Prometheus 6

I'd said before that I'm focusing on politics until the election goes one way or the other, after which I'd get back to social and racial justice. And let those who WILL object note that the only way they are left out is if they do not feel I am part of their society. I add the racial part because minorities tend to come up particularly short in the justice area.Joe set me off, though. I said I'd make an example of him, and I meant it. And now I'm at least half way in that mode.

I've been reading Discriminations for a minute. If I recall, Cobb once pinged them with a response to a post of mine. It's an anti-affirmative action site, as though "affirmative action" were an actual thing. John would, of course, say he's running an anti-discrimination site.

What he's done, though, is give me more evidence that the more erudite anti-racial justice positions are fueled by str8 ig'nance. For example he writes about an editorial in the NY Times:

The theme, of course, is the failure of Brown's purported promise of integration.

For those who believe in integration, and who hoped Brown v. Board of Education would make it a reality, it is easy to lament what one author has called Brown's "hollow hope."

The Times does add its own contribution to this familiar tale, by playing fast and loose with some statistics. In the 1972-73 school year, the editorial points out,

more than 46 percent of black children in the South attended majority white schools.... In recent decades, as the nation's commitment to integration has waned, and the Supreme Court has become more conservative, the trend lines have reversed. Nationally, 70 percent of black students now attend schools in which racial minorities are the majority.

Yes, but what were the national numbers in 1972-73, and what are the numbers in the South today? The editorial doesn't say.

Remember two days ago when I showed his bad attitude about a seriously useful minority recruiting program at Auburn's Computer Science program by providing the correct context?Well, I'm about to do it again.Let's look at that second quote of his, that starts in the middle of a sentence and elides a chunk of unspecified size. Check the full source. In fact, let's underline his quotes so you can see how he twisted the intent of the editorial by his selective quoting.

There was bitter opposition to school integration. In the South, elected officials engaged in "massive resistance." Prince Edward County, Va., closed its schools rather than integrate them. Federal troops had to accompany the first blacks to attend Little Rock Central High School. But after years of further litigation, and great struggle by civil rights activists, Brown's impact began to be felt. In the 1972-73 school year, more than 46 percent of black children in the South attended majority white schools.

At the heady moment of victory, Thurgood Marshall, who argued the case for the N.A.A.C.P., predicted segregation in education would be eliminated nationwide in five years. Integration has proved far more elusive than that. When the courts tried to desegregate the North, cities like Boston engaged in their own versions of massive resistance. In recent decades, as the nation's commitment to integration has waned, and the Supreme Court has become more conservative, the trend lines have reversed. Nationally, 70 percent of black students now attend schools in which racial minorities are the majority.

For those who believe in integration, and who hoped Brown v. Board of Education would make it a reality, it is easy to lament what one author has called Brown's "hollow hope." Still, anyone who was alive in Topeka in 1954 would find modern America's racial landscape unrecognizable, and might well be inclined to see Brown's glass as considerably more than half full.

Either John can't read (obviously not the case) or he has an agenda that honesty will not support.