If racial progressivism could be confined to the idea "that races are roughly the same" that would be less poisonous that what is actually happening. Which is that - in the post-Christian West - white middle-class progressivism has taken the corrupted form of certain aspects of Christianity whereby 'people of colour' (and especially people of African enthnicity) are sanctified and white people are, by definition, steeped in sin. It is all very shallow.... and paradoxically narcissistic in that you the white progressive get to feel good about yourself personally by denouncing your white peers. And of course, regard for truth and factual evidence goes right out the window....as for example in the denial of the manifest fact that the offending rate for violent crime is higher among black people than other ethnicities. British television drama is awash with this sort of thing.... https://grahamcunningham.substack.com/p/non-binary-sibling-is-entertaining
Stephen Pinker made the point back in 2006 that, “the power to uncover genetic and evolutionary roots of group differences in psychological traits is both more likely to materialize and more incendiary in its consequences. And it is a prospect that we are, intellectually and emotionally, very poorly equipped to confront.” https://newrepublic.com/article/77727/groups-and-genes
But it is only incendiary because academia has suppressed civilized discussion of group differences for so long. Say ... who’s doing the suppressing?
“Of course, some people who are interested in race and human variation are motivated by malice. They want to support prior prejudices...”
“Prejudice” is a weasel word showing how our language has been corrupted by political correctness. It’s true that we might be mistaken about an individual or group due to ignorance but there is no “pre”-judice, only judice even when it turns out we’re mistaken because we can only be proven wrong after the fact. Adding “pre” is an attempt to call into question our judgements about groups/individuals/things in general *before* the explanation for our “judice” has even been examined, i.e., “prejudice” rigs the discussion in favor of the PC view that rejecting alien phenotypes (or other groups) is always wrong. In addition, most people simply reject alien phenotypes for aesthetic reasons, not because they have lower IQs or higher crime, so it’s not even an issue of “judice”, only a matter of preference. Yes, sometimes we meet someone from a group we dislike that is lovely, intelligent, etc. but that doesn’t mean we should then override our preferences and embrace the whole group.
Persistent behaviors too. Most East Asians are not violent, are quiet and studious, polite etc. Obviously some exceptions will exist. But let's face it behavior is really what all this is about. Persistent patterns of behavior. Ashkenazi Jews and East Asian kids do their homework etc.
This is the fault line for the progressives. They'll accept West Africans are superlative athletes, but reject any notion they have short time horizons, for example. Political correctness is poison.
A lot of it starts with parenting, the home environment, and the peer groups with complementary values and habits. Children in African countries like Ghana are raised much the way East Asian children are, and their diaspora communities are known for their success. Once again, it is NOT about skin color or other phenotypes, but CULTURAL VALUES.
No, it always starts with genetics. The early home environment is crucial, especially the mother-child relationship. Reading to kids etc. But genetics is the actual start.
Complementary values and habits help too of course. Self-organizing communities etc.
Not everyone is genetically capable of being a high intellectual, but people ARE capable of being socialized to have a decent work ethic and good manners. It is fine to grow up and have a working class job, and do that job with effort and integrity. I am less concerned about everyone being a genius, and more concerned with people simply being well-mannered and self-sufficient. Too many mothers nowadays "over parent," and this leads to entitlement, dependency, and learned helplessness. Early independence is important, and so are natural consequences for poor choices.
We are discussing inheritance of behavioural traits, not just IQ. I agree many lower IQ people can be trained to be very productive. Further to this, it is not healthy to have societies of only high IQ people. They tend to implode. Someone has to deal with the garbage after all.
But other traits are inherited too. Low empathy, poor impulse control and different time horizons are all examples. These are present in different quantities in different groups and have profound effects on societies. They have the strongest effect in societies that cannot discuss them.
"Further to this, it is not healthy to have societies of only high IQ people. They tend to implode. Someone has to deal with the garbage after all."
No offence intended to the garbage-collectors, but there's no inherent reason why this needs to be true. Israeli ashkenazim settlers were perfectly capable of working as farmers, for example (and they did, quite effectively.)
I don't generally want to dunk too hard on the "stable two-parent homes are the foundation of society" crowd, because I think they might be right, albeit for different reasons from what they think. But the bulk of evidence from twin studies suggests that violent criminality is about as heritable as intelligence.
If we accept violent behavior is a cluster of behaviors we think of as antisocial, then inherited traits are all there. Poor time horizons, impulsivity, aggression.
The west just cannot face this despite the research that exists.
Fabulous essay (as usual). Until people understand and accept that the distributions of cognitive ability for various racial groups are characterized by different means, we will continue to be on the defensive when the charge of "systemic racism" is made to explain disparate life outcomes.
A wonderful piece and I for one AM grateful that such people as Jenson, Rushton, Lynn (and yourself) have the courage to put the record straight. Others, who are more cowardly, of course benefit from your courage and honesty without ever having to raise their heads above the parapet or endanger their careers but hopefully their shame will eat away at their consciences and they'll die miserable deaths.
Where there is a defective culture then schools must try to correct that deficiency. For example, at the Michaela school (ages 11+) in London almost all pupils are black and 40% are entitled to free school meals due to poverty. The kids are taught belonging, emotion regulation, diligence, gratitude and agency. Every day at lunchtime the kids recite "I am the captain of my soul, the master of my fate." The public exam results at age 16+ are some of the best, if not the best in the country. If this cultural deficiency is not being ameliorated at school where you are, why not? By the way, no one who has ever come to know a young boy can doubt the criticality of having a father.
The biggest problem I see in racial theories is that it is used as more as a biological marker/label (which is all race is: a way to identify where one's ancestors may have come from). People use it as a societal marker and a way to justify racist ideologies. Further, when people try to tackle "race issues" (e.g., differences in IQ, crime rates, etc.), very rarely do they ever focus on the actual root (e.g., higher crime correlates to higher rates of lack of a connected/present father), and moreso on independent factors (e.g., blaming crime solely on poverty).
Anthropologists long ago established the threshold was a group average IQ of 95 to maintain anything resembling a civilization. Below that it is some form of tribalism all the way down.
The point he made was even controlling for cultural variables, striking differences in general intelligence remain between different races. These are persistent across time even with modern education, and the same groups in different countries display the same patterns. Including their ancestral homes.
As for your original point, complex factors accounting for behaviour like fatherless homes, the fatherless homes are more common in some groups than others. This too varies by group. Some factors may underpin both child abandonment and high crime, in this case inherited antisocial traits. This too is measurable and also present in different quantities in different groups.
If racial progressivism could be confined to the idea "that races are roughly the same" that would be less poisonous that what is actually happening. Which is that - in the post-Christian West - white middle-class progressivism has taken the corrupted form of certain aspects of Christianity whereby 'people of colour' (and especially people of African enthnicity) are sanctified and white people are, by definition, steeped in sin. It is all very shallow.... and paradoxically narcissistic in that you the white progressive get to feel good about yourself personally by denouncing your white peers. And of course, regard for truth and factual evidence goes right out the window....as for example in the denial of the manifest fact that the offending rate for violent crime is higher among black people than other ethnicities. British television drama is awash with this sort of thing.... https://grahamcunningham.substack.com/p/non-binary-sibling-is-entertaining
Excellent account. Measured and calm.
Stephen Pinker made the point back in 2006 that, “the power to uncover genetic and evolutionary roots of group differences in psychological traits is both more likely to materialize and more incendiary in its consequences. And it is a prospect that we are, intellectually and emotionally, very poorly equipped to confront.” https://newrepublic.com/article/77727/groups-and-genes
But it is only incendiary because academia has suppressed civilized discussion of group differences for so long. Say ... who’s doing the suppressing?
Indeed. But the data is piling up.
An inevitable side effect of the omerta is the data and methodology is becoming unimpeachable because it as to be.
Now do "gender."
...then religion. LOL
Aim higher. Homosexuality, lol.
Homosexuality and religion do have some commonalities. Again LOL
Proud race realist
“Of course, some people who are interested in race and human variation are motivated by malice. They want to support prior prejudices...”
“Prejudice” is a weasel word showing how our language has been corrupted by political correctness. It’s true that we might be mistaken about an individual or group due to ignorance but there is no “pre”-judice, only judice even when it turns out we’re mistaken because we can only be proven wrong after the fact. Adding “pre” is an attempt to call into question our judgements about groups/individuals/things in general *before* the explanation for our “judice” has even been examined, i.e., “prejudice” rigs the discussion in favor of the PC view that rejecting alien phenotypes (or other groups) is always wrong. In addition, most people simply reject alien phenotypes for aesthetic reasons, not because they have lower IQs or higher crime, so it’s not even an issue of “judice”, only a matter of preference. Yes, sometimes we meet someone from a group we dislike that is lovely, intelligent, etc. but that doesn’t mean we should then override our preferences and embrace the whole group.
Persistent behaviors too. Most East Asians are not violent, are quiet and studious, polite etc. Obviously some exceptions will exist. But let's face it behavior is really what all this is about. Persistent patterns of behavior. Ashkenazi Jews and East Asian kids do their homework etc.
This is the fault line for the progressives. They'll accept West Africans are superlative athletes, but reject any notion they have short time horizons, for example. Political correctness is poison.
A lot of it starts with parenting, the home environment, and the peer groups with complementary values and habits. Children in African countries like Ghana are raised much the way East Asian children are, and their diaspora communities are known for their success. Once again, it is NOT about skin color or other phenotypes, but CULTURAL VALUES.
No, it always starts with genetics. The early home environment is crucial, especially the mother-child relationship. Reading to kids etc. But genetics is the actual start.
Complementary values and habits help too of course. Self-organizing communities etc.
Not everyone is genetically capable of being a high intellectual, but people ARE capable of being socialized to have a decent work ethic and good manners. It is fine to grow up and have a working class job, and do that job with effort and integrity. I am less concerned about everyone being a genius, and more concerned with people simply being well-mannered and self-sufficient. Too many mothers nowadays "over parent," and this leads to entitlement, dependency, and learned helplessness. Early independence is important, and so are natural consequences for poor choices.
We are discussing inheritance of behavioural traits, not just IQ. I agree many lower IQ people can be trained to be very productive. Further to this, it is not healthy to have societies of only high IQ people. They tend to implode. Someone has to deal with the garbage after all.
But other traits are inherited too. Low empathy, poor impulse control and different time horizons are all examples. These are present in different quantities in different groups and have profound effects on societies. They have the strongest effect in societies that cannot discuss them.
"Further to this, it is not healthy to have societies of only high IQ people. They tend to implode. Someone has to deal with the garbage after all."
No offence intended to the garbage-collectors, but there's no inherent reason why this needs to be true. Israeli ashkenazim settlers were perfectly capable of working as farmers, for example (and they did, quite effectively.)
I don't generally want to dunk too hard on the "stable two-parent homes are the foundation of society" crowd, because I think they might be right, albeit for different reasons from what they think. But the bulk of evidence from twin studies suggests that violent criminality is about as heritable as intelligence.
If we accept violent behavior is a cluster of behaviors we think of as antisocial, then inherited traits are all there. Poor time horizons, impulsivity, aggression.
The west just cannot face this despite the research that exists.
It’s like Bo is reading my mind. Really an excellent essay.
white middle-class progressivism. You mean White middle-class liberals.
The Marxists use victim classes to foment revolution.
Fabulous essay (as usual). Until people understand and accept that the distributions of cognitive ability for various racial groups are characterized by different means, we will continue to be on the defensive when the charge of "systemic racism" is made to explain disparate life outcomes.
A wonderful piece and I for one AM grateful that such people as Jenson, Rushton, Lynn (and yourself) have the courage to put the record straight. Others, who are more cowardly, of course benefit from your courage and honesty without ever having to raise their heads above the parapet or endanger their careers but hopefully their shame will eat away at their consciences and they'll die miserable deaths.
Excellent article. And thank you for following your own advice and pursuing this line. We do need to discuss these topics.
A great article by Mr. Winegard.
Knowledge is the goal—the wise hunger for it.
Where there is a defective culture then schools must try to correct that deficiency. For example, at the Michaela school (ages 11+) in London almost all pupils are black and 40% are entitled to free school meals due to poverty. The kids are taught belonging, emotion regulation, diligence, gratitude and agency. Every day at lunchtime the kids recite "I am the captain of my soul, the master of my fate." The public exam results at age 16+ are some of the best, if not the best in the country. If this cultural deficiency is not being ameliorated at school where you are, why not? By the way, no one who has ever come to know a young boy can doubt the criticality of having a father.
Very well-said! Thank you!
you have a sentence structure bug around the middle of the article, search for "the its"
The biggest problem I see in racial theories is that it is used as more as a biological marker/label (which is all race is: a way to identify where one's ancestors may have come from). People use it as a societal marker and a way to justify racist ideologies. Further, when people try to tackle "race issues" (e.g., differences in IQ, crime rates, etc.), very rarely do they ever focus on the actual root (e.g., higher crime correlates to higher rates of lack of a connected/present father), and moreso on independent factors (e.g., blaming crime solely on poverty).
Controlling for family structure, crime, and income, racial differences in IQ remain, if I’m not mistaken.
True, but these things obviously aren't due to someone's biological makeup, but rather the culture they're in.
Intelligence is a strong determinant of culture.
Anthropologists long ago established the threshold was a group average IQ of 95 to maintain anything resembling a civilization. Below that it is some form of tribalism all the way down.
Thanks.
The point he made was even controlling for cultural variables, striking differences in general intelligence remain between different races. These are persistent across time even with modern education, and the same groups in different countries display the same patterns. Including their ancestral homes.
As for your original point, complex factors accounting for behaviour like fatherless homes, the fatherless homes are more common in some groups than others. This too varies by group. Some factors may underpin both child abandonment and high crime, in this case inherited antisocial traits. This too is measurable and also present in different quantities in different groups.