mobileCategory: science
10/19/07 11:04 - ID#41711
Are you kidding??
Ok so, this guy, uh "James Watson, a Nobel Prize winner for his part in the unravelling of DNA" ( 
) has basically said that africans are not as intelligent as white westerners because of genes.
My first instinct is to say, of course they are not as smart because WE have denied them the ability to learn, exploited them, colonized them, enslaved them, and continue to do so. My next argument being that "intelligence" is relative. We as white americans have been trained to think in certain ways that is quite distinct from many cultures and this could easily be reflected in how we measure our intelligence vs. other culture's.
I thought Ok, maybe this guy did some "testing" and maybe his tests show some kind of difference, but as I kept reading, more and more information about this guy is revealed and not only is he racist asshole, he is also homophobic and mysogynistic. IE:
"In 1997, he told a British newspaper that a woman should have the right to abort her unborn child if tests could determine it would be homosexual. He later insisted he was talking about a "hypothetical" choice which could never be applied. He has also suggested a link between skin colour and sex drive, positing the theory that black people have higher libidos, and argued in favour of genetic screening and engineering on the basis that " stupidity" could one day be cured. He has claimed that beauty could be genetically manufactured, saying: "People say it would be terrible if we made all girls pretty. I think it would great."
There are toooo many connections here. Doesn't he know that "libido's" of black women and men have been used as a TOOL agaist them for hundreds of years? Does he have any idea that this kind of bullshit has allowed white men and black men to rape black women with the excuse that they are much more sexual than white women? Doesn't he know that the "black male rapist" was just another way to keep black men as predators to be feared? If this guy is so smart maybe he should know when to keep his goddam thoughts to himself.
And one more thing. I am always always always weary of science. Sometimes I really do think we are sticking our dirty little noses where they don't belong and that we are doing something terribly terribly wrong. What would happen if we made "all girls pretty"? What the fuck would that solve? And what would happen if we were able to screen out stupidity? It sounds more and more like a SciFi remake of the Holocaust to me. It makes me sick to my stomach that we are messing with nature's (god of you want) plan of who are are and what we are going to be.
On that note, don't forget about CNN's special report: PLANET IN PERIL premieres Oct. 23 & 24 at 8pm on CNN and stars 3 of my most favoritist men, Anderson Copper, Dr. Sanjay Gupta and Jeff Corwin from Animal Planet.
) has basically said that africans are not as intelligent as white westerners because of genes. My first instinct is to say, of course they are not as smart because WE have denied them the ability to learn, exploited them, colonized them, enslaved them, and continue to do so. My next argument being that "intelligence" is relative. We as white americans have been trained to think in certain ways that is quite distinct from many cultures and this could easily be reflected in how we measure our intelligence vs. other culture's.
I thought Ok, maybe this guy did some "testing" and maybe his tests show some kind of difference, but as I kept reading, more and more information about this guy is revealed and not only is he racist asshole, he is also homophobic and mysogynistic. IE:
"In 1997, he told a British newspaper that a woman should have the right to abort her unborn child if tests could determine it would be homosexual. He later insisted he was talking about a "hypothetical" choice which could never be applied. He has also suggested a link between skin colour and sex drive, positing the theory that black people have higher libidos, and argued in favour of genetic screening and engineering on the basis that " stupidity" could one day be cured. He has claimed that beauty could be genetically manufactured, saying: "People say it would be terrible if we made all girls pretty. I think it would great."
There are toooo many connections here. Doesn't he know that "libido's" of black women and men have been used as a TOOL agaist them for hundreds of years? Does he have any idea that this kind of bullshit has allowed white men and black men to rape black women with the excuse that they are much more sexual than white women? Doesn't he know that the "black male rapist" was just another way to keep black men as predators to be feared? If this guy is so smart maybe he should know when to keep his goddam thoughts to himself.
And one more thing. I am always always always weary of science. Sometimes I really do think we are sticking our dirty little noses where they don't belong and that we are doing something terribly terribly wrong. What would happen if we made "all girls pretty"? What the fuck would that solve? And what would happen if we were able to screen out stupidity? It sounds more and more like a SciFi remake of the Holocaust to me. It makes me sick to my stomach that we are messing with nature's (god of you want) plan of who are are and what we are going to be.
On that note, don't forget about CNN's special report: PLANET IN PERIL premieres Oct. 23 & 24 at 8pm on CNN and stars 3 of my most favoritist men, Anderson Copper, Dr. Sanjay Gupta and Jeff Corwin from Animal Planet.
Permalink: Are_you_kidding_.html
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And... he's an... asshole??!
Whoa...
And second, I don't understand your bringing in black single mothers into this argument. Are you referring to his comment about blacks libidos? I think there may be alot you don't know about the history of women's sexuality and how it has been shaped and exploited by men and how there have been racially specific uses of sexuality that have long standing effects on black women. Even if black women might have higher libidos, (which I do not beleive) that does not explain single motherhood...what about contraception, forced sterilization, forced motherhood, cultural expectations, welfare, and slavery?
One final thing...we need to remember that Race as we know it is a cultural construct. Throughout history legal definitions of who and who is not black or white have been changed according to ideas of needs of the elite. It is never never never as simple as black and white.
He just sounds like many of the really old men who can't wrap their mind around today's society. this one just happens to have a microphone and a nifty title.
Oh yes and one more thing...I by NO MEANS consider myself a scholar. I read, I write, I participate in hierarchal forms of knowledge production, but I do not beleive that my degree gives me any more right or authority to talk about shit than anybody else. I just write what I think based on what I know. That is all.
What? You mean to say that a scientist managed to their pre-conceived notions through a study? Noooo. I've never heard of this.
(e:lauren) - surely when people disagree with you, you'd hate it when you're told to keep your thoughts to yourself because your thoughts, to them, are so horribly offensive that they think they simply shouldn't be said. Think abortion is murder? STFU! Think feminism is fascism by another name? STFU! Don't like the war? Oh... please continue and would you like a cup of tea? Its an incredibly arrogant mindset. Sometimes you simply have to let people talk, not only because we have certain unalienable rights, but because you have to give them enough rope to hang themselves. Its far more satisfactory to let people make fools of themselves and watch them squirm than it is to tell them to keep their mouth shut.
Now, I probably 99.9 percent of the time roll my eyes at the politically correct. If he wasn't a biased, racist jerk, and if his findings were purely scientific, he still would be in hot water with them. Larry Summers, a LIB, got forced out of Harvard for daring to suggest differences between the sexes.
This time though, I think they are absolutely right about the guy. Wow, a scientist creating research to support his bias? Naah, never heard of it. I agree, it is really a sad state of affairs. I'm sure Europe will have him.