Posted on April 1, 2004

O Tempora, O Mores! (April, 2004)

American Renaissance, April 2004

Out With the White Children

Last fall, for the first time, non-whites outnumbered whites in Florida’s public schools. Whites were just 49.75 percent of the state’s 2.6 million public school students, followed by blacks at 23.88 percent, Hispanics at 21.7 percent, and Asians at 2.04 percent. Students who say they are multiracial outnumbered Asians, at 2.34 percent. Florida is the seventh state to see its public school student body go majority non-white, after Hawaii (80 percent non-white), New Mexico (66 percent), California (65 percent), Texas (59 percent), Mississippi (53 percent), and Louisiana (51 percent). Public schools in the District of Columbia are 95 percent non-white. Hispanics, whose enrollment increased by more than 500,000 since 1977, are driving whites out; now one in six white students in Florida attends private school. [Letitia Stein, Minorities Reach Majority in State Schools, St. Petersburg Times, Feb. 27, 2004, p. 1A.]

Out With the White Men

When he ran for Brooklyn Borough President in 2002, Marty Markowitz promised that if he were elected, he would remove the portraits of “the old white guys” — like George Washington — that hung in the Brooklyn Borough Hall. “There’s not one picture of a person of color, not one kid, not one Latino in Borough Hall,” he said. Mr. Markowitz has kept his promise. Although he let Washington stay, he replaced every other portrait with works by contemporary black artists. “We are always celebrating the diversity of Brooklyn,” he explains.

One celebration of diversity is an unflattering image of the Pope, mocking him for his apology for the church’s role in the slave trade. Another, called “Sweet Thing,” features a voluptuous woman with “inviting hips [and] enticing thighs.” Danny Simmons, the black man in charge of the new paintings, says art like “Sweet Thing” “goes a long way toward making Borough Hall more inclusive.” [Gersh Kuntzman, Brooklyn Finally Shows Its True Colors in Borough Hall, New York Post, Feb. 12, 2004, p. 31.]

No Sauce for the Gander

In February, the College Republicans at Roger Williams College in Bristol, Rhode Island, caused a furor when their president, Jason Mattera, announced a $250 whites-only scholarship. Mr. Mattera, who is Puerto Rican, got a $5,000 scholarship from the Hispanic College Fund that gave him, he says, “an inherent advantage over my white peers.” He thinks scholarships should reward merit, not race, and offered the whites-only scholarship as a protest. The school administration denounced Mr. Mattera, as did state and national GOP leaders. [Jennifer Syles, Whites-Only Scholarship Generates Controversy, CNN, Feb. 20, 2004.]

There was, of course, no outrage when the Goizueta Foundation, (established by Robert Goizueta, the late former president of Coca-Cola) awarded a $500,000 grant to Reinhardt College, a small liberal-arts college in north Georgia, for Hispanics-only scholarships. [$500 Mil Dolares en Becas Para Latinos ($500,000 in Grants for Latinos), Atlanta Latino, Jan. 29 — Feb. 4, 2004, p. 12.]

Nashville Next

Nashville, Tennessee, will soon get 400 Somali Bantu, its share of the 13,000 sponsored by the US Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR). ORR and World Relief, an agency the feds hired to help settle the newcomers, held a conference in Nashville in January to teach people what to expect from primitives who have never seen electricity or indoor plumbing. ORR plans similar sessions in other US cities. [Anita Wadwhani, Conference to Guide Social Workers as Bantu Refugees Arrive in Midstate, The Tennessean (Nashville), Jan. 11, 2004.]

Nashville is already dealing with a wave of Hispanics, who are “socially isolated” because they are poor and can’t speak English. As usual, the local papers say this is the fault of native Nashvillians who must “learn about and appreciate the traditions of the foreign born.” They should also pay for a new bureaucracy to “pull together all the existing services for immigrants and then identify unmet needs.” [Making Nashville a More Diversity-Friendly City, City Paper (Nashville), Jan. 12, 2004, p. 3.]

Nashvillians are also supposed to learn Spanish. Ken Darby is personnel manager for Commercial Painting, which has a 20-percent Hispanic workforce. He offers English courses for the Mexicans, but also tried to get Americans to study Spanish. He ran into a barrier of healthy sentiment. “It didn’t seem to work,” says the poor, baffled Mr. Darby. “Americans have a more narrow-minded attitude of, ‘This is America and we speak English so they should speak English.’” [Jared Porter, ProLingua Works to Break Down Language Barriers on the Job, Green Hills News (Tennessee), Feb. 5, 2004, p. 22.]

Color TV

Despite recent efforts to shake up its prime-time lineup, cable news channel MSNBC continues to lag well behind rivals CNN and Fox News. Needless to say, some people claim the problem is too many news shows with white hosts and white guests that ignore the nation’s 90 million non-whites. “A significant portion of the American population simply is not tuning in because there’s nothing of interest for them there,” says Sam Riddle, of Al Sharpton’s National Action Network. Curtis Symonds, a black programming consultant, says programmers need “to take the blinders off and realize there’s a huge crossover in multicultural audiences.” [With New Chief on Board, MSNBC Needs an Identity, Reuters/Hollywood Reporter, Feb. 23, 2004.]

More Color TV

The cable network Showtime is working on a new reality program. In Make Me Cool, modeled on Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, a gang of blacks will give a “desperately dweebie” white guy a “hipness makeover.” The joke version of the title among those developing the program is Black Eye for the White Guy. “There’s something in the culture right now that there are parts of black culture that everyone wants to aspire to,” says Showtime executive producer Jay Blumenfield. “We want to explore that. We want to face racial stereotypes head on and say, ‘What is this? Why is this?’” Explaining why the network had chosen whites, Mr. Blumenfield said, “The first people will be uncool, and the easiest way to express that is they’ll be white.” The program will not just change the way whites look; “this is about immersing them in a whole new culture.” [Phil Kloer, Black Eye for the White Guy? Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Feb. 20, 2004.]

City of Fools

In December 2003, federal immigration agents arrested a dozen or so illegal aliens in Portland, Maine. In January, at a meeting at Portland’s city hall, assistant US Attorney for Maine Halsey Frank had to justify the arrests to an angry crowd of immigrants, social activists, and politicians — including the mayor. The locals accused the feds of racial profiling because they caught some of the illegals outside social service agencies and other places that attract non-whites. Mr. Frank’s explanation that the federal government has an obligation to enforce immigration laws was poorly received.

“To us, this is clear violation of civil rights,” complained Winston McGill of the Portland NAACP. “We do feel this was based on color.” Ben Guiliani, president of El Centro Latino, denied the government had probable cause to question people and make arrests. “I can tell you the border patrol is not raiding Irish pubs in Boston,” he said. “Probable cause is what? Being brown?” Others said immigrants were afraid to leave their homes for fear of border patrol agents. The Rev. Mutima Peter of the International Christian Fellowship Church said the arrests were like the police-state brutality that led many immigrants to leave home in the first place. Mayor Nathan Smith said the city will continue to enforce a local ordinance that forbids city officials and police officers from questioning a person’s immigrant status. [Justin Ellis, City Reaches Out to Immigrants, Portland Press Herald, Jan. 7, 2004.]

Rx: Quotas

The Institute of Medicine, a division of the National Academy of Sciences, says not enough non-whites are entering medicine. Only two percent of registered nurses, 3.4 percent of psychologists, and 3.5 percent of doctors are Hispanic, and only five percent of doctors and dentists are black. There are hardly any American Indian doctors, though nearly 20 percent of medical school graduates are Asian. The Institute of Medicine says medical schools should slant their admissions towards non-whites, and put more non-whites on admissions committees. They also want Congress to pay for “diversity” programs, and for state and local governments to reimburse tuition, and forgive student loans for non-white medical students. [Minorities Few in Health Fields, AP, Feb. 6, 2004.]

Suffer the Little Children

Congolese are superstitious. Fighters on all sides in the five-year-old civil war believe that eating their enemies gives them special powers. Now, fear of child witches is sweeping the country. Parents accuse children of witchcraft when crops fail, if they lose jobs, or anything else goes wrong. A child may also be accused of being a witch if he playfully speaks to an animal or a tree, or just has a nightmare. Medicine men make suspected witches vomit out the evil spirits by forcing them to swallow gasoline, bitter herbs, and even small fish. One family tried to purify an 11-year-old girl by pouring acid over her and trying to make her drink it. They thought she had bewitched her half brother and made him sick.

If the exorcism fails and the problem isn’t solved, families turn the children out. UNICEF says more than 40,000 children wander the streets of Kinshasa, and at least 60 percent of them are accused witches. Many fall in with street gangs that steal and scrounge for food. Girls as young as five work as prostitutes. Some of the older children are violent. Recently a gang of children ambushed and killed four policemen armed with automatic rifles. [C.J. Maloney, Suffer the Children, The Independent (Southern California), Feb. 19, 2004, p. 20. Sudarsan Raghavan, Congo Children Suffering Accusations of Witchcraft, Philadelphia Inquirer, Nov. 3, 2003.]

Gate Crashers

Border patrols in both the US and Canada have noticed an increase in human smuggling across the border, and are trying to stop it. On February 22, authorities nabbed 11 South Koreans who hoped to walk across the Alberta-Montana border. Six were women. Korean women are known to pay from $6,000 to $10,000 to smugglers, and often end up working as prostitutes to pay off the debt. Many Korean illegals enter from Canada because they can get there without a visa. Better enforcement along the Western border means smugglers have to look for less well-guarded crossings in the Canadian interior. [Linda Slobodian, Human Smuggling Ring Smashed at US-Alberta Border, Calgary Herald, Feb. 24, 2004.]

Ethnicity in Britain

When the British government conducted the national census in 2001, the English, Scots and Welsh could not indicate their “national” identities in the same way as Indians, Bangladeshis, Africans, and the Irish, and were identified only as “white.” The Office of National Statistics received much criticism for this; “There’s a growing interest in how people perceive themselves nationally” says a spokesman. Now, when Britons fill out government forms, surveys and job applications, they can describe themselves as “white English” or “Afro-Caribbean Scottish.”

Whites may find the new classifications a double-edged sword. They may promote national consciousness, but government race-minders will also use them to stamp out “racism” among whites. Employers in Britain must “promote racial equality,” so a Scottish company employing only Scots could be violating race relations laws. In 2002, rugby commentator Mark Souster, who is English, sued the BBC for discrimination after he was replaced as BBC Scotland rugby correspondent by a Scot. [John Elliot and David Robertson, English, Scots and Welsh are now Officially Ethnic, Sunday Times (London), Jan. 11, 2004, p. 7.]

English in Decline

According to British language expert David Graddol, English is unlikely to become the global language after all. He predicts a multilingual future, with English “first among equals” but no longer dominant. After Chinese, English is the second-most-spoken language, but he thinks Hindi-Urdu and Arabic will surpass it by 2050, as the percentage of native English speakers drops from its 1950 high of nine percent to five percent. As the prominence of English declines, he says, “Monolingual speakers of any variety of English — American or British — will experience increasing difficulty in employment and political life, and are likely to become bewildered by many aspects of society and culture around them.” Already 20 percent of people in the United States speak a language other than English at home. [English Language Unlikely to be Dominant, Expert Says, AP, Feb. 27, 2004.]

Faith in Britain

Although three fourths of Britain’s 60 million people claim to be Christian, only 916,000 attend weekly Church of England services. By contrast, 930,000 of 1.8 million British Muslims go to mosque at least once a week. This marks the first time Muslim attendance has outstripped Anglican. Muslim leaders say the numbers mean Muslims should now share some of the Church of England’s privileges as an established religion. These include tax breaks and the right of senior bishops to sit in Parliament. [Nicholas Hallen and Christopher Morgan, Muslim Piety Outstrips Anglican, Sunday Times (London), Jan. 25, 2004, p. 1.]

Islam already gets preferential treatment from British radio and television, according to Lord Dubs, the retiring head of Britain’s Broadcasting Standards Commission (BSC). “In portraying Muslims,” he says, “they have held back, they have censored themselves, they are timid. I have seen them pour scorn on Christianity more than on other religions. Christianity is an easier and more acceptable target — followed, to a lesser extent, by Jews and Hindus.” Lord Dubs also says the BSC itself has been biased in favor of Muslims.

The Right Rev. Richard Holloway, also a BSC member, notes that someone once said “Jesus f****** Christ” on a program aired on Britain’s Channel 4. He says the program would not have been broadcast with a slur against the prophet Muhammed. “There is much more sensitivity to disturbing Islam,” he explains. “It is partly because the Muslim community does not have a tradition of humour about religion.” [Nicholas Hallen, TV Chiefs Favor Muslims, Says Watchdog, Sunday Times (London), Dec. 28, 2003.]

Sounds Good to Us

Vernon Robinson is a black man running for the Republican nomination in the 5th Congressional District of North Carolina. He is an Air Force Academy graduate, has an MBA, has been a business professor, and was elected twice to the Winston-Salem city council. According to his campaign literature:

“Mr. Robinson is pro-life, pro-gun, and pro-Ten Commandments. He’s led the fight against wasteful spending, racial quotas, and special rights for homosexuals. And he’s led the charge to create jobs by eliminating excessive taxation, regulation, litigation, and illegal immigration.”

Among his enemies are what he calls “the race hustling poverty pimps like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton.” He boasts that the local paper calls him the “black Jesse Helms,” and indeed Sen. Helms has endorsed him, as have Rep. Tom Tancredo and Pat Buchanan. He sounds better than a lot of whites. [Campaign Flyer, Robinson for Congress.]

Dividing Lines

On any given morning, as many as 300 mostly Mexican and Guatemalan men line up along Center Street in Jupiter, Florida, waiting for someone to stop and offer them jobs. Most are illegals, who will work for $5 to $10 an hour. The men live in squalid apartments on the south side of Center Street, sometimes as many as 10 to a one-bedroom apartment. Whites live on the north side of Center Street in upscale houses, and many aren’t happy with their new neighbors.

“My kids don’t ride their bikes on Center Street anymore, and they don’t take the school bus,” says Sherrie Stevenson. “There are so many of those men, and it’s dark when the bus comes in the morning. It’s too scary.”

According to Jupiter police, the men are often guilty of minor nuisance crimes. “The main problems,” says Officer Freddy Almodovar, “are that the day laborers block the sidewalks, leave trash around, sometimes they catcall girls.” Because they live in small apartments, they produce a lot of trash, make noise, and urinate in public “because somebody else is in the bathroom.” He admits this is unpleasant for nearby homeowners, but adds, “some of those same people with the nice houses come here to get guys to cut their lawns. You can’t have it both ways.”

Assistant town manager Andy Lucasik says Jupiter needs a lot of low-wage labor, but has almost no low-income housing. “We have a large number of gated communities that have a great need for landscaping. We have golf courses and construction projects,” he explains. “They all use workers like those who live in those apartment complexes.” The city is thinking about an ordinance to limit the number of people who may live in an apartment, but fears this could force the men out on the street. As for loitering, the city may build a “labor bazaar” on city property where men could look for work.

The laborers say that would be fine with them, but they worry about the proposed housing ordinance. “They haven’t come to check our apartments, but some people are saying we might get deported,” says Jose, 48, an illegal from Guatemala. “I’ll tell you this, the people around here need us. If they hire an American to do these jobs it will cost them $200 per day, and we’ll do it for $80 or even $60.” [John Lantigua, Suburbanites, Day Laborers at Odds in Jupiter, Palm Beach Post, Feb. 16, 2004, p. 1A.]