John McWhorter is back, reporting from his Catskills bungalow for the latest installment in our ongoing conversation. Let’s get into it. While I’m at home rather than a bungalow, I’m fresh off a wonderful vacation in North Carolina, which I spent surrounded by my wife, children, and grandchildren. Two of my granddaughters are now young women in college and law school, and they had some questions for me about some of the public positions I’ve taken. I recount the discussions I had with them about the
Racializing society the first time was pure poison. Yet here we are, intent on doing it again, just with different scapegoats. I still marvel at the people who, with straight faces, pretend that life for minorities today is worse than it was during the "colored only" era. I started school with kids whose parents used the separate fountains and facilities. What an insult to those parents' memories to pretend nothing has changed.
Enjoyed your discussion. On Flannery O’Connor: Her subject matter was poor Southern whites, and some of her characterizations, as in “A Good Man is Hard to Find,” are pretty unflattering, even savage. How she thought about black people is not surprising, as John said, and really beside the point when considering her writings. Ironic she is being attacked for her racial views. Southern whites (I am one) would have better cause to be offended, but I doubt enough of them have read her amazing fiction to matter. On Rushdie: He too is considered a great literary artist, and like O’Connor, not many of the people he is purported to be offending will ever read his books. Another irony, and a tragic one in his case. I am a reasonably well read person and I struggled to get through The Satanic Verses, although I recognized the brilliance of some of his passages. A very difficult read. After I finished I thought, not one Muslim in a million would ever actually read, much less understand, this novel of “magic realism.” Which makes the vicious, violent campaign against this poor man doubly stupid.
Had a professor mentor me this past year. Retired to a place in Boise. I went to visit him and we made a pilgrimage to Hailey Idaho to the birthplace of Ezra Pound. One of our favorite poets. Pound is a good litmus test for people. You can know someone is smart if they have heard of him. You can know someone is cool if they like him despite having heard of him. Very important to know who is cool these days.
This has been another stunning week of The Glenn Show, bringing home two great conversations to absorb. Kmele Foster is new to me but I am a fan now.
I settle with my profound gratitude for this forum. My scorch marks and flayed skin accrued from encountering woke culture continues to find healing salve here, enough that I am showing up as myself more fully and confidently in 'woke' places. I love that. I find my shoulders more relaxed and I breathe easier after hearing these podcasts, so thank you John and Glenn.
Oh. And you should have seen what the famous theater artist Michael Jackson ( A Strange Loop) wrote on his Facebook before quickly deleting it.
It was right after the we see you white American theater manifesto emerged and a friend of mine said: oh look there is hope, look what Michael Jackson wrote… And within the hour it had disappeared.
He spoke in the strongest language possible and with massive amounts of humor, against the manifesto. And he is a black theater artist so… It meant something… But then it quickly disappeared.
I had to pause and say thank you Glenn for sharing the story about your family reunion. It was a lovely glimpse into your life. Even with drama, it sounds like a lovely time.
ETA: The first 9 minutes of this episode alone were more than worth the subscription price!
THE issue dividing Blacks/Whites is lack of meaningful Black leadership. Obama blew that chance. Black leadership voicing the need for Black cultural change toward individual responsibility for outcomes and integration with White culture's values in speech, education, and parenting. Cosby said it best, then he blew it too.
I think John's recognition that the negative reaction of students getting a worse grade than they felt deserving of as a universal experience is a valuable one. I can remember having that one, myself, as a young man in college for the first time. I missed the cutoff for an A in a class by 2 points (out of 400 total) and even had what I felt was a good rationale for why I deserved credit on a question on the final and when my teacher considered it and said no, I blamed him and thought back to all the events that took place over the semester for any reason to think of him as unfair. I eventually moved past it and accepted that an almost-A wasn't going to taint my academic record and now that I'm much older, I recognize my urge to blame the teacher as a character flaw common in adolescence/early adulthood. When I complained about it to friends and family, I was fortunate that those people encouraged me to move past it. Had they instead encouraged me to get angrier about it and given validity to my outrage, I might have had a much more difficult time. I'm back in school now as a 39 year old (at the same school as Glenn's granddaughter, apparently, Go Illini!), making all As and recognizing the difference between the 4.0 I have now at a better university and the 3.3 I earned in my early 20s is how much effort I put into my schoolwork and how little I go out partying and doing other non-academic activities. I think if one of my classmates now expressed feelings of being treated unfairly because of their race or other immutable characteristics, I wouldn't encourage them to feel that outrage more strongly, thinking of myself as an ally in the process. (Admittedly, this is likely what I'd have done when I was younger.) Instead, I'd probably try to share some of my process for preparing for exams and writing papers (assuming I'm doing well in the class, myself). In the event that one of my teachers doesn't give me a grade that I feel I deserve, I am confident in my abilities to articulate an argument for why I do deserve better and if the teacher won't accept it or offer a sufficient refutation of my arguments, I'll present my case to his or her boss with the same confidence. This seems to me like the result of having enough of my unreasoned arguments rejected and my good ones accepted on their merits. I never enjoyed having holes poked in my bad arguments, but it was this displeasure that forced me to make better ones. I think denying someone the same requirement denies them the same opportunity to grow and ergo can't be viewed as moral or ethical behavior. I really enjoy the show, Glenn and John!
Completely agree with the insecurity, this behavior shows itself in many different settings. Take exception of the example of the right and stolen election. Stacey Abrams rode on the narrative and Dems pushed it in 2016. Safe and fair elections are of the past, as is freedom of speech. Here’s an example using both .. Douglas Mackey
“Federal prosecutors allege he conspired with others to use memes and social media platforms to spread misinformation aimed at depriving people of their right to vote during the 2016 presidential election.” “With Mackey’s arrest, we serve notice that those who would subvert the democratic process in this manner cannot rely on the cloak of Internet anonymity to evade responsibility for their crimes,” Seth D. DuCharme, acting US attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said in a statement.”
He is from Vermont. He made Memes, no evidence of any crime; he made fun of H Clinton.
Why would any one be judged on the past using current norms .. When slaves were brought to America it wasn’t even by “Americans” it was a hodge podge of immigrants.. Americans didn’t sprout from the ground in the US. I don’t care what the statute, name on a building, confederate or not.. leave it alone! Men, women, children died.. fighting for what they believed. They shouldn’t have to account for how they believed by today’s standards.
There's a good chance the "History written in lightning" quote is apocryphal.
Since George Washington's farewell speech the foreign policy in this country has been isolationist, Woodrow Wilson almost single handedly changed that into the interventionist, "make the world safe for democracy", global police we've been for the past 100 years.
Not saying that was a good thing, not saying we should or should not take his name off the school , but you can draw a straight line from Wilson to the Iraq war, or Obama's drone strikes; Wilson's impact over the past 100 years was objectively immense.
Aug 15, 2022·edited Aug 16, 2022Liked by Glenn Loury
I agree 100% that top performing students largely stay away from divisive social justice activities. I have years of experience with new students at a top university, and can predict with fair accuracy which students will wield the social justice shield and sword. Top students of all backgrounds - in the top 5% - rarely address DEI topics if given a choice. If they do, it is usually in an uplifting, positive way in the manner of Martin Luther King Jr’s I had a Dream approach coupled with America as melting pot world. Ditto the second tier students- top 15% to 5%.
Below the top 15%, the correlation grows between declining ranking and use of a negatively formulated DEI viewpoint. Women are more likely than men to do so ; black and Latino much more likely to do so than white or Asian. But, interestingly Indian and Pakistani women are much more likely than Indian or Pakistani men to do so, and much more likely than Chinese or Korean women to do so.
When you factor in occupation and education of parents into the equation, those lower performing students with upper middle class parents - doctors, lawyers, professors, engineers- then the correlation is huge between lower ranking and the use of a snarky, divisive DEI viewpoint.
Clearly minorities and women who are in a well resourced environment prior to college feel the competition with high performers quite significantly and are much more likely to react to their lesser chances by using social justice ideas to shield themselves from criticism and to cut down the high performers as being undeserving because they are white or male or heterosexual, etc.
Fantastic conversation. I’m not sure if John has addressed the We See You White American Theatre before but this is the first time I have heard him talk about this manifesto. As a white actor who thought that our theater community was a very open and unbiased place for the past many years I was very shocked + depressed when the manifesto appeared in 2020 but soon learned that there were few white colleagues that I could talk about this with. So we gathered in little phone conversations and whispered about it. Certain friends were horrified when I expressed my doubts about this approach. My doubts being that the theatre could not be torn apart on racial lines. But clearly it was a power grab. And if you wanted to keep working in the theater you had to sign on with this manifesto.
Racializing society the first time was pure poison. Yet here we are, intent on doing it again, just with different scapegoats. I still marvel at the people who, with straight faces, pretend that life for minorities today is worse than it was during the "colored only" era. I started school with kids whose parents used the separate fountains and facilities. What an insult to those parents' memories to pretend nothing has changed.
Enjoyed your discussion. On Flannery O’Connor: Her subject matter was poor Southern whites, and some of her characterizations, as in “A Good Man is Hard to Find,” are pretty unflattering, even savage. How she thought about black people is not surprising, as John said, and really beside the point when considering her writings. Ironic she is being attacked for her racial views. Southern whites (I am one) would have better cause to be offended, but I doubt enough of them have read her amazing fiction to matter. On Rushdie: He too is considered a great literary artist, and like O’Connor, not many of the people he is purported to be offending will ever read his books. Another irony, and a tragic one in his case. I am a reasonably well read person and I struggled to get through The Satanic Verses, although I recognized the brilliance of some of his passages. A very difficult read. After I finished I thought, not one Muslim in a million would ever actually read, much less understand, this novel of “magic realism.” Which makes the vicious, violent campaign against this poor man doubly stupid.
Had a professor mentor me this past year. Retired to a place in Boise. I went to visit him and we made a pilgrimage to Hailey Idaho to the birthplace of Ezra Pound. One of our favorite poets. Pound is a good litmus test for people. You can know someone is smart if they have heard of him. You can know someone is cool if they like him despite having heard of him. Very important to know who is cool these days.
Word.
This has been another stunning week of The Glenn Show, bringing home two great conversations to absorb. Kmele Foster is new to me but I am a fan now.
I settle with my profound gratitude for this forum. My scorch marks and flayed skin accrued from encountering woke culture continues to find healing salve here, enough that I am showing up as myself more fully and confidently in 'woke' places. I love that. I find my shoulders more relaxed and I breathe easier after hearing these podcasts, so thank you John and Glenn.
"Passionate identitarian unreason" is a beautiful description of a horrifying social disease.
Oh. And you should have seen what the famous theater artist Michael Jackson ( A Strange Loop) wrote on his Facebook before quickly deleting it.
It was right after the we see you white American theater manifesto emerged and a friend of mine said: oh look there is hope, look what Michael Jackson wrote… And within the hour it had disappeared.
He spoke in the strongest language possible and with massive amounts of humor, against the manifesto. And he is a black theater artist so… It meant something… But then it quickly disappeared.
I had to pause and say thank you Glenn for sharing the story about your family reunion. It was a lovely glimpse into your life. Even with drama, it sounds like a lovely time.
ETA: The first 9 minutes of this episode alone were more than worth the subscription price!
THE issue dividing Blacks/Whites is lack of meaningful Black leadership. Obama blew that chance. Black leadership voicing the need for Black cultural change toward individual responsibility for outcomes and integration with White culture's values in speech, education, and parenting. Cosby said it best, then he blew it too.
I think John's recognition that the negative reaction of students getting a worse grade than they felt deserving of as a universal experience is a valuable one. I can remember having that one, myself, as a young man in college for the first time. I missed the cutoff for an A in a class by 2 points (out of 400 total) and even had what I felt was a good rationale for why I deserved credit on a question on the final and when my teacher considered it and said no, I blamed him and thought back to all the events that took place over the semester for any reason to think of him as unfair. I eventually moved past it and accepted that an almost-A wasn't going to taint my academic record and now that I'm much older, I recognize my urge to blame the teacher as a character flaw common in adolescence/early adulthood. When I complained about it to friends and family, I was fortunate that those people encouraged me to move past it. Had they instead encouraged me to get angrier about it and given validity to my outrage, I might have had a much more difficult time. I'm back in school now as a 39 year old (at the same school as Glenn's granddaughter, apparently, Go Illini!), making all As and recognizing the difference between the 4.0 I have now at a better university and the 3.3 I earned in my early 20s is how much effort I put into my schoolwork and how little I go out partying and doing other non-academic activities. I think if one of my classmates now expressed feelings of being treated unfairly because of their race or other immutable characteristics, I wouldn't encourage them to feel that outrage more strongly, thinking of myself as an ally in the process. (Admittedly, this is likely what I'd have done when I was younger.) Instead, I'd probably try to share some of my process for preparing for exams and writing papers (assuming I'm doing well in the class, myself). In the event that one of my teachers doesn't give me a grade that I feel I deserve, I am confident in my abilities to articulate an argument for why I do deserve better and if the teacher won't accept it or offer a sufficient refutation of my arguments, I'll present my case to his or her boss with the same confidence. This seems to me like the result of having enough of my unreasoned arguments rejected and my good ones accepted on their merits. I never enjoyed having holes poked in my bad arguments, but it was this displeasure that forced me to make better ones. I think denying someone the same requirement denies them the same opportunity to grow and ergo can't be viewed as moral or ethical behavior. I really enjoy the show, Glenn and John!
"bug-eyed, little black man" I nearly spit out my coffee. Ha, ha. Baldwin...great writer but an ugly, ugly man.
I think John might be describing himself at the end of this podcast without any self awareness
Completely agree with the insecurity, this behavior shows itself in many different settings. Take exception of the example of the right and stolen election. Stacey Abrams rode on the narrative and Dems pushed it in 2016. Safe and fair elections are of the past, as is freedom of speech. Here’s an example using both .. Douglas Mackey
“Federal prosecutors allege he conspired with others to use memes and social media platforms to spread misinformation aimed at depriving people of their right to vote during the 2016 presidential election.” “With Mackey’s arrest, we serve notice that those who would subvert the democratic process in this manner cannot rely on the cloak of Internet anonymity to evade responsibility for their crimes,” Seth D. DuCharme, acting US attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said in a statement.”
He is from Vermont. He made Memes, no evidence of any crime; he made fun of H Clinton.
Why would any one be judged on the past using current norms .. When slaves were brought to America it wasn’t even by “Americans” it was a hodge podge of immigrants.. Americans didn’t sprout from the ground in the US. I don’t care what the statute, name on a building, confederate or not.. leave it alone! Men, women, children died.. fighting for what they believed. They shouldn’t have to account for how they believed by today’s standards.
There's a good chance the "History written in lightning" quote is apocryphal.
Since George Washington's farewell speech the foreign policy in this country has been isolationist, Woodrow Wilson almost single handedly changed that into the interventionist, "make the world safe for democracy", global police we've been for the past 100 years.
Not saying that was a good thing, not saying we should or should not take his name off the school , but you can draw a straight line from Wilson to the Iraq war, or Obama's drone strikes; Wilson's impact over the past 100 years was objectively immense.
I agree 100% that top performing students largely stay away from divisive social justice activities. I have years of experience with new students at a top university, and can predict with fair accuracy which students will wield the social justice shield and sword. Top students of all backgrounds - in the top 5% - rarely address DEI topics if given a choice. If they do, it is usually in an uplifting, positive way in the manner of Martin Luther King Jr’s I had a Dream approach coupled with America as melting pot world. Ditto the second tier students- top 15% to 5%.
Below the top 15%, the correlation grows between declining ranking and use of a negatively formulated DEI viewpoint. Women are more likely than men to do so ; black and Latino much more likely to do so than white or Asian. But, interestingly Indian and Pakistani women are much more likely than Indian or Pakistani men to do so, and much more likely than Chinese or Korean women to do so.
When you factor in occupation and education of parents into the equation, those lower performing students with upper middle class parents - doctors, lawyers, professors, engineers- then the correlation is huge between lower ranking and the use of a snarky, divisive DEI viewpoint.
Clearly minorities and women who are in a well resourced environment prior to college feel the competition with high performers quite significantly and are much more likely to react to their lesser chances by using social justice ideas to shield themselves from criticism and to cut down the high performers as being undeserving because they are white or male or heterosexual, etc.
Fantastic conversation. I’m not sure if John has addressed the We See You White American Theatre before but this is the first time I have heard him talk about this manifesto. As a white actor who thought that our theater community was a very open and unbiased place for the past many years I was very shocked + depressed when the manifesto appeared in 2020 but soon learned that there were few white colleagues that I could talk about this with. So we gathered in little phone conversations and whispered about it. Certain friends were horrified when I expressed my doubts about this approach. My doubts being that the theatre could not be torn apart on racial lines. But clearly it was a power grab. And if you wanted to keep working in the theater you had to sign on with this manifesto.
So grateful to hear these conversations.