Solving the "Race" Problem

PoliticalChic

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Another day, another post by some Liberal sticking up for black folks against imagined insults by the Right.

So....let me give a tip-of-the-hat to brilliant Daniel Patrick Moynihan: Liberal? Conservative? Or simply smart.

His proposal for treating blacks? He suggested that "the issue of race could benefit from a period of 'benign neglect'.
Not the overarching 'mothering' that Liberals have enforced....

Why? Because he understood the history of every ethnic group. Such as the Irish....




1. The Irish were the first ethnic minority in American cities, and their history shows the classic pattern of new comers to the urban economy, and society. Beginning in the 1820’s, and continued with the massive immigration of the 1840’s and 1850’s. Starting at the very bottom of the urban occupational ladder, with the men as laborers and the woman as maids. Housing was far worse than urban slums today.
Thomas Sowell, "Ethnic America," chapter one.

a. The French sociologist, Gustave de Beaumont, visited Ireland in 1835 and wrote: "I have seen the Indian in his forests, and the Negro in his chains, and thought, as I contemplated their pitiable condition, that I saw the very extreme of human wretchedness; but I did not then know the condition of unfortunate Ireland...In all countries, more or less, paupers may be discovered; but an entire nation of paupers is what was never seen until it was shown in Ireland."

b. Slaves in the United States had a greater life expectancy than peasants in Ireland.





2. The living conditions was readily conducive to violence, alcoholism, and crime. And the native population quickly moved out of neighborhoods en masse as the immigrants moved in. They were characterized as drunkards, brawlers, and incompetents.

a. “The first blacks to move into Harlem were middle-class Negroes who left the black enclave in mid-Manhattan around the turn of the century to get away from the Irish living nearby.” Thomas Sowell, “Ethnic America,” p.39.

b. The Irish had similar relations with the Scotch-Irish, the Germans, the Italians, and the Jews. Wittke, “The Irish in America,” p. 183,189,190.

3. Unemployment exacerbated by signs such as “No Irish need apply.” The jobs they could get were considered too hard, too dirty, too menial, or too dangerous for others.

4. Their average life expectancy was forty years, thus the 19th century observation, “you seldom see a gray-haired Irishman.”






5. They rose slowly….over generations. Their first successes were in politics. It started in the mid-19th century, and within a few decades, they became dominant in big city “machines” in Boston, New York, and other metropolitan areas.

a. And while this brought prosperity and prominence to a few, it had little impact on the lives of most Irish-Americans. In the 1890’s most of the men were still laborers, and the women, domestics.

6. How about the Kennedys? The first arrived in 1848, a laborer. He lived and he died a laborer. Edward Banfield, “The Unheavenly City,” p. 58.

a. But- his son was successful enough to send the grandson to college. That grandson was Joseph P. Kennedy, and he made a fortune that enabled the great-grandsons to achieve …a certain level of success in politics.

7. For the Irish, their success took over a century before equality was achieved in income, IQ, occupations, and other socioeconomic indicia.





8. Note: social acceptance came slowly, and followed achievements, rather than being a precondition.

a. It was the misfortune of black Americans that they were just on the verge of passing through the immigrant experience when damaging ideas about welfare and the lenient attitude about crime took hold. It could have happened to the Italians, Germans, Jews or Irish, but luckily for them, there were no Liberals around to “help” when they arrived. Coulter, “Mugged,” chapter 7.

So....what can we learn from the classic pattern exhibited by the travails of the Irish?

Solving the problem of 'race'?


Don't expect to race to a solution.
 
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A well-dressed, educated, second generation or better, Irishman appears no different than any white American. An African-American of the same stripe is still black and in this country, fucked up as its been about race, it still matters. That's why examples from European immigrant groups aren't equivalent.
 
A well-dressed, educated, second generation or better, Irishman appears no different than any white American. An African-American of the same stripe is still black and in this country, fucked up as its been about race, it still matters. That's why examples from European immigrant groups aren't equivalent.

Well, captain obvious....fixated on color as you are, you are oblivious as to the numerous similarities that abound......

....you choose to ignore the similar memes that were associated with the Irish and blacks,...


...and pretend that many Irish are not identifiable as such.


The subtext of the OP is that the marginally intelligent, and those who lean toward the mantra of the Left...that America and Americans are evil, are unable to acknowledge that there is a period of acculturation that 'immigrant' groups go through.


If the 'special' treatment accorded to blacks was not....they'd do as well as the Irish, Germans, Jews, Italians....etc.



Unless you'd like to make the argument that they are inferior to these other groups. Is that where you were headed?
 
Please do not use my Irish ancestors as a tool to bash blacks, PC.

While I know that you are being tongue in cheek...I can't pass up this opportunity to add to the ideas of the OP....


I sure hope you aren't falling into the category of folks who pretend to the world what good folks they are in sniffing out imagined 'racism' at every opportunity.


Coulter speaks to that exact point in chapter seven of her book, "Mugged," as follows:

'Liberals took blacks as their pets, and then tried to kill them off by patronizing them to death. Thrilled with their role as ‘white friend-of-the-blacks,’ many found that they could actually make a living at it! The part requires sneering at nonexistent racists, and memorizing one line: “Goddam it, this may cost me my career but I’m going to speak up for racial equality and let the chips fall where they may!” '


Seems as though those Liberals actually believe that blacks can't handle life as well as other ethnic groups did.

You don't believe that.....do you?
 
Please do not use my Irish ancestors as a tool to bash blacks, PC.

While I know that you are being tongue in cheek...I can't pass up this opportunity to add to the ideas of the OP....


I sure hope you aren't falling into the category of folks who pretend to the world what good folks they are in sniffing out imagined 'racism' at every opportunity.


Coulter speaks to that exact point in chapter seven of her book, "Mugged," as follows:

'Liberals took blacks as their pets, and then tried to kill them off by patronizing them to death. Thrilled with their role as ‘white friend-of-the-blacks,’ many found that they could actually make a living at it! The part requires sneering at nonexistent racists, and memorizing one line: “Goddam it, this may cost me my career but I’m going to speak up for racial equality and let the chips fall where they may!” '


Seems as though those Liberals actually believe that blacks can't handle life as well as other ethnic groups did.

You don't believe that.....do you?

No, but apparently Coulter thinks black people are verging on retardation.
 
Please do not use my Irish ancestors as a tool to bash blacks, PC.

While I know that you are being tongue in cheek...I can't pass up this opportunity to add to the ideas of the OP....


I sure hope you aren't falling into the category of folks who pretend to the world what good folks they are in sniffing out imagined 'racism' at every opportunity.


Coulter speaks to that exact point in chapter seven of her book, "Mugged," as follows:

'Liberals took blacks as their pets, and then tried to kill them off by patronizing them to death. Thrilled with their role as ‘white friend-of-the-blacks,’ many found that they could actually make a living at it! The part requires sneering at nonexistent racists, and memorizing one line: “Goddam it, this may cost me my career but I’m going to speak up for racial equality and let the chips fall where they may!” '


Seems as though those Liberals actually believe that blacks can't handle life as well as other ethnic groups did.

You don't believe that.....do you?

No, but apparently Coulter thinks black people are verging on retardation.



Not true.


Her book...you might want to read it as one of those painful experiences that folks endure to build character....decries the "help" that Liberals provide for blacks that actually inhibits their advancement in society.

Summed up in this item from the OP:

It was the misfortune of black Americans that they were just on the verge of passing through the immigrant experience when damaging ideas about welfare and the lenient attitude about crime took hold. It could have happened to the Italians, Germans, Jews or Irish, but luckily for them, there were no Liberals around to “help” when they arrived. Coulter, “Mugged,” chapter 7.
 
Perhaps the solution, and working ever so slowly, is that the American people become a little darker in color. How long?
The changes in the race problem just during my lifetime have been enormous, changes that have caused some people no end of grief and others some hope.
For me, I got out of Canaryville, the Yards and Archey Road. Anyone?
If we ever achieve the utopian dream of a job for everyone able to work and a wage that meets minimum standards we would be well on our way to solving the race thing.
 
Perhaps the solution, and working ever so slowly, is that the American people become a little darker in color. How long?
The changes in the race problem just during my lifetime have been enormous, changes that have caused some people no end of grief and others some hope.
For me, I got out of Canaryville, the Yards and Archey Road. Anyone?
If we ever achieve the utopian dream of a job for everyone able to work and a wage that meets minimum standards we would be well on our way to solving the race thing.

1. reggie....I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt, and assume you are not lame-brained enough to be advising such....but guess who is:

Michael Moore, in his book “Stupid White Men : ...And Other Sorry Excuses for the State of the Nation!” urges whites to marry blacks and procreate so we can breed the whiteness out of the country. P. 79.



2. If I were to write a satirical post as though I were an inveterate Liberal, I'd write exactly what you did:

"If we ever achieve the utopian (sic) dream of a job for everyone able to work and a wage that meets minimum standards we would be well on our way to solving the race thing."


a. Only a Liberal would resort to a view that Utopia on earth is the ultimate aim. That's like a photographer whose plan is to take a close-up of the horizon.


b. Wages? Money? Materialism?


You Leftists really don't understand people, and that's why totalitarian states need gulags and re-education camps to insure 'correct' thinking.


You might lean from Dennis Prager's "Still The Best Hope:"


Every Leftist is, essentially, a Marxist…even though most eschew the title since the fall of the Soviet Union. Even so, Left-wing ideas are predicated on Marx’s materialist view. Philosophically, the term implies that only material things are real.

And, of course, God and religious beliefs are nonsense.

From Marx on, the Left has fought against religion for the above reason, and because they understood how difficult it is to get religious people to engage in revolution for the purpose of bettering their material lives. Such folks often relegate the material world to lower priority than the spiritual, moral and intellectual world.

While the Judeo-Christian society labels actions as ‘good’ or ‘evil,’ due to morality and/or self-control, the Left sees the results as due to material inequality, i.e., violent crime due to poverty.

The Left has been far more interested in fighting material inequality than tyranny, which is why Lenin, Mao, Pol Pot, Ho Chi Minh, Castro, etc., tend to have the support of Leftists around the world.
 
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Perhaps the solution, and working ever so slowly, is that the American people become a little darker in color. How long?
The changes in the race problem just during my lifetime have been enormous, changes that have caused some people no end of grief and others some hope.
For me, I got out of Canaryville, the Yards and Archey Road. Anyone?
If we ever achieve the utopian dream of a job for everyone able to work and a wage that meets minimum standards we would be well on our way to solving the race thing.

"...a wage that meets minimum standards...."


Minimum wage laws are a major impediment to low-skilled workers entering and moving up in the labor force.....

...and a fine method of keeping blacks unemployed.


1. In 1938 the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) established a federal minimum wage law for all employees engaged in interstate commerce.($7.25 as of 2009) When Social Security and medial benefits are included, the wage must be considered to be over $10/ hour. This governmental intervention in the labor market makes it impossible to argue that there is a free market in this respect.
Walter E. Williams, "Race & Economics," chapter three.


2. It should be noted that in 1930 blacks represented over 80 % of the unskilled labor force, but were excluded from unions. The fact is that Davis-Bacon was collusion between labor and contractors, as the Secretary of Labor determines the prevailing wage, and almost always the calculation was the same as union wages…no matter large percentages of the work was by non-union workers.

a. Davis-Bacon wages add 4% to commercial construction, and 9% to residential. Hammermesh and Rees, “The Economics of Work and Pay,” p. 247


3. To be clear, the Davis-Bacon requirements make it unfeasible for non-union shops to hire and train unskilled workers, as they would have to pay wages that exceed the workers’ productivity.

a. After the enactment of Davis-Bacon, black unemployment rose relative to that of whites.
Vedder and Galloway, “Racial Dimensions of the Davis-Bacon Act.”


Your view is a perfect example of Liberal hallmark: feeling passes for knowing.
 
This is a political year and all the candidates are promising us a utopia if elected. I have lived through many a promised utopia and most of the time could not tell the difference between the utopias. Well one utopia, did seem different, a Republican utopia of course, Hoover's. That which is keeping Blacks from jobs is the same today as it was in 1930 and the same as 1910.
America since 1789 has never had a free market.
 
Every Leftist is, essentially, a Marxist…even though most eschew the title since the fall of the Soviet Union. Even so, Left-wing ideas are predicated on Marx’s materialist view. Philosophically, the term implies that only material things are real.

Go read Engles "Socialism: Scientific and Utopian". It's a pretty short book so even you could probably read it. Socialism predates Marx. Then look up Robert Owen, Charles Fourier, Henri St. Simon, and the Fabian Society.

If you are going to throw out political cant, al least get your history right so you don't embarrass yourself like this. Of course I am assuming that you have some self-respect and try to get the facts right. I may be wrong.
 
During the Fifties many people were afraid to even carry a book about Marx or communism. That was a fearful age. Fortunatley we are emerging from that Dark Age and now able to study those ideologies and understand what happened and why Marx not only failed but would never work. It is still confusing to many and doing one's homework is enlightening. Two mini ages in less than 100 years: Dark Ages and period of Enlightenment.
 
During the Fifties many people were afraid to even carry a book about Marx or communism. That was a fearful age. Fortunatley we are emerging from that Dark Age and now able to study those ideologies and understand what happened and why Marx not only failed but would never work. It is still confusing to many and doing one's homework is enlightening. Two mini ages in less than 100 years: Dark Ages and period of Enlightenment.

In graduate school my research required a security clearance. The major who conducted the interview for the DIA shared a copy of my FBI file. It turns out that virtually all of us on National Defense Education Act fellowships had FBI files based on the same information that got us the NDEA fellowships. My sin? undergraduate courses in Russian history, very suspicious for an economist on the government payroll working on labor force estimates for the Soviet Union.
 
Another day, another post by some Liberal sticking up for black folks against imagined insults by the Right.

So....let me give a tip-of-the-hat to brilliant Daniel Patrick Moynihan: Liberal? Conservative? Or simply smart.

His proposal for treating blacks? He suggested that "the issue of race could benefit from a period of 'benign neglect'.
Not the overarching 'mothering' that Liberals have enforced....

Why? Because he understood the history of every ethnic group. Such as the Irish....




1. The Irish were the first ethnic minority in American cities, and their history shows the classic pattern of new comers to the urban economy, and society. Beginning in the 1820’s, and continued with the massive immigration of the 1840’s and 1850’s. Starting at the very bottom of the urban occupational ladder, with the men as laborers and the woman as maids. Housing was far worse than urban slums today.
Thomas Sowell, "Ethnic America," chapter one.

a. The French sociologist, Gustave de Beaumont, visited Ireland in 1835 and wrote: "I have seen the Indian in his forests, and the Negro in his chains, and thought, as I contemplated their pitiable condition, that I saw the very extreme of human wretchedness; but I did not then know the condition of unfortunate Ireland...In all countries, more or less, paupers may be discovered; but an entire nation of paupers is what was never seen until it was shown in Ireland."

b. Slaves in the United States had a greater life expectancy than peasants in Ireland.





2. The living conditions was readily conducive to violence, alcoholism, and crime. And the native population quickly moved out of neighborhoods en masse as the immigrants moved in. They were characterized as drunkards, brawlers, and incompetents.

a. “The first blacks to move into Harlem were middle-class Negroes who left the black enclave in mid-Manhattan around the turn of the century to get away from the Irish living nearby.” Thomas Sowell, “Ethnic America,” p.39.

b. The Irish had similar relations with the Scotch-Irish, the Germans, the Italians, and the Jews. Wittke, “The Irish in America,” p. 183,189,190.

3. Unemployment exacerbated by signs such as “No Irish need apply.” The jobs they could get were considered too hard, too dirty, too menial, or too dangerous for others.

4. Their average life expectancy was forty years, thus the 19th century observation, “you seldom see a gray-haired Irishman.”






5. They rose slowly….over generations. Their first successes were in politics. It started in the mid-19th century, and within a few decades, they became dominant in big city “machines” in Boston, New York, and other metropolitan areas.

a. And while this brought prosperity and prominence to a few, it had little impact on the lives of most Irish-Americans. In the 1890’s most of the men were still laborers, and the women, domestics.

6. How about the Kennedys? The first arrived in 1848, a laborer. He lived and he died a laborer. Edward Banfield, “The Unheavenly City,” p. 58.

a. But- his son was successful enough to send the grandson to college. That grandson was Joseph P. Kennedy, and he made a fortune that enabled the great-grandsons to achieve …a certain level of success in politics.

7. For the Irish, their success took over a century before equality was achieved in income, IQ, occupations, and other socioeconomic indicia.





8. Note: social acceptance came slowly, and followed achievements, rather than being a precondition.

a. It was the misfortune of black Americans that they were just on the verge of passing through the immigrant experience when damaging ideas about welfare and the lenient attitude about crime took hold. It could have happened to the Italians, Germans, Jews or Irish, but luckily for them, there were no Liberals around to “help” when they arrived. Coulter, “Mugged,” chapter 7.

So....what can we learn from the classic pattern exhibited by the travails of the Irish?

Solving the problem of 'race'?


Don't expect to race to a solution.

Well I am half Irish and half Black, I guess I'm totally fucked.:eusa_shhh:
 
a. The French sociologist, Gustave de Beaumont, visited Ireland in 1835 and wrote: "I have seen the Indian in his forests, and the Negro in his chains, and thought, as I contemplated their pitiable condition, that I saw the very extreme of human wretchedness; but I did not then know the condition of unfortunate Ireland...In all countries, more or less, paupers may be discovered; but an entire nation of paupers is what was never seen until it was shown in Ireland."


I spent some of my youth in the unfortunate company of taigs (under arms) in N. Ireland, so I can corroborate Monsieur de Beaumont's observation. The Irish are indeed a wretched tribe, prone to destructive alcoholism and unwarranted violence. Allow me to draw from observations entered into my diary during my time entrenched in Belfast.

The Irishman

Build: Wiry (ancestors didn’t enjoy enough meat)

Colouring: Red, fiery

Physiognomy: Large, broad nose, flat forehead, huge ears, lurks close to the ground

Defining characteristics: Violent, impetuous, self-pitying, devious, delusional, eloquent, generous

Contribution to Britannia’s glory: Rather more than they let on, but scarcely in credit overall

Summary: The Irishman is a savage, there really is no other way of putting it. But he is a savage who desperately wants to be liked. Thus his savagery manifests itself in various and contradictory forms: there is the out-and-out barbarism of the bog dweller; there is the rank treachery of the smiling Irish charmer who beguiles and deceives in equal measure; and then there is the thespian humility of the middle-class Irishman. An Englishman would return a wallet because it is in his culture; a Scot would do so because it in his nature; a Welshman wouldn’t bother to return it at all; but Paddy would return it with such a great show of modesty and “ah, sure, t’was nothing” that one would soon come to wish he hadn’t bothered. Of course, Paddy has his qualities: a pleasing way with words; a sense of fair play that (even if acted out to attain the approval of foreigners) is still to be welcomed; and most of all a certain generosity of spirit. This occasionally strays into the realm of a somewhat Sicilian propensity to look after his own clan – doubtless the consequence of centuries of poverty – at the expense of everyone else in society, but still - misdirected altriusm is better than outright selfishness.

Conclusion: One can understand why some Saxons enjoy the more relaxed atmosphere of the Emerald Isle; but, in truth, no sane Englishman could ever choose to swap his calm, phlegmatic, moderate disposition for the raging, lunatic passions of Paddy.
 

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