Why even hard-working blacks support preferences

A reader brings out an interesting angle on blacks’ motivations for backing racial preferences.

Reader to LA:

In your e-mail to Stuart Taylor you state, “Even those blacks who do not directly receive benefits receive the psychological benefits of racial pride, seeing blacks in many prominent positions that in many cases they would not be in absent preferences.” Absolutely correct, but, in addition to the psychological benefits they receive, it is their hope that the power accrued by these blacks in prominent positions will result in policies that provide material benefits to blacks across the economic spectrum, a sort of rising tide that raises all black ships.

For several years I’ve worked with a black guy who lives his life conservatively, works two jobs and more hours than anyone I’ve ever known, but is a staunch Democrat, his opposition to Republicans being that he dislikes the Christian Right and those born to privilege. We have a great rapport, frequently jostle on political issues and can say absolutely anything to one another without offense being taken. I once asked him why the vast majority of blacks continue to vote for Democrats when the deterioration of the blacks’ condition overall exactly parallels the effort ostensibly made by those they vote for to extricate them from their misery. His answer was, “Because they think that they’ll get something for nothing.” And therein lies the crux of the problem as most blacks believe that, in the end, they will be provided with material benefits by a society that supports preferences. Evidence of this is the political sideshow we’re witnessing concerning the distribution of federal money in New Orleans. If the money being talked about materializes and is evenly distributed among those displaced by the storm it will be the equivalent of each of them hitting the lottery.

LA to reader:

Wait—he’s a Democratic partisan, AND he tells you that blacks vote for Dems “because they think that they’ll get something for nothing”? Wow. So he’s saying that about himself as well, right?

Devastating.

Reader to LA:

Yes, he is saying that about himself as well, even though he works like he never expects a dime to come his way by any means other than the fruits of his labor.

LA to reader:

That’s an incredible insight. It means, even though he himself works hard, what he IDENTIFIES with is the idea of blacks getting something for nothing. What people do themselves and what they identify with are two different things. For example, there are many faithfully married liberal couples who would never dream of pursuing an unfaithful or promiscuous lifestyle themselves, but who identify with unrestricted sexual freedom as the highest good and will kill to defend it as a general proposition for society.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at September 29, 2005 08:26 AM | Send