Black attorney general pulls white America’s chains

Several readers have sent this story:

Eric Holder, the nation’s first black attorney general, said Wednesday the United States was “a nation of cowards” on matters of race, with most Americans avoiding candid discussions of racial issues.

In a speech to Justice Department employees marking Black History Month, Holder said the workplace is largely integrated but Americans still self-segregate on the weekends and in their private lives.

This is a replay of the epic New York Times series some eight years ago about white-black relations in the work place, in which the subject was not white anti-black discrimination, because the article couldn’t find any, but a new liberal problem, the regrettable “silence” of whites on race, their reluctance to engage in deep discussions about race with their black co-workers. It was climaxed by a special Nightline episode (with, as I remember, a participatory audience of whites and blacks) in which the same complaint about white “silence” continued to be made, by, among others, New York Times executive editor Joseph Lelyveld, one of the most precious, dislikable liberals I’ve ever seen. Of course, what everyone involved in the proceedings knew but would not say (hmm, there’s that “silence” again) was that if whites said what they believed about race, e.g., if they pointed out that their black co-workers were not up to par and had been admitted, hired, and retained due to an all-encompassing system of racial preferences, and that no criticism of black poor performance or troublesome behavior could ever be made in the work place, they’d lose their jobs and their careers. So Holder’s call for people (meaning whites) to stop being “cowards” on race and engage in “candid” discussion is a call for a hundred (white) flowers to bloom, so he can cut their heads off. Of course, Holder doesn’t expect whites to expose themselves to his tender ministrations. What’s really happening here, as Gintas puts it, is that “he’s just mocking us.”

But Holder should be careful. If he keeps up his taunting of whites as “cowards” on race, they might take him at his word and really start saying what they think.

—end of initial entry—

Ben W. writes:

Who I associate with on weekends and in my private life should not be a concern of Holder’s!

LA replies:

There are some blacks and liberals who really want to end all racial-self-segregation. Michael Meyers of the New York Civil Rights Coalition is one. Years ago I heard a talk by Meyers in which he said that society should force people to integrate.

Mark A. writes:

Three cheers for Eric Holder!! This is great! VFR readers should be rejoicing. This is one of the perks of an Obama administration! Let the white “useful idiot” Obama voters see what their idol has in store for them. We’re getting the same useless wars, corporate welfare, and insane monetary policy as the Bush administration but at least now we get some entertainment too!

Posted by Lawrence Auster at February 18, 2009 08:19 PM | Send