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The unbelievable has happened
(Note: readers’ comments begin here.)
How did it happen that Jared Taylor was given the opportunity to explain race realism straight up in the Washington Examiner, a mainstream conservative publication? How did it happen that he was treated as a legitimate voice, not labeled as a racist or evil, not consigned to a marginalized status from which he had to struggle to get his message heard?
I have sometimes said, imagine an America in which Jared Taylor was allowed to discuss his views on race directly and clearly in a mainstream venue, without being subjected to the third degree. Now it has happened.
I can’t explain how it happened, but I think we can say with a fair degree of certainty that it would not have happened had John McCain been elected president.
Taylor’s explanation of race realism is straightforward and concise. He speaks of the reality that race matters, but without being reductive, without turning it into a biological dogma. As he has always done, he sees race realism mainly as a matter of common sense and common human experience, which the unnatural orthodoxy of liberalism prohibits people (or rather, prohibits white people) from seeing and discussing.
I have strongly criticized Taylor for some things, particularly certain associations of his. But when it comes to the thing that Taylor does best, the thing he was born to do, he is very good.
(The article has a photo of Taylor shaking hands with Jesse Jackson at the National Press Club recently, but no explanation of that came about.)
Race realist Jared Taylor declares the “civil rights struggle was won long ago”
July 20, 2010
By Jamie Hines
Jared Taylor, current editor of the American Renaissance, denies the term “white nationalist” and explains why he is not a “white supremacist.” But, what this established journalist claims, is that he is a “race realist.” Taylor’s views have become an important piece of the race relations puzzle, and can often be found in studies, essays, newspapers (including the Washington Post) and books. Taylor has been called everything from a racist to a “true paragon of tolerance.” He takes a few moments to discuss with Jamie Hines what is a “race realist,” why there is no need for the civil rights battle, and what he thinks of President Barack Obama.
JH: I’ve read that you describe yourself as a “race realist.” What is a “race realist?”
JT: Race realism is rejection of the agreeable fantasies about race that have become orthodoxy since the 1960s. First, it is obvious that most people prefer the company of others of their own race. Forced integration therefore causes tension and resentment.
Second, race is an important element in individual and group identity, which means it is impossible to build a society in which race does not matter.
Third, people of different races build different societies. Blacks—wherever they are found in large numbers—establish communities with certain characteristics, and whites and others do the same.
Fourth, the combination of the first three factors means that racial diversity is a source of constant conflict. This is blindingly obvious, yet one of the requirements of respectability in this country is to pretend—and to repeat loudly at every opportunity—that diversity is a strength.
Fifth, the evidence is overwhelming that there is a substantial genetic contribution to well-established racial differences in average IQ. North East Asians living in America have higher incomes, better test scores, and more education than whites because they are, on average, smarter. Whites are smarter than Hispanics, who are smarter than blacks. It is vital to recognize this because otherwise “society” (meaning whites) is blamed for the failures of blacks and Hispanics.
Finally, race realism recognizes that whites have legitimate group interests just like everyone else.
JH: What are the legitimate group interests of whites?
JT: It is vital to eliminate the stark racial double standard that denies white even have legitimate interests as a group. White pride or racial consciousness is considered “bigotry” or “hatred,” while any other kind of racial consciousness is considered to be a healthy form of ethnic self-esteem. This means every group in the country—except whites—is constantly pushing its collective interests, while whites are not allowed even to have interests as a group, much less work for them.
Some of the interests of whites are obvious. The first is not to be reduced to a minority. Most whites don’t want this but they dare not say so for fear of being accused of “hate.” Hispanics, on the other hand, are constantly rejoicing in their increased numbers and influence, and it is considered natural for them to look forward to eventually become a majority. Their gain is our loss, so why are they allowed to be happy about their gain but we are not allowed to resist our loss?
Whites have every right to prefer the kind of society that they create and to resist demographic shifts that are already changing their country in profound ways. Jews have a right to a Jewish state, and they keep it Jewish through selective immigration. Japanese have a right to a Japanese state and they keep it that way through restrictive immigration. Whites also, whether in North America or Europe, have the right to live in nations that reflect their culture and heritage.
Second, what is known as “affirmative action” is really discrimination against whites. If the kinds of preferences shown to blacks or Hispanics were shown to whites it would be a nation scandal, but because the victims are whites (and sometimes Asians) it is of no consequence. Whites must work to eliminate this while it is still possible to do so. When non-whites become majorities, they are likely to push for even more extensive racial preferences than the ones they enjoy today.
JH: Do you consider yourself a White Nationalist and/or a White Supremacist? Why or Why not?
JT: No. I don’t know what the term white nationalist is supposed to mean. White supremacists presumably want to rule other races, and race realists have no such desire. I believe people of every race should be free to pursue their own destinies, and this is impossible in societies in which they become minorities.
It should not be necessary to add that a concern for one’s own interests implies no hostility to others. Race realists understand that people of all races have the same rights: to preserve their culture and identity against any force that would dilute or replace it. One’s race is one’s extended family. Putting the interests of family before the interests of strangers is not hostility to strangers. One can become good friends with strangers but family comes first.
JH: After doing some research, I’ve found that your parents were “conventional liberals” who were missionaries in Japan. At what point, and why, did your views shift from what you seen at a younger age?
JT: I, too, was a conventional liberal until I was in my 30s. I preferred being a liberal. Liberals are happy to consider themselves morally superior to conservatives (and certainly to anyone who could be called a “racist,” whatever that means). Also, liberalism is the driving, majority ethos of the United States, and it is more comfortable to agree with the majority. I clung desperately to liberalism. It was the study of history and economics as well as extensive travel in Europe and Africa that finally ground away my liberal illusions.
JH: How do you feel about the election of the first black President?
JT: It was bound to happen eventually, given the collapse of the white majority. Until 1965, we had an immigration policy designed to keep the country majority white. Since that time, the white percentage has declined from about 88 percent to perhaps 62 percent. Do not forget: 55 percent of whites voted for Mr. Obama’s opponent. Twenty years ago, any candidate who got 55 percent of the white vote became president. Now, a majority of whites can vote for a candidate but his opponent may win. In this sense, because of demographic change, you could say that whites did not get the president they wanted. Why should whites encourage that kind of change?
As for Mr. Obama, he encourages the population shifts that are displacing whites. He has sued a state that simply wants to enforce the duly established immigration laws that the federal government refuses to enforce. He wants to give amnesty to 12 million illegal immigrants, most of whom are non-white. In these respects, he is probably not much different from his main Democratic opponent, Hillary Clinton. However, even she would not have ordered the Justice Department to drop its voter-intimidation case against the New Black Panthers. This sort of thing is alienating whites.
JH: Describe the current state of race relations in America.
JT: Race is, and always will be, a serious social fault line in this country. Relative peace is maintained because whites tolerate “affirmative action” and massive non-white immigration. They do this because they are browbeaten and bamboozled into thinking it is wrong for whites to act in their own interests. This will not always be the case, and race relations will get worse as more and more whites begin to resist dispossession.
JH: What are your thoughts about people who say, “race doesn’t matter?”
JT: They are fools. Race obviously matters. Ninety percent of the churches in the United States are at least 80 percent one race. Is that an accident? Residential segregation is not much different from patterns in the 1950s. Why is that? The NAACP, the Urban League, the Congressional Black Congress, the National Council of La Raza, the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), and literally thousands of other groups and associations are based deliberately and specifically on race. Try telling their members race doesn’t matter.
It is almost exclusively white people who say race doesn’t matter, and this is because they are the only people who are required at least to pretend that it doesn’t matter. This, in turn, is because they are not allowed to have explicit racial interests of their own, and must deliberately close their eyes to the racial chauvinism of others lest they acknowledge this anti-white double standard.
JH: Do you believe that there is a need to fight for civil rights in America?
JT: What do you mean by “civil rights”? People of all races have the same legal rights in the United States, so the “civil rights” struggle was won long ago. Many blacks and Hispanics seem to think racial preferences for themselves are “civil rights” but they are actually a power grab at the expense of whites.
[end of interview]
- end of initial entry -
July 23
John Dempsey writes:
I searched the Washington Examiner for the article, as you did not provide a link in your post. I could not find it. I then Googled the title of the article and found it at Examiner.com/Syracuse Is Examiner.com affiliated with the Washington Examiner? I’m not sure it is. Can you shed some light?
LA replies:
Can you do a Google for some of the text in the Taylor interview and find the article that way?
John replies:
Yes, it comes up with a number of hits all linking to this article, the text of which you posted. Incidentally, a link to your post is at the top of the Google search page.
Searching the author Jamie Hines, you will find that she is the “DC Civil rights Examiner” for Examiner.com There does not seem to be an affiliation between Examiner.com and the Washington Examiner. None apparently exists.
LA replies:
Thanks, I’ve added the link to the entry.
On the connection between Examiner.com and the Washington. Examiner, that is confusing. I’ve remarked how irritating and common it is when the website of a newspaper does not visibly identify the newspaper’s name and location. This is a little different. There appear to be “Examiners” in many different cities. The Examiner.com site provides a prompt to change the city, but that doesn’t work, it doesn’t give you a list of cities to choose from. We haven’t yet determined for sure that the Taylor interview is in the print version of today’s Washington Examiner.
And look how confusing it is, just above the article, where it says,
New York / DC / Civil Rights Examiner
This article is part of Washington D.C.’s best
Do they expect their readers to understand what that means?
John replies: Yes, it does confuse, intentionally. It seems that Examiner.com is a web-based “news” outfit that has affiliates in a great many cities, also publishing a “national” page. They acquire people’s IP address in order to personalize their ads to specific locations. Its many categories of news each has their own “examiner”, or reporter, in every affiliate city.
Mark Jaws writes:
One of the benefits of being a convert to Catholicism is discovering a heretofore unknown community of Catholic historians—past and present, such as the incomparable Hilaire Belloc, who examine issues such as the Middle Ages and the Reformation from a different (pro-Catholic) point of view. I am currently reading Belloc’s book, “How the Reformation Happened,” which describes the various factors producing the tremendous pressure which allowed one monk (Martin Luther) in one rather provincial city, Wittenberg, to shatter the continental unity of Christendom.
Perhaps a similar scenario will play out with the 50-year suppression of white racial consciousness in American and throughout the West. Lord knows, the pressure behind the dam has been mounting for a long time and Obama has only made matters worse—I mean better. In his short reign, whites have been confronted with his anti-Semitic and anti-white preacher, the White House Beer Summit, the Wise Lateena, the dismissal of the voter intimidation case against the New Black Panthers, and now the Sherrod affair. Certainly as our society becomes less white, and Moslems, Mestizos, mulattos and blacks assume a greater role in the ruling class, it will be impossible for the Stalinist media to conceal the excesses of the multicultural left. I am not certain if and when the dam will break, but if it does, it will likely catch the left off guard, and play out in our favor.
Paul Nachman writes:
On top of the Jared Taylor interview, there’s this frank article by Sen. Webb.
Laura G. writes:
I certainly appreciate Taylor’s contributions to the defense of attention to race in the affairs of our public spaces. I wonder if he has read Natan Sharansky’s 2008 work on this subject, “Defending Identity.” Sharansky is one of the inspiring and towering heroes of our age, and it seems to me that we would do well to be aware of his thoughts on issues of civil rights and individual freedom. Sharansky brought deep convictions to his defense of freedom, and it is instructive to listen to his thoughts about the sources of his astounding personal strength.
Major concepts that he elaborates is that it requires a strong, unambiguous, and developed sense of personal identity in order to defend freedom, and that since the beginning of the twentieth century there have been several forces that worked to create a pervasive erosion and attack on identity. One was utopian Marxism of the early 20th century, with its categorization of men into classes, and its rejection of individual autonomy including Jewish identity. This assault on identity was enthusiastically embraced by the Western “useful idiots” among other adherents. The second great attack on identity is post-identity theory, such as post-nationalism, post-modernism, post-racialism, etc. Moral equivalence of all cultures is central to this and led to a third attack, led by multiculturalism with its rejection of specific virtues and evils of specific cultures. Strong attachments to identities such as national identity, cultural identity, and other group identities were charged with being the sources of the 20th century wars, and the theories of group identities urge erosion of national autonomy, cultural adherence, religious identity, and so forth all driven by “tolerance” of radical rejection of existing cultures and non-natives. The Muslim invasion of Europe was the immediate result of these concepts, and here we can thank these concepts for the invasion of our nation from the south. He notes the specific lack of tolerance (suppression by force when needed) for the wishes and needs of native populations, there as well as here.
Sharansky asserts the primacy of robust identity in the defense of freedom and civil rights, and discusses at length such issues as the defense of a nation state. Because of his personal history, he focuses on the Marxist assaults, but I expect that he would agree that the rejection of a racial basis for one aspect of identity is equally aggressive and totalitarian. As always, I look forward to comments from your readers on this pivotal issue.
LA replies:
I am skeptical of Sharansky’s wisdom and usefulness. First, it seems to me that his primary concepts were formed in response to Soviet totalitarianism, which is not an appropriate model for dealing with the soft tyranny of modern liberal societies. Second and more important, he remains a liberal, and while promoting “identity,” he also seems to imagine societies in which wildly incompatible identities all get along in multicultural, “all cultures are equal,” fashion.
I wrote at VFR in June 2008:
In a previous post, I expressed uncertainty about the meaning of Natan Sharansky’s thesis on the need to balance democracy with “identity.” Was he, somewhat like a traditionalist, trying to return from today’s extreme right-liberalism back to the more balanced liberalism of the past that upheld nationhood along with individual rights? Or was he, like a typical liberal, going “back to the future,” replicating the familiar and inevitable transition from extreme right-liberalism (universalist individualism) to left-liberalism (diversity and multiculturalism)? Sadly, based on his article in today’s Wall Street Journal, it appears to be the latter.
I say “appears” because Sharansky uses the word “identity” as an all-purpose abstraction without defining it. Sometimes he seems to be using it in the sense of the national or religious identity of a nation’s majority group, sometimes he uses it in the sense of the identity of minority groups, namely Muslims. He even says at one point, apparently speaking of national identity, “the right to express one’s identity is seen as fundamental.” But the very phrase, “right to express one’s identity,” is the kind of language that is used in the context of multiculturalism, not in the context of traditional nations and peoples. To put the “identity” of the nation on the same level as the “identity” of an alien minority not only creates hopeless conceptual confusion; in practical terms it legitimizes the ongoing multicultural weakening of national identity.
According to Sharansky both the historic peoples of the West and the Muslim immigrants in the West have their respective “identities,” and everyone can get along if all groups adhere to “democratic norms.” “Democratic norms”—code word for the universalist, deracinated liberalism of today—is his ultimate standard, not traditional national identity. Meaning that the Western nations should continue to welcome Muslims and other non-Western minorities; allow Muslims to wear the veil in public (something he praises America for doing); and only stop the Muslims from doing really “non-democratic” things like female mutilation. From the logic of his argument we can presume that, like Hirsi Ali, Sharansky also supports the spreading of sharia, so long as it’s done by “democratic, peaceful” means.
At bottom, Sharansky remains a right-liberal whose right-liberalism leads to the left-liberal empowerment of alien cultures and the steady dissolution of the nations of the West.
Paul K. writes:
Jared Taylor is also quoted briefly at liberalism’s Holy of Holies, National Public Radio, in connection with the Shirley Sherrod story.
Jared Taylor, editor of American Renaissance, describes himself as a “race realist” and advocates abolishing immigration and anti-discrimination laws. He says it’s clear that Sherrod’s comments were taken out of context. Nonetheless, he says they tell an important tale.
“Practically nobody in America had trouble believing that this black employee of USDA would take this extremely race-based view,” Taylor says. “That’s the significance of this story. It seemed entirely plausible to most Americans that a black employee would have this view of how she should do her job.”
He is even given the last word:
“This notion that we’re all going to hold hands and sing “Kumbaya,” that’s pure fantasy,” says Taylor, the American Renaissance editor. “Racial loyalties are part of human nature.”
Peter G. writes:
Whites are finally awaking to the future implications of black (minority) grievance culture. In spite of no black in American being a slave in six generations, whites are now realizing that they and generations to come will be forced to perpetually grant favoured status to blacks and other minorities.
Larry, you’ve done a substantial amount of research on the Civil rights Act. Does it imply a sunset clause, in that once economic and social conditions improve for blacks it can be rescinded? [LA replies: of course they flirt with sunset clauses, such as Justice O’Connor’s majority opinion in Grutter v. Bollinger, which said that affirmative action ought to end in 25 years, but it’s completely meaningless and any conservative who takes such statements seriously is in conservative kindergarten.] Here in Canada, the government has just announced it’s taking steps to remove affirmative action policies from federally funded institutions. This was driven by multiculturalism, to achieve numerical inclusion of minorities. Since Canadians haven’t been stigmatized completely as historical racists, numerics were the means to determine racial bias, although I’ve often asked people who claim to be a member of a minority: Where are you a minority? Somehow the reality escapes them that they constitute a global majority.
I wonder how ordinary white Americans are processing what’s occurring, to recognize yourself as the numerical majority yet being deprivileged to last place in the entitlement/rights/moral status social matrix. Imagine it’s a very unsettling conquered emotion, with no stake in the current regime. How long will they tolerate it? Perhaps you could ask the pool of well informed readers if there’s a historical equivalent to compare with.
LA writes:
Reader MBS attempted to post the Jared Taylor interview at Free Republic, and got this personal reply from FR’s editor, Jim Robinson:
“Re: Race Realist Jared Taylor Declares the “Civil Rights Struggle Was Won Long Ago”
From Jim Robinson | 07/23/2010 12:20:47 PM PDT replied
Look, Jared Taylor is a racist and we do not want him or anything about him or his cohorts on FR. You have a history of posting racist crap that our moderators end up pulling. Keep it up and I will give them the green light to nuke your account. No racism on FR!
That means no Jared Taylor. And no Steve Sailor. No Sam Raymond. Nothing from racist sites like from inverted-world.com.
If you don’t know what racism is you’d better learn in a hurry or just quit posting to FR altogether.
Also, you’ve had several posts pulled for copyright violations.
You also once registered a new account to repost a pulled article and that account was nuked.
The next violation of any kind by you and your entire account gets nuked.
Jim
Follow-up e-mail by Robinson:
As I said, if you don’t know what racism is then you’re probably not
FReeper material and the sooner we part company the better.
OneSTDV writes: I saw this from the editor of Free Republic:
“That means no Jared Taylor. And no Steve Sailor. No Sam Raymond.”
If I remember correctly, you’ve also been banned from Free Republic. I’ve had a few
articles posted over there on race and somehow I got past the censors.
Probably because I’m a small time blogger though.
I wonder how long until they ban Brietbart too.
LA writes:
Robinson expects all his commenters to to know what he defines as racism. But has he ever defined it and given examples? For example, does he say it’s racist to publish DoJ statistics showing the incidence of black on white murder and rape compared to white on black murder and rape? Does he say it’s racist to present IQ data showing that the number of blacks with IQ over 130 is vanishingly small, and that the number of blacks with IQ over 140 is essentially non-existent, meaning that the absence of blacks in high level intellectual professions is not due to white racism but to natural differences between the races? Does he say it’s racist to quote data showing that at elite universities and professional schools virtually all the blacks are admitted with scores that get whites automatically rejected, meaning that there is no overlap in abilities between blacks and whites at the same school and that every black who is admitted to that school is admitted by rejecting a much more qualified white?
I’m just wondering what Jim Robinson regards as so egregious that he will not allow it to be posted at his site.
July 24
Gerry T. Neal of the traditionalist blog Throne, Altar, Liberty writes from Winnipeg, Canada:
Greetings. I have read and enjoyed View from the Right for many years. I am writing in response to your July 22 entry, “The Unbelievable Has Happened,” regarding a mainstream interview with Jared Taylor. In commenting about the article you say, “The article has a photo of Mr. Taylor shaking hands with Jesse Jackson at the National Press Club recently, but no explanation of how that came about.” That photograph appears to be dated to March 18 of this year. That was the day that the Center for Immigration Studies held a press conference at the National Press Club in response to the SPLC’s “Stop the Hate” campaign and introduced their publication Immigration and the SPLC: How the Southern Poverty Law Center Invented a Smear, Served La Raza, Manipulated the Press, and Duped its Donors. Jared Taylor was present and the lead story in the daily news articles on American Renaissance’s website for that day, was his report about this press conference. I have not been able to find any source indicating that Jesse Jackson was also present at that conference but it would seem to be the most likely occasion for that photograph to have been taken.
LA replies:
I see that in Mr. Neal’s most recent entry, “Freedom and the Individual,” he argues that the true opposite of today’s leftist statism is not liberal individualism, but traditionalism. He writes:
Christianity shaped the Western world for well over a thousand years, teaching the importance of the individual within rather than outside and against the context of the family, community, and society. The conservative today, seeking a restoration of personal liberties that have been swallowed up by contemporary collectivist liberalism, must look for a foundation for personal liberty that is older than the Modern Age, one grounded in Western traditions that draw from Christianity and the Greco-Roman classical heritage and which are not hostile to stable society and the common good.
Posted by Lawrence Auster at July 22, 2010 11:14 PM | Send
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