student came back to me, years later, when another black young man said that he had wanted to become a pilot, and had even planned to join the Air Force in order to do so. But then, he said, he now “realized” that “the Man” would never allow a black guy to become a pilot.
This was decades after a whole squadron of black fighter-plane pilots made a reputation for themselves in World War II as the Tuskegee Airmen. There have been black generals in the Air Force.
Both these young men — and many others — have learned all too well the lessons taught by race hustlers, in their social version of the laws of aerodynamics, which said that they could not rise.
You don’t hear about racial “leaders” such as Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson among Asians or Asian-Americans. Here and there, you may see some irresponsible academics peddling that line in the classroom — some of whom are of Asian ancestry, since no race of human beings is completely lacking in fools.
But they do not get the same attention, or draw the same following, as race hustlers operating in black or Hispanic communities. By and large, Asian youngsters rise and fly.
Other groups in times past also arrived on these shores with very little money and often with very little education, at least during the immigrant generation.
A poem by Carl Sandburg, back during that era, referred to a Jewish fish peddler in Chicago: “His face is that of a man terribly glad to be selling fish, terribly glad that God made fish, and customers to whom he may call his wares from a pushcart.”
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wonderful post, I never thought about the lack of a "grievance industry" for Asians in America, but they do not have that crutch of "guilt" used by blacks for the years of slavery although I would imagine the lives of the Chinese who came here to work on the railroads was not much better.
If you think about it through the long range eye of world history, just about everyone's ancestors were someone's slaves at some time. The Gauls and celts were slaves to the romans, greeks and Persians, many south American tribes were slaves to the more dominant incas, maya and Aztecs etc etc etc, yet you only have the American blacks still whining about slavery that happened generations ago.
Maybe I, of Irish and german ancestry, should seek reparations from the Italian government since my ancestors were undoubtedly slaves of some roman at some time...
Until the blacks in America (and not all black here now were descended from blacks who were slaves in the south) can disabuse themselves of the idea that somehow they alone were the subject of slavery as a class or race, they will remain self-exiled bitter victims of an imagined singular grievance that entitles them to some special consideration. they need to get over themselves and have a little more faith in what their hard work could accomplish rather than gripe to get something for an ancestor's non-particular experience.
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Dr Sowell is one of the finest minds in the conservative camp IMO. Good article as usual, thanks for posting it.
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Dr Sowell is one of the finest minds in the conservative camp IMO. Good article as usual, thanks for posting it.
I owe Dr. Sowell for setting me down and explaining the world to me. If it weren't for him I would probably still be an idiot lefty.
His Columns are good, his Books are brilliant. (http://www.tsowell.com/writings.html) Knowledge and Decisions is what changed me, but the Trilogy on culture (Conquests and Cultures, Migrations and Cultures, Race and Culture) was eyeopening as well. A Conflict of Vision basically helped me gain my first understanding of the other side ( because while I was one of them,it was through lack of intelligence applied to the subject, not the sociopathic narcissism that drives the die hards) and then Sowell turned me onto Eric Hoffer, and there is no better description of Left than "the True Believer"
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Dr Sowell is one of the finest minds in the conservative camp IMO. Good article as usual, thanks for posting it.
I owe Dr. Sowell for setting me down and explaining the world to me. If it weren't for him I would probably still be an idiot lefty.
His Columns are good, his Books are brilliant. (http://www.tsowell.com/writings.html) Knowledge and Decisions is what changed me, but the Trilogy on culture (Conquests and Cultures, Migrations and Cultures, Race and Culture) was eyeopening as well. A Conflict of Vision basically helped me gain my first understanding of the other side ( because while I was one of them,it was through lack of intelligence applied to the subject, not the sociopathic narcissism that drives the die hards) and then Sowell turned me onto Eric Hoffer, and there is no better description of Left than "the True Believer"
I truly believe he is the smartest man in America. How odd that the many who thinks himself the smartest man, and the man that actually IS the smartest man, are both black men. And yet the black culture seems to teach them that they CANNOT be smart and should not attempt to be so. I do not understand it.
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My daughter teaches female Chinese students at a boarding school. They are expected to get good grades. There is no other option.
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Bravo. Thanks for posting. On our side we have patriots like Sowell, Clarence Thomas, and Allen West. They've got hustlers like Sharpton and Jackson, making a nice living demoralizing black youth. And Obama the exploiter.
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let's not forget Dr. Ben Carson
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I truly believe he is the smartest man in America. How odd that the many who thinks himself the smartest man, and the man that actually IS the smartest man, are both black men. And yet the black culture seems to teach them that they CANNOT be smart and should not attempt to be so. I do not understand it.
His are the only books that share a shelf with those of the Founding Father's writings. If Sowell could have been there in 1787, I don't think we would be in the mess we are in now. I have have written him on occasion, and more than once he has actually taken the time to write me back. Thomas Sowell is a national treasure. I give a copy of "Knowledge and Decisions" to every College and High School graduate that I am obligated to give a gift to. But don';t forget I am a racist who hates black people. Good thing Sowell isn't a real black person or I would be in trouble.
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Yeah, one of my favorite thinkers of all time.
And I hate the left all the more for they way they dismiss such people, those who dare to step off the plantation and think for themselves, who make no claim on the fruits of labor of their fellow man. Those that don't see their skin color as a curse or a crutch nor something to be exploited.
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And another one. (http://www.nationalreview.com/article/352518/heady-vision-control-thomas-sowell)
Though the best of all time is the Sowell Triumvirate of questions
The Difference Between Liberal and Conservative (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5KHdhrNhh88#)
At What cost?
As compared to what?
Do you Have any Hard evidence of that?
and while not officially grouped by Sowell with those, but suggested by him later:
And after you do that, what do you think will happen Next?
With these questions you can destroy ANY lefty position.
Not that they will notice, recognize it or care
If we had to have a black man for president why couldn't it be this black man? Oh right, he is not dumb enough to run.