Diversity Pro and Con: A Nigerian Case Study

After recently attending the award-winning Nigerian musical FELA!, about a musician’s travails in that challenged African nation, I was out in Berkeley with friends enjoying a great Nigerian band (BaBa Ken/Katoja). The venue included many ex-patriot African patrons. While enjoying the music, my party ran smack dab into the issue of recklessly importing people who grow up in a very different and, in the case of Nigeria, dangerous place. Shit happens, and it did.

At one point in the evening, my girlfriend whipped out her recently acquired iPhone 4s, to take a picture of me. Immediately afterwards, we were faced with a very angry Nigerian fellow who thought she was taking pictures of him to somehow facilitate his untimely demise. Perhaps he left Lagos under a cloud - I do not know. The country is certainly a very dangerous place where a small amount of tribal difference, hostility, or money, can get someone killed.

Anyway, despite our attempts, the Nigerian fellow could not comprehend that his identity did not reside on the phone, and that we did not work for the government. At one point he grabbed the phone, to get a closer look, and then refused to return it. In all his yelling, he asked me if I wanted to fight. I said no, but also that he was not leaving with that phone. His final word was that he was keeping the phone and dared that I should call the police. It was as though he thought the police would either support his obstinacy, or (more likely) that calling the authorities was silly.

I approached the club owner, explained the events and asked him to call Berkeley PD. Before making the call, the owner wanted to talk to the guy and ‘straighten out this misunderstanding’. That conversation ended with the owner fending off the beginnings of a battery by the Nigerian. I then became adamant about calling the police, even if I had to make the call myself.

The Berkeley PD quickly arrived and patiently threatened the man into returning the phone. On their way to this result, they explained all the rights and responsibilities that governed his free attendance at the night club, including possible photos, and admonished that those ideas he brought from Nigeria carried no weight in the U.S. Although he eventually relented, he clearly was not convinced by anyone that Berkeley was not Lagos, Nigeria and that his understanding was inadequate, nor was his behavior in need of adapting.

I went home that night with a profound feeling that this man should not be here, and there are probably many others like him. It is too damn easy to get into this country! Thank goodness he did not have a weapon. While his influential experiences may be little fault of his own, there is no reasonable excuse for his theft or refusal to accept and follow the laws of his adopted land. And whether his ancestors were brought here in chains or he came willingly, the requirement is the same – know the law, follow the law, or suffer the consequences.

At one point early in the dispute, the Nigerian’s female companion attempted to guide him, but his words and body-language, and her immediate retreat, quickly established that he would not hesitate to ‘knock the you-know-what out of her’. His words to her “you, shut up!” were sautéed in a violent tone and look, and the instant fear in her eyes told a deeper and chilling story, by itself.

James C. Collier

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Technorati Tags: Diversity Pro and Con: A Nigerian Case Study, Nigeria, Immigration, FELA, Berkeley Police, Acting White

Random African-ness: Antelope Takes Out Cyclist

"Evan Van der Spuy, a 17-year-old member of Team Jeep, was flying in the Time Freight MTB Express Mountain race Sunday near Pietermaritzburg when a leaping Red Hartebeest, or antelope, ran smack into him. Travis Walker, his trailing teammate, happened to have a camera strapped to his bike."



James C. Collier

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White Violence, Navy Seals and the Death of Osama

In the shadow of my previous post on black violence (here) and the recent killing of terrorist leader, Osama Bin Laden, perhaps it is appropriate to talk more about violence, specifically non-urban, non-black violence. On one side I feel good that the mastermind of the 9-11 tragedy is gone. On the surface, our government killed him in response to him killing many thousands of Americans and Muslims alike, under his jihadist rhetoric. However, I will always wince when governments sanction and carry-out actions to kill named individuals. It is a slippery slope to be on, considering the strangeness of bedfellows.

The reality of publicly eliminating the practical and/or symbolic leadership of a sworn and deadly enemy brings violence, and its epitome, the taking of a life, front-and-center onto humanity’s stage. Fighting and killing is what we humans do, better than anything else. The Navy Seals are our most elite example of evolved, expert, surgical-level, violence, but in the end it is all the same - the best killers that technology has to offer, killed a man. Killers, it is what we are.

I have a good friend whose young son is training in hopes of joining the Seals as an officer. On one side, I am cheering the kid on, because he is an ace and wants to defend his country in this way. On the other hand, I shudder to think of him as the killing machine the Navy will make of him. The sacrifice he will make for our benefit will be great. Those Black Ops guys must leave their souls at the gates of hell, less they come to think of themselves as gods. They have a target that they kill, retrieve, or blow up, without any consideration beyond the order. It has to be that way. FTR, Bin Laden is dead because that is what it said on the order, period.

We should know this about the killing, it cannot stop. It will not stop. Us or them. Them or us. Our planet is getting smaller with each smartphone. The human infestation continues, with a competition for dominion increasing from the leading to trailing edges of global society. It is happening in places like Kenya, and Tibet, New York, and New Zealand - by governments and street-thugs alike. I guess this is progress, to somebody.

UPDATE: Here is what the White House had to say about the timing of the Seal Team 6 rescue on the same day as Obama's 2012 State of the Union address. You be the judge.

James C. Collier

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#16 Why Are Blacks So Violent?

After the recent spate of violence to plague McDonald’s restaurants, I have noticed this question continuing to pop up in discussion forums, and in my head, as well. The answers tossed around are usually either racist/ignorant, PC-silly, or some combination. I thought I would try my hand at something more enlightened. Before I start, the reasons that Blacks are violent are both similar and different than for Whites (who I will cover another time). Here goes.

Reason Part 1. Modern-era ethnic Africans, with ancestral influence dating back at least 5,000 years, and including Africa-Americans, have significantly less relative exposure to the rule-of-law (ROL) and, therefore, less cultural acceptance and manifestation of same. ROL provides a process and procedure for guiding and controlling behavior, and specifically managing conflict.

Reason Part 2. Black Americans, from slavery to recent years, have lived under a compromised (i.e. exploitative) version of this country’s Euro-based rule-of-law, as embodied in the US Constitution. This bastardized ROL singled-out the group for abuse under color of authority, thereby making eventual trust and acceptance in the law nearly impossible, if not always more difficult than with other citizens (especially recent immigrants).

Reason Part 3. The poor and uneducated, in general, have less adherence to the rule-of-law (and protection, as well) even when all additional factors are counted. African-Americans are disproportionately represented in the poor and uneducated demographics.

These reasons are simply explanatory. They are not excuses, nor are they allowances. Regardless of group experiences, Blacks are individuals with full responsibility for their specific actions. Historical experience must never override adherence to laws, even in the case where parts or the whole of the law is errantly applied. To do so invites the greater risk of social collapse, the companion of anarchy.

I'm no authority, just a blogger asking why. Thoughtful alternatives? Come one, come all.

James C. Collier

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Why Are Europeans In Such A Hurry?

The average work pace of an employed German citizen is faster than anybody else on the planet. Irish people walk faster than everybody else. The Swiss have the most accurately set, and re-set, timepieces, and across all measures they live life at the fastest overall pace. So says the research of Professor Robert Levine, of Cal State Fresno, author of "A Geography of Time" (here).

So why does this matter? Life is not a race, is it? Well, it kind of is. Living at a faster pace is like speeding in your car. Speeding safely requires that the driver look farther down the road, with more accurate anticipation of what lies ahead. So, the skill that makes Lewis Hamilton a champion Formula One driver is his ability to see, think, and react ahead of his 200 mph race car, better than the competition. Speed and great anticipation go hand-in-hand in societies, as well as speed freaks.

Historically, when fast-paced societies meet up with slower ones, the faster folks easily dominate. When all difference is accounted for, the ‘early bird’ does indeed get the worm, the girl, the nice house, the fancy car, the fat paycheck. The speedy get the upper hand and never release their lead, unless the rules of competition are somehow changed. America is slowing down. Mexico is dead last (of those the professor studied) on the speed of living scale, according to Levine’s research observers. African countries and their transplants seem to compete with Central and South Americans for slowness.

Mind you, being fast does not make you better, per Professor Levine (or me), it just makes it easier to master your domain and dominate others. The Swiss, German, or Japanese ideals arguably leave much happiness on the table, while their people speed about their lives. I recall searching a toy store in Frankfurt airport for my son - not a model Porsche in sight. Nevertheless, the influence of pace is uncontestable. The next time you see lateness or earliness in yourself, or others who look similar or different, take a moment to consider how the speed and pace, and horizon, of different cultures plays into who is on top, and who is not.

James C. Collier

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Why is Black Hair Curly, Kinky, and/or Nappy?

The single biggest driver in human evolution was the challenge of matching the demands and capacities of our out-sized brain against the relative limitations of a weak physique. When researching the ‘whims of mother nature’, nothing is arbitrary. Sure, there are variances and distributions, but you can be sure that somewhere in the mix resides an objective mean – defining form and substance with a purpose.

Hair, like skin, is part of our genetically malleable, adaptable, outer layer, protecting us from the elements, the heat, cold, wetness, dryness, and utilizing the visible and not-so-visible light (energy) spectrum. Early primates and proto-humans had straight hair, which was an asset in low exertion foraging environs of ranging temperature, but not conducive to extending our physical endurance in the competition for food and survival, especially in mid-day Africa. Tightly coiled, moisture resistant head-hair created an enhanced barrier to ultra-violet (UV) radiation by turning many times on itself. This configuration also allows the release of perspiration droplets into a more optimal evaporative state whereby the droplets capture the heat of air moving around the coils before the perspiration rolls off and evaporates said heat away from the body. Presto! Cool scalp, cool brain, and greater endurance.

Conversely, straight hair was a liability, as it is more moisture absorbent, becoming heavy and causing it to stick to adjacent hair shafts and the scalp, effectively blocking the airflow required for heat exchange and dissipation. The straight hair of those precursors to modern humans would have made them less able to exert themselves for survival and advancement.

So with all due respect to Chris Rock, there is no such thing as ‘good’ or ‘bad’ hair. Curly, kinky, or nappy hair adaptation meant survival and prosperity as a species, in the birthplace of humanity. Moreover, just as coiled hair and pigmented skin conveyed advantage in Africa, straight hair, and light skin adaptation did the same moving north, in logical ways and for discernable reasons (more on this later). And for the record, Don Imus (here) is a true moron. The Rutgers ladies (pictured) are infinitely more appealing than his sorry behind.

Reference: Nina Jablonski, PhD., "Skin:A Natural History".

James C. Collier

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Why Are Black People Black-Skinned?

While asking the question ‘Why are White People White?’ (here), I touched on that black people are black by the same mechanism. However, my explanation was too brief, and the question deserves its own full answer. Keep in mind this evolutionary cheat-sheet: first, there was panting and hairiness, and then came limited sweating and hairiness, and now we have full-body sweating and no hair (little hair).

To begin, earlier hairy primates, or proto-humans, living in Africa were less efficient at dissipating the body heat that resulted from strenuous exertion (hunting, gathering, and avoiding predators). Panting is the way most mammals cool themselves, rather than through sweating. As an evolutionary alternative, sweat glands appeared first over hairy bodies and then over less-hairy bodies, allowing for rapid cooling and quick evaporation. Evaporative cooling pulls heat away, countering the insulating effect, whereby the moisture stays on the skin, trapped by hair, and increasing in temperature from both the sun and internal exertion.

Indeed, sweat glands were an improvement over panting, allowing for greater exertion, but there was another hurdle. Full-body hair on proto humans grew out of ‘white (non-pigmented) skin’ underneath, in combination to regulate Vitamin D(3) production, for bone and reproductive health. Without the hair to block the sun, the skin had to take on this critical task by itself, via melanin production, thereby making the evolutionary case from fully covered, dark haired, white-skinned, proto-humans into hair-less dark-skinned humanoid descendants. Viola, black people!

It was relentless large brain demands (thinking) of proto-humans that drove body evolution to change and advance. Hairlessness, sweat glands, and dark-skin proved a potent combination in response, allowing humans to run greater distances, fight longer fights, dehydrate at a slower pace, and recover normal body temperature more quickly. Humanoids quickly became formidable foes, as their body capabilities ‘caught up to’ their brainy demands.

Reference: Nina Jablonski, PhD., "Skin:A Natural History".

James C. Collier

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Why are White People White-Skinned?

Being black, I scarcely wondered why I was black, but I did often wonder why white people were white. I never believed in the ‘God wanted it that way’ answer. It seems very natural that whites and blacks would harbor the same question, however taboo it is to toss it into conversation. Indeed, science has provided us with an answer, but I hardly see it in print for non-scientists.

The scientific record shows relatively hair-less humans evolving from hairy primates in Africa. At the time when hairy proto-humans ‘loss’ their hair and developed sweat glands for cooling their big brains, they also needed to adapt their production and regulation of the pro-steroid hormone, Vitamin D(3), which was critical to healthy bones and reproduction. The result was an adaptive higher level of melanin in the skin, turning it dark. Viola, healthy dark-skin humans to populate the world!

As early Africans migrated north to Eurasia, with its lessened sun intensity, dark skin posed a problem. Vitamin D(3) fell to unhealthy levels, except that built-in genetically adaptive skin traits quickly kicked-in to lightened skin responsible for producing the required D(3). The farther north they ventured the lighter the skin needed to be to absorb the right amount of sun. It really is that simple. There is a great book that explains all of this in detail, written by recognized skin authority, Nina Jablonski PhD., called “Skin: A Natural History” (here).

So there it is - latitude (north/south position) on the globe pretty much dictates skin color (here). There are a few exceptions to this rule, associated with levels of Vitamin D in the diet. By example, the Inuits (indigenous Arctic people) are relatively darker, even at such a high latitude, because of oily-fish diets laden with Vitamin D(3). Aborigines in continental Australia, arriving via the ‘intercoastal migration’, maintained their melanin through similar fish-rich diets, on the coast, coupled with the fierce demands of an intense interior desert sun.

As a side bar, and from a Vitamin D(3) healthiness perspective, the continental US is (on average) too sunny for most fair whites, and not sunny enough for most brown-skin blacks. Everyone needs Vitamin D management for good health.

James C. Collier

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Syndrome Gives Blacks Blue Eyes

A recent commenter on this blog suggested that the blue-eyed Black boy, in an earlier post, may present Waardenburg Syndrome, a rare autosomal genetic disorder that has possible bright blue eyes as one of its qualifying criteria, along with possible deafness (common). Actually, the cause of the blue eyes is a form of albinism that may include patches of non-pigmented skin or forehead hair, regardless of ethnicity.

There are four types of Waardenburg Syndrome, with a mix of possible characteristics as the determinant. Medical challenges increase with type. The boy in the picture is displaying two major symptoms of type 1, as does the previous boy (perhaps) (here); bright blue eyes and dystopia canthorum, a condition where the inner corners of the eyes are set more widely apart, but with normally distanced eyes.

Waardenburg occurs once in every 42,000 births, and is a deficiency inherited from a single parent, who may or may not display similar characteristics. Regarding the eye, color abnormalities come in three forms; heterochromia (multiple colors), bilateral isohypochromia (pale blue eyes), or fundus (reflective) pigmentary alterations (spottiness).

So, besides naturally occurring genetic blue eyes in dark skinned people, as previously discussed, understanding Waardenburg's is another avenue of accurately recognizing phenotype (gene expression) in eye color.

James C. Collier

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The Great Slavery Debate: Reparations Twist

When witnessing a debate on reparations, I often feel like I’m listening to people speaking completely different languages. Consider that when unarmed Black Oakland BART rider Oscar Grant was killed by a White police officer on a train platform, Blacks demanded a first-degree murder charge, although it had little chance of being sustained (no malice aforethought). While the accusation made Blacks feel good for a minute, the illusion of fair play departed when the jury opted for a more accurate charge.

When Blacks argue for reparations, it does not mean that they know or care anything about an accurate application. What they care about is a means to take revenge, while getting compensated for the suffering of their relatives (the end). Of course, Whites (and some Blacks) try to explain that reparations do not apply, to a chorus of ‘I-don’t-give-a-bleep what a White man or Uncle Tom thinks’. It’s not about laws or evolving moral codes of the day – it’s about emotion and payback. We need to call it what it is.

Reparations debates will never be resolved until Blacks can inject some objectivity where only emotions currently exist. For their part, Whites will never be a part of the resolution until they can cop to how reasonable it is for Blacks to blame slavery, as the catch basin, for the litany of misdeeds that continued after slavery ended.

Hopefully the day will come when Blacks stop soliciting unfulfilling indulgences from Whites, when what they really want is for Whites to admit that their ancestors outsmarted themselves, not only by kidnapping Africans, but more so by not making Blacks equal opportunity citizens after the emancipation. Both Blacks and Whites need to work (together), minus race cards, at understanding how pretend equality (of opportunity), the sustained post-slavery sin, got us to the dysfunctional mess we find ourselves today. Only then can we start making decisions and taking action to reverse the damage.

James C. Collier

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The Great Slavery Debate: Ungrateful Negroes

When it comes to discussing, or even thinking about, slavery, the great taboo of White folks is embodied in the question forever on their minds and almost never on their tongues, “Why are Blacks so ungrateful to be in America, when Africa is the worst place on the globe in terms of health, jobs, government, education, crime, climate, resources, blah, blah, blah?”

They will go on to say, “sure, slavery was bad for your ancestors, but it ended a long time ago”. They will also say that racism may exist, “but it exist in Africa too, and much worse, with one tribe committing genocide on another”. In the days before political correctness, Whites were fond of telling Blacks that they should go back to Africa, if they don’t like it here. The implication was always that however bad Blacks think America is, it is worse in Africa.

Where White people got off track is in thinking and acting like Blacks are immigrants. “Go home”, has always been the retort for the disgruntled immigrant, and some even made the return trip. But the African ancestry that was forced here is mostly like those people who stayed behind in Europe, China, India, etc. – meaning they are not immigrant-minded. So why did Black people stay here? Out of those that could have returned, they stayed mostly out of spite, and certainly not because anyone offered them a shot at the American Dream. This was the grand screw-up of US leadership before, during, and after the Civil War.

Fast-forward - if Black people could ever find a reason to want to be here, because of the relative opportunity, instead of being here to simply piss-off White people, a lot of the problems of the day would disappear. And ditto, if White people could ever accept responsibility for post-slavery abuse, without pretending to handover the keys to the kingdom, or other counter-productive acts of contrition.

The paradox is that Blacks cannot make Whites miserable about the past and what followed, without assuring their own adjacent misery, and Whites cannot make amends by only pretending to consider Blacks capable and deserving of a fair shot. So we are all miserable together down the crapper.

James C. Collier

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The Great Slavery Debate: The Debt of Slavery

It is a recurring theme within American Black culture that White people owe a special debt to Blacks because of slavery. Certain conservatives try to short-circuit this claim by arguing that slavery was not profitable, but even if profitability was arguable (and it is not), some will still claim it as a theft of service. However, since slavery has always been with humanity, we will need to carefully establish the point, exactly, when it became theft, and worthy of damages.

Nowhere in the bible is it written that slavery is an abomination unto the Lord, or anybody else. There is no commandment against it. People were not stoned or crucified for practicing it, unlike stealing, killing, adultery, blasphemy, and a list of other prescribed avoidances. In fact, the bible and the Koran, the two most enduring rulebooks of history, and the basis of our rules of law, make nary a mention of slavery as anything more than an everyday part of life.

Did the tribal rulers of Africa think they were stealing the lives of rival Africans when they captured and traded them to Europeans for gunpowder/weapons, utensils and foodstuffs? I think not. Many Africans might argue that they were actually sparing the lives of their kindred enemies by shipping them off, as the alternative was to simply kill them. So it would seem that slavery broke neither laws nor moral codes, a continent away or here, until those practicing it changed their minds about it. This is no different than our current hot-button items of abortion, or same sex marriage. All is allowed until strictly forbidden.

People who argue for repayment nearly always cite reparations paid to indigenous Americans, Japanese internees, and WWII era Jews, but in those cases (here, here, here), laws (treaties) on the books were expressly broken. It seems that the acts of elevating the Atlantic Slave Trade, and slavery in America, to a cut above all other slavery invokes some special status where societal advancement no longer adheres to linearity. The sooner a proper perspective is in place, the better off we will all be.

Finally, perspective is not an invitation to insult and cruelty - slavery did happen and its association with a struggling group is undeniable. Nearly forty years ago a White high school classmate, Paul Ivancie, stated to me, unapologetically, how cool it would be to have a slave. His stupidity brought me face-to-face with the love/hate conundrum Blacks face in this country. There are still Antebellum Whites like him out there - I just hope that when my kids meet such people those words will roll off their backs better than mine.

James C. Collier

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The Great Slavery Debate: Was Slavery Profitable?

Note: There are many who say that the economics of slavery were not very profitable, Thomas Sowell notably, and I would say they are wrong. However, it is important to distinguish (as I will attempt) between plantation slavery economics and the greater commerce value/impact of the triangular trade.

There are two high schools (Part 1 today), and one graduate school (Part 2 coming), of thought on the degree to which this country owes its fortunes to slavery, and by inference to Black ancestry. It is this notion of who benefited and who is owed, intertwined with current dysfunction, which sits as a big bugaboo to progress.

The Atlantic Slave Trade was a profitable component of triangular commerce of that day, but by itself not world changing. In fact, slavery has often been the spoil of a society that was good at something else, mainly war. Having other people to do your loathsome work has been a luxury for the already rich. The Atlantic Slave Trade was a final burst where pure labor was of pivotal importance to a more sophisticated system of commerce, mostly involving sugar and Europe’s sweet tooth for its by-products.

In the labor-starved Americas, slavery is what made the triangular system happen, on the front end. Thereby, it deserves a disproportion of the credit for the very profitable distilled-spirits and textiles on the back end. On the other hand, while plantation slavery made those owners rich, those same owners were not directly responsible for this country’s economic fortune. The overhead required to administer slaves within a system of zero incentive, was high. As a sidebar, had slaves been able to work in parallel to purchase their freedom, the US might have avoided a devastating war with itself.

The Wall Street banks and insurance companies in the north were a different story than the plantations. The slave trade business gave this country a critical foundation in establishing the commerce and banking infrastructure that world leadership would require. The names of those companies and their impact are undeniable – JP Morgan, Chase, Lehman Bros., Aetna, New York Life, to name a few.

So, in answer to whether slavery was profitable, the answer is both no and yes, but much more yes – as it was the lubricant for the most profitable European commerce transactions of the day. This is true even though American plantations were inefficient in their brutal waste and high overhead cost.

Up Next: Part 2 (Graduate School). Just because slavery was profitable does not mean that slaves, or their ancestors, have a rightful claim. The details and context of the day, both legal and ethical, must be applied.

James C. Collier

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The Great Slavery Debate: Origins

Considering that most Americans cannot name all fifty states, or find S. Dakota on a map, it would not surprise me at all that those same folks think that slavery was invented, or re-invented, in the colonies now making up these United States. Unfortunately, what most Americans know of slavery was passed down from people who saw Alex Hailey’s fictionalized Roots mini-series. There is much more to slavery than this, as it has been going on for thousands of years.

Slavery began when hunter-gathering ended, some say about 11,000 years ago. Once agriculture advances produced more food than people in certain areas could eat, people began enslaving others, as they could afford to keep their captives fed. Before that, they simply killed their enemies without a blink. To help our perspective, during the 1,000 or so years of the Roman Empire, 100 million people in an around the Mediterranean area were enslaved.

The lives of slaves have rarely been ‘good’, as some would describe. Throughout time, slaves have been property not people. Their treatment, and very existence, has always been at the whim of their owners. This means they could be killed, assaulted, neglected, or simply worked to death, without repercussions. In most cases slave women bore offspring into slavery, both replenishing and growing the ranks.

Slavery has always been profitable and the foundation of commerce for all societies. Slavery commerce was often the aim/outcome of going to war, where entire societies were enslaved and sold as spoils. It is estimated that 25 to 50% of the world’s population has been enslaved at some time in history. So, the millions of slaves captured and delivered during the Atlantic Slave Trade hold no distinction other than the distance they were transported, and timing with the moral question of acceptability.

The taboo nature of slavery history has fostered a level of ignorance, all the way around, that hinders placing it in proper perspective.

James C. Collier

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Anti-Rape Condom From South Africa

I heard about this South African device during the FIFA World Cup, this past summer. Some people are quick to point out that the device does not actually prevent rape, rather it ‘shreds’ the penis of the attacker, creating a disincentive. Most of the articles I have read are simply reprints of the inventors’ press release, but the discussion (here) presents a better debate of the issues and context. It is important to note that rape and HIV infections in S. Africa are rampant, and the highest in the world.

World-wide Rape Statistics per capita (here).

Food for thought.

James C. Collier

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The Great Slavery Debate: The Footing

The second most challenging aspect of a slavery discussion is not getting blasted out of the saddle, with your point-of-view still in the holster. Unless your words are something like, ‘slavery in America was the pinnacle of man’s inhumanity to man’, you barely stand a chance. This is because today’s discussion is most often against today’s morality, rather than the progress of that time. Of course, to say that America’s slavery was not the worst is nothing close to saying that it was anything less than bad. All slavery was/is bad for the enslaved, as well as the society.

The only relative comparison I will make is that the Atlantic slave trade objectively delivered more slaves from Africa to South America (over 5,000,000) than to the North (500,000), and by all accounts, those delivered to the south suffered a much higher mortality. Their life spans were short, only one to five years, due to the grueling work, mistreatment, and harsh conditions on plantations, in mines, and elsewhere. South American slave owners expected to get no more than a few years of hard labor from a slave, and they went about fulfilling this prophecy. The work was 7 days/week, 18 hours/day, no women, no children, bad food, no care, and no mercy.

The most challenging aspect of a slavery discussion is the notion that current Black plight, with respect to crime, unwed parenting, drug abuse et al, is somehow a function of the ‘slavery-at-it’s-worst’ label attached to the American colonies (British and French). I have yet to find a description of slavery, anywhere, or at anytime, that tracks to the dysfunction within today’s Black community. So, I think it must derive from another source. FYI, my authority on slavery is a book entitled, Slavery: A World History, by Milton Meltzer.

My objective, in this series, is not to deny or discount the negative impacts of slavery, then or now, nor is it to absolve its practitioners or their beneficiaries. I will discuss this later. Rather for now, I will say that dispassionate research indicates that current Black plight is not located at the intersection of the two, nor are any solutions. In its proper proportion, slavery informs us in critical ways. When taken out of proportion, it mostly blocks our view and advancement.

James C. Collier

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Technorati Tags: The Great Slavery Debate – The Footing, Atlantic Slave Trade, Milton Meltzer, Victimhood, Immigration, Acting White

The Great Slavery Debate – An Introduction

Perhaps the most recurring historical truism of America is the need for Americans to move past slavery. Mind you, move past does not mean ‘get over it’, in the snide way some people admonish. At the front of the line of the many who need to move on are Black people. In therapeutic lingo, this means squarely facing the past then letting it go, so as not to impede the future.

This weekend I had a spirited debate with some family members, including my 19 year old daughter and her boyfriend. The young Black man, from Atlanta, was the most adamant contender that ‘our slavery’ was worst than previous instances, although he offered no specific difference, other than the distance that slaves were transported.

Others in the debate gave examples of the brutality of slavery in the South, from beatings, murders, assaults, to the wrenching apart of loved ones. My offering, that these treatments were within the range of treatments of slaves throughout human history, fell on deaf ears. Nope, the contention remained that ‘ours was worst and this is why Black people are so messed up today’.

Over the coming weeks/months, I will take a look at some questions about North American slavery, against the context of today. Why did it happen? Who benefited the most/least? Why did the founders adopt it, and then fight about it. Who was Jim Crow? What is the social and economic legacy? How has slavery history affected modern-day immigration? What lessons were learned/not learned?

If this weekend was any indicator, it might be kind of interesting.

James C. Collier

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Technorati Tags: The Great Slavery Debate – An Introduction, Atlantic Slave Trade, Confederacy, Victimhood, Immigration, Acting White

Ghana Suffers Futbol’s Folly

At the risk of having the whole sporting world mad at me, I will make some newbie-World-Cup-fan observations about football/soccer. My preface – I am only an end-of-season grid-iron football fan, as antics of US players are just too annoying for me, so perhaps age has thinned my skin. My focus here is on the rules, drama, and cheating, and how futbol reflects the world stage. I claim no providence, and I‘m sure some life-long futbol fans will set me straight, no problem.

My wide-angle lens observes that the Africans and upper Europeans play a similar rule-based game, while lower Euros and Latinos, play trick-the-ref, and see futbol as a way to break into soap drama (All My Children). Between faking mortal wounds and claims of innocence drenched in bloodstained-guilt, I think I’m watching Kobe and Paul Pierce. And don’t get me started on certain religious members making the sign of the cross after, and/or, before they have tripped their opponent onto his face. I suppose this is done with the foot of God – God’s hand is a different topic.

Early on, I dismissed the correlation between a country’s adherence to the rule of law and their on-field behavior, as it did not explain the good behavior of the Africans. However, upon inspection, all the African teams, save Algeria, have outrageously expensive Euro-coaches who, I would expect, threaten to yank players immediately if they fall into smarmy field antics, which would embarrass the paler folks back home. So the rule of law does apply.

Moving on, how can one referee be expected to keep track of all these guys running around on such a big-ass playing field? The players wait for the lone ref’s distraction to safely get in the first opposing pop, hoping that he sees the retaliation and whips out the red card. I pulled this crap on my sister everyday of my early childhood, until mom and dad teamed up and busted my scrawny ass.

The killer for me is the out-and-out cheating. The handballs, by way of flailing arms, to trade a sure-thing goal for a penalty kick. WTH! Ghana got severely robbed by Uruguay. That was not the hand of God that stopped that ball, but rather the cheating hand of Luis Suarez. Granted, the rules worked as designed, but Uruguay shamelessly exploited a gaping loop-hole to send Ghana packing. Somewhere above God is saying, “leave me and my hands out of it”! In futbol, cheaters can and do prosper.

OK all you futbol fans, let me have it (English preferred or Pontiff (pseudo-sanitized) Latin).

James C. Collier

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Technorati Tags: Ghana Suffers Futbol’s Folly, World Cup, South Africa, Handball, Rule of Law, Acting White

Manute Bol: 1962-2010

A giant among men.

James C. Collier

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Technorati Tags: Manute Bol: 1962-2010, Sudanese, NBA Basketball, Humanitarian, Dinka, Acting White

Looking At Disparities Through The Lens of Race

How properly could someone assess your life by taking a glance at the clothes in your closet? Can these garments tell the significant events of your life? Do they say when you got married, had a baby, graduated from college, got promoted in your job, retired, had surgery, or became a grandparent? The answer is no. Clothes, shoes, and hats are impermanent and tell us little. From a biological perspective, our skin and its coloration suffers the same fate. It comes in many varieties, but tells us almost nothing about our underlying differences.

Not a week goes by that I do not read an argument by an often-professed race-realist presenting that the intelligence-related disparities we witness between Blacks, Whites, Asians, Latinos, et al, must be genetic in origin, via ethnicity, since intelligence is more than 50% heritable (percentage of expression of traits directly from genes). In these arguments, the inference of empirical results always trumps the lack of supporting physiological evidence. The discussion typically focuses on IQ, standard test scores, school grades, graduation, and finally, on general behavior.

We all live each day looking through the race lens, but no one is more fanatical than the race-realist. Ardent realists, dedicated students of disparity, ignore the most obvious challenges to their argument that ‘race drives differences’. They ignore that skin coloration is impermanent and by far the most genetically labile organ of the human body, meaning it quickly changes based on the environment, and absent mutation. They ignore the skin’s profound sensitivity and responsiveness to sunlight intensity, and how quickly it must lighten or darken to protect healthy reproduction. They also ignore that skin coloration is of no value in determining phylogenetic relationships (evolutionary history of an organism group) among modern human groups.

The infinitely complex brain, in the alternative, is perhaps the least labile of our organs and has evolved universally, including at least one 'leap', in homo sapiens over tens of thousands of years, and millions of years over the span of humanity (genus homo). I have yet to hear an objective argument from realists reconciling these two physiological extremes, brain versus skin, in human evolution. Minus any such reconciliation, it is scientifically unforgivable to conclude much of anything about brain genetics and race-based outcomes, as viewed through today’s ‘extremely near-sided’ lens of skin coloration.

Researchers continuously look for evidence of inter and intra-group changes in our brains. Mutations have certainly occurred, and on rare occasion have ‘stuck’ (become positively selected). In the case of Ashkenazi Jews and sphingolipid disorders, we know precisely what constitutes evidence of a physiological change that might show itself in intelligence disparity. But in no case has science proved more than a normal distribution of intelligence across the species covering the most recent 50,000 years of brain evolution and travel about the globe. Trying to deduce today’s accumulation of disparate test results through the constantly changing and impermanent lens of race is as futile as searching in a clothes closet.

Various ethnicities certainly reflect different measured intelligence, but the genetic variation/distribution driving these differences occurred, by virtue of a basic time-line analysis, most substantially while waves of advancing dark-skinned homo sapiens were migrating from Africa. Skin color, as we see it today, is an extremely limited analytical tool for looking into the past, or explaining the present.

James C. Collier

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Technorati Tags: Looking At Disparities Through The Lens of Race, Race Realist, Genetics, Bell Curve, Acting Black, Acting White