Action Alert: The Rehabilitation of Racism

EXTRA!Update (12/94)

The New York Times Book Review (10/16/94) ran a lengthy piece 
that had a simple message: It's all right to believe that 
some races are genetically inferior to others.

That was the underlying theme of Malcolm W. Browne's review 
of three books: the widely publicized The Bell Curve, by 
Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray, Philippe Rushton's 
Race, Evolution and Behavior, and Seymour Itzkoff's Decline 
of Intelligence in America.

For those who have managed to avoid reading about The Bell 
Curve, it's yet another resurrection of the pseudo-science of 
eugenics, which applies mock-Darwinian notions of evolution 
to human beings, arguing that our species will somehow 
de-evolve unless steps are taken to make sure that the 
genetically inferior don't outbreed the superior. For Murray 
(and the late Herrnstein), as for most eugenicists, 
inferiority just happens to be associated with being poor and 
black.

The other two books appear to be more unabashedly cranky 
versions on the same theme. Itzkoff, as summarized by Browne, 
condemns "an economically and intellectually elite caste of 
liberals...[who] have isolated themselves from American 
society...by their paternalistic treatment of the underclass, 
by discounting the importance of family values and by failing 
to raise enough bright, educated children to sustain national 
competence." It sounds like Dan Quayle on steroids.

Rushton, for his part, believes that "mongoloids, caucasoids 
and negroids" are sub-species that have evolved "different 
reproductive strategies": "Whites, on average, emphasize 
nurture rather than numbers of offspring, while blacks, on 
average, are shaped by evolutionary selection pressures to 
produce more children but to nurture each one less."

Browne -- who has a full-time job as a science writer for the 
Times -- could have used his review to debunk this racist 
claptrap. Instead, he recommends all three books: "The 
possibility that the authors may be even partly right makes 
these three books worth plowing through and mulling over."

All the authors, according to Browne, are "recognized by 
colleagues as serious scholars." Even Rushton, with his focus 
on cranial capacity and genital size, "is regarded by many of 
his colleagues as a scholar and not a bigot." (Browne doesn't 
mention, as an October 20 Rolling Stone article did, 
Rushton's linking of "Nazi Germany's military prowess to the 
purity of its gene pool.")

It's clear that Browne has largely bought in to these 
writers' eugenic assumptions. The Bell Curve, he writes, 
"makes a strong case that America's population is becoming 
dangerously polarized between a smart, rich, educated elite 
and a population of unintelligent, poor and uneducated 
people."

Browne even seems to chide Murray and Herrnstein for not 
issuing more of a call to arms. It's hard to tell the critic 
from the cranks when he takes on the coolly paranoid tone of 
those who see themselves as defenders of the race: "Sooner or 
later...society may have to decide whether human beings have 
the right -- perhaps even the duty -- to strengthen our 
species' cognitive defenses against an increasingly dangerous 
global environment."

Browne ends his review with a plea "for freedom of debate and 
an end to the shroud of censorship imposed upon scientists 
and scholars by pressure groups and an acquiescing society." 
In fact, there is no censorship of these subjects among 
scientists: The theory of eugenics has been debated for more 
than 100 years -- and has lost.

The general failure of many reviewers to see through the 
long-discredited myths of The Bell Curve will be addressed in 
an upcoming issue of EXTRA!. One might have hoped, though, 
that the New York Times Book Review, widely seen as the most 
influential book review in the country, would have assigned 
these books to a writer with a little more understanding of 
the science of genetics -- and a little less attraction to 
the pseudo-science of eugenics.

What to do

To express your opinion, write to

     Rebecca Sinkler
     Editor, New York Times Book Review
     229 W. 43rd St.
     New York, NY 10036

or call 212-556-1466. As always, please send copies of your letters to

     Sam Husseini
     FAIR
     130 W. 25th St.
     New York, NY 10001
     Tel: 212-633-6700
     Fax: 212-727-7668
     email: fair@igc.apc.org (or use this form)