THOMAS SOWELL, SYSTEMIC RACISM, AND STATISTICS

 

 

Thomas Sowell is an American economist, turned social theorist, political philosopher, and author. He is currently Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford. (Wikipedia)

 

Disparities in outcome do not prove systemic racism (SR). Instead, Sowell argues that statistics have been erroneously invoked to make charges of SR. One example is that blacks have been turned down for loans twice as much as whites. However, the charge of racism can only be made if certain other stats are ignored. Sowell writes:

 

·       If such data are included, it turns out that, in 2000, black applicants were turned down for prime mortgage loans twice as often as white applicants—and white applicants were turned down nearly twice as often as Asian American applicants. (Intellectuals and Race)

 

Sowell reasons that since it cannot be that whites are turned down twice as often as Asians because of racism, then there is no clear grounds to assume SR in regards to the rejection of blacks. Besides:

 

·       black-owned banks turn down black mortgage loan applicants at an even higher rate than do white-owned banks, and it seems equally unlikely that this is due to racial discrimination.

 

The Left can point to disparities to erroneously use them to prove SR and to inflame blacks against the system. Sowell demonstrates that the misuse of statistics doesn't stop there:

 

·       It is much the same story in the public schools, where black students are disciplined for misbehavior more often than white students—who in turn are disciplined more often than Asian American students.

 

Therefore, these simple disparities do not constitute evidence of white discrimination against blacks.

 

Sowell credits the paternalistic Left and its “I know better than you” attitude for the problems in his community:

 

·       At the heart of the Left’s vision of the world — and of themselves — is that they know better what is good for other people. This means that the Left sees itself as having both a right and a duty to take away other people’s options.

 

Sowell had experienced this “I know what’s better for you” attitude in many ways:

 

·       Many years ago, in a debate on William F. Buckley’s program Firing Line, I was told by a left-wing lawyer that black parents without a good education themselves could not make wise choices for their children’s education. But hard evidence says otherwise. There are whole chains of charter schools, such as the KIPP (Knowledge Is Power Program) schools and the Success Academy schools, where ghetto kids have academic achievements equal to those of children in affluent suburbs — and sometimes higher achievements…Black parents who enroll their children in charter schools have apparently made better choices than the know-it-alls on the left.

 

Sowell also claims that the “I know best” Left has also hurt and marginalized by denigrating law-enforcement:

 

·       When it comes to crime and violence, the political Left, including much of the media, are having a great time demonizing the police. Blacks are the biggest victims of the sharp upturn in murders that has followed. But, yet again, hard evidence carries very little weight when the Left is feeling good about themselves, while leaving havoc in their wake. The absurdity to which this kind of media frenzy about the police can lead is shown by the fact that a black policeman in Charlotte, North Carolina, shooting a black suspect who had a gun, has been blown up into a racial issue across the nation. Have we become so gullible that we are so easily manipulated and stampeded? http://www.nationalreview.com/article/441176/california-ballot-proposition-58-shows-left-taking-school-choices-away-parents

 

 

The “divide and conquer” Leftist strategy has hurt whites as well as blacks:

 

·       None of the most popular political panaceas for helping black communities has a track record of making things better, and some have made things much worse. (Sowell)

 

This should raise the question, “Who really cares, who is truly our friends, and who is just using us are a pawn to support their political agenda?” According to Sowell:

 

·       Many things that are supposed to help blacks actually have a track record of making things worse. Minimum wage laws have had a devastating effect in making black teenage unemployment several times higher than it once was.

 

·       In later years, as the minimum wage was repeatedly raised to keep up with inflation, black teenage unemployment from 1971 through 1994 was never less than 3 times what it was in 1948, and ranged as high as more than 5 times the 1948 level. It also became far higher than the unemployment rate of whites the same age.

 

Ironically, the Left continues to unfold their charges of SR and the alleged racist attempts to maintain “white privilege,” creating hatred, distrust, and polarization However, the Left’s attempts to replace the present system might have done more to un-privilege the black community than anything else. Sowell charges:

 

·       The relations between the police and the black community are another issue that has gotten a lot of attention, and produced counterproductive results. After all the rhetoric and all the efforts towards more tightly restraining the police, the net result has been that murder rates have soared in cities where that policy has been followed — and most of the people killed have been black.

 

Our culture of blame and shame refuses to compare the status of blacks before and after the institution of their liberal policies. However, Sowell wants us to see the larger picture:

 

·       In my own life, I was very fortunate when I left home in 1948, at age 17 — a high school dropout with no skills or experience. At that time, the unemployment rate of black 16- and 17-year-old males was 9.4 percent. For white males the same ages, it was 10.2 percent. http://jewishworldreview.com/cols/sowell091316.php3#4KH2HlYyLYYSVZxU.99

 

The Left has little interest in such statistics, only those that they can twist to show that our entire system is so corrupt that it must be removed.

VODDIE BAUCHAM, BLM, MARXISM, AND JUSTICE

 

 

The Good News includes some bad news, even many warnings. Warnings are part of Jesus’ message:

 

• “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves.”(Matthew 7:15)

 

• And he cautioned them, saying, “Watch out; beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod (Mark 8:15)

 

Jesus had warned about any teaching that would corrupt the faith. The faithful Christian servant must do likewise.

 

Now for another warning. In every Marxist nation, Christianity has been oppressed to the point of extermination. VODDIE T. BAUCHAM JR., pastor, church planter, and dean of the School of Divinity at African Christian University in Lusaka, Zambia, warns that, according to the Marxist Critical Theory (CT):

 

• Christianity is part of the oppressive hegemony! And according to some, it is the most pernicious aspect of it; it has and maintains “privilege,” and contributes to oppression. One of the foundational CSJ textbooks, Teaching for Diversity and Social Justice, is a mainstay in schools of education. In it, the term “Christian privilege” refers to “the social advantages held by Christians in the U.S. who experience social and cultural advantages relative to non-Christians” derived from hegemony. Hence, it is rooted in “the assumptions underlying institutional rules and the collective consequences of following those rules,” and therefore, “is generally unacknowledged by those who hold it, because it is maintained through the pervasive but largely invisible culture of normative religious practices.” This is the classic Gramscian-Marxist view of hegemony. (Baucham, “Fault Lines,” 207)

 

According to CT, everything about the prevailing culture must be mercilessly criticized until overthrown. Baucham cites another CT neo-Marxist:

 

• “Religious freedom… is really code for white Christians being able to do what they want to do,” (“The Color of Compromise” author Jemar Tisby told Veggie Tales). (207-08)

 

For the CT and the Critical Race Theorist, there can be “No Peace” as long as there is “No Justice.” For them, however, “justice” will not be achieved until the entire system is overthrown.

 

The CT neo-Marxist invariably regards Christianity as the opposition. Baucham cites “Teaching for Diversity and Social Justice”:

 

• The significance of Christianity in U.S. life and the challenges it poses for minority religions is a social justice issue that requires the kind of historical knowledge and structural/cultural analysis we use to understand other forms of oppression that stand in the way of social justice. (208)

 

For the Marxist CT, undermining Christianity is a matter of justice, since it provides the foundation and support for oppression. Therefore, it must be eliminated and replaced by a Marxist system.

 

Baucham argues that BLM (“Black Lives Matter”) is married to Marxism and CT:

 

• The organization is Marxist, revolutionary, feminist, misandrist, pro-LGBTQIA+, pro-abortion, and anti-family, with roots in the occult. It is unacceptable for Christians to partner with, celebrate, identify with, or promote this organization. And that includes being bullied or pressured into using the phrase “black lives matter.” (“Fault Lines,” 223)

 

BLM, a product of Marxist training, has no qualms about the use of pressure and intimidation. Baucham believes that it is his duty as a Christian to expose BLM, especially through its own writings:

 

• We are self-reflexive and do the work required to dismantle cisgender privilege and uplift Black trans folk, especially Black trans women who continue to be disproportionately impacted by trans-antagonistic violence. We foster a queer-affirming network. When we gather, we do so with the intention of freeing ourselves from the tight grip of heteronormative thinking, or rather, the belief that all in the world are heterosexual. (BLM’s website’s “What We Believe” page)

 

In Marxist fashion, BLM’s intention is to “dismantle” and “disrupt.” Force and propaganda replaces peace and reason as their tools for social change:

 

• We build a space that affirms Black women and is free from sexism, misogyny, and environments in which men are centered. We make our spaces family-friendly and enable parents to fully participate with their children. We dismantle the patriarchal practice that requires mothers to work “double shifts” so that they can mother in private even as they participate in public justice work. We disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure requirement by supporting each other as extended families and “villages” that collectively care for one another, especially our children, to the degree that mothers, parents, and children are comfortable. (Black Lives Matter, “What We Believe,” http://archive.is/oARH0)

 

These are not the teachings that have promoted the Christian faith:

 

• Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. (1 Corinthians 13:4-6)

 

Baucham exemplifies these biblical principles:

 

• I forgave the Africans who took my ancestors’ freedom. I forgave the Americans who bought and exploited them. I forgave the family that replaced my identity with their German name. I just forgave! I did not harbor any ill will. I did not feel entitled to any apologies or reparations. By God’s grace, I recognized that Providence had blessed me beyond my ancestors’ wildest dreams—or my own. I couldn’t help but remember Joseph’s words: “As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today” (Genesis 50:20). (228-29)

 

Join me in praying that the Lord will both warn and revive His Church!

MARXISM AND ITS MARRIAGE TO COERCION AND VIOLENCE

 
Hatred and jealousy are always seeking their justification, anything to make their cause seem righteous, even if violence is its tool. Samuel Gregg has written:

• As a matter of principle, Marxists aren’t troubled by scruples. They will kill, steal, lie, railroad the innocent — whatever it takes to advance the Revolution. Marx himself never shied away from what his program entailed. “When our turn comes,” he wrote in 1849, “we shall not make excuses for the terror.” The actions of his apostles, ranging from Lenin to Stalin, Che Guevara, Mao, and Pol Pot, to the Castro brothers, prove just how “principled” Marxists are willing to be, even if it means gulags, “reeducation” camps, or simple murder.

With such a history, it is surprising that Marxism has been able exercise its considerable influence over the universities and even many churches. But how? It now wears a new face with an updated strategy - the gradual infiltration of culture.

Antonio Gramsci of the Marxist Frankfort School wrote in favor of a Marxist infiltration of culture and the arts. Truth wasn’t their tool but bullying and discrediting of any opposition. Gregg uncovers the new and refined Gramscian strategy against the opposition:

• Such people must be marginalized because of their faith and/or politics, lest they threaten the left’s “hegemony” over the means of “cultural production.” Truth is no longer important, for truth is just a ruling class construct. What matters is the pursuance and maintenance of power, so that millions of media-consumers and thousands of university students can continue being enlightened about the hidden structures of privilege. The most insidious aspect of this mentality is that its logic, on its terms, can’t be refuted. If you question, for instance, the hermeneutics of suspicion, then you must be part of the ruling class’s apparatus of control, whether you realize it or not. At worst, you are evil. At best, you are a dupe. As Joseph Ratzinger once observed, this was a standard retort deployed by Marxist-inclined liberation theologians whenever anyone questioned their positions. https://stream.org/dangerous-marxist/

If truth doesn’t matter, then there is no way to justify Marxism but through brute force, a tool from which Marxists never shied away from using, whether to get power or to maintain power. No wonder that genocide has always found its place in their tool kit, as the vote has found its home in democracies.

Meanwhile, the New Marxist uses a new an improved form of violence. They seek to deconstruct everything of value in the prevailing culture as tools of control and oppression of the ruling class. Even the concepts of truth and justice are tools to clandestinely maintain the power of the “privileged.” Any defense of the prevailing order is shouted down and the guilty “privileged” are told that they have no right to speak.

Evidently, idealistic university students have been convinced by the “logic” of the New Marxist. Consequently, they believe that they are pursuing a righteous cause as they shout down any voice deemed to be speaking for the “oppressors.”

 

MARXISM, THE OPPRESSORS, WOKE, AND INCOME GUILT

 

One highly esteemed pastor emeritus made a highly racist, but now a highly fashionable statement during an interview:

• A friend of mine recently, who is a pastor, was talking to a Norwegian man who had just moved into his community and went to his church. And at one point he heard the pastor talking about the fact that we’re all complicit in creating this narrative that ‘black people are dangerous’ and etcetera, and so we’re implicit in this. Afterward the white, the Norwegian came up and said “no no no, I’m Norwegian. No, I had nothing to do with it,” and my pastor friend said “studies have shown, that have pretty much proven that if you have white skin it’s worth a million dollars over a lifetime, over somebody who doesn’t have white skin. https://protestia.com/2020/09/18/tim-keller-if-you-have-white-skin-the-bible-says-youre-involved-in-injustice/

This absurd statement raises several questions.

Are all those who make on the average of a million dollars more than the average black guilty of racism, like blacks over six feet six who play for the NBA? Or those who are only black by various degree? Or blacks with white skin? Or whites with dark skin?

Are all whites guilty of the sins of a few whites? Are all blacks guilty of the crimes of a few blacks? Should there be different standards of justice and punishment based upon skin color? The less pigment, the more guilt? Must we calculate pigment before sentencing?

Do more whites than blacks perpetuate the racist narrative that blacks are dangerous? Even if someone believes this way, should this make them guilty? And what about blacks who think that whites are morally inferior? Should our justice system now include thought police? Evidently, this esteemed pastor emeritus would answer yes:

• And that’s because of historical forces that have come about, and at this point you can go at it several ways. One, as I’ve mentioned, if you have that asset of white skin, right now, historical asset, then you actually have to say ‘I didn’t deserve this’ and also to some degree, ‘I’m the product of…I’m standing on the shoulders of other people who got that through injustice.” So the Bible actually says ‘yes you do…you are involved in injustice’, and even if you didn’t actually do it, therefore you have a responsibility. Not just to say “well, maybe if I get around to it, maybe we can do something about the poor people out there.’ No- you’re part of the problem.

Is it unjust to benefit from the hard work of one’s parents? Is there a single Bible verse claims that we are guilty if we have more than our neighbor? Instead, it is biblically legitimate to pass on an inheritance to the children:

• A good man leaves an inheritance to his children’s children, but the sinner’s wealth is laid up for the righteous. (Proverbs 13:22)

If the inheritance is I’ll-begotten, then the inheritor has a duty to make reparations to the victims. However, this pastor unbiblically assumes that any disparity in wealth is a sin. But it is assumed that we should save to care, first of all, for our own families, even if this means that we have more wealth accumulated than our neighbor:

• If any believing woman has relatives who are widows, let her care for them. Let the church not be burdened, so that it may care for those who are truly widows. (1 Timothy 5:16)

The Bible repeatedly claims that it is fitting that those who work should benefit from their labors, while those who refuse to work should bear the consequences:

• For even when we were with you, we would give you this command: If anyone is not willing to work, let him not eat. (2 Thessalonians 3:10)

Are the productive ones “the problems” as this pastor emeritus charges? While for the Marxist, they are. If you have accumulated wealth, you are automatically in-league with the oppressors and are guilty. However, we need to ask, “Did God make Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Job guilty by giving them great wealth? Of course, they had to share this wealth with those in need, usually in the form of a loan. However, it was understood that giving had to begin with those within their own  circle:

• And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up. So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith. (Galatians 6:9-10)

No indication of income redistribution or equating wealth with guilt! Nevertheless, we do have a responsibility for the poor. However, in view of how indiscriminate entitlement programs have destroyed the recipients, their families, and communities, giving must be done wisely and with concern about the impact of the giving.

In regards to helping the under-privileged, Pastor Rick Warren has written in the preface to Theologian Wayne Grudem’s “The Poverty of Nations:

• Having traveled the globe for thirty years and trained leaders in 164 countries, I’ve witnessed firsthand that almost every government and NGO (non-profit) poverty program is actually harmful to the poor, hurting them in the long run rather than helping them. The typical poverty program creates dependency, robs people of dignity, stifles initiative, and can foster a “What have you done for me lately?” sense of entitlement.