O Tempora, O Mores! (June, 2008)
American Renaissance, June 2008
According to US Census Bureau estimates, fewer Hispanics came to the US from July 1, 2006 to July 1, 2007 than in the previous year, but the total number of Hispanics already here continues to increase rapidly. During this one-year period their numbers rose by 1.4 million to 45.5 million, and they now make up 15.1 percent of the US population.
Nine of the ten states with the highest Hispanic growth rates were in the South. South Carolina led with an increase of 8.7 percent from 2006 to 2007 to 168,920 — this represents a 76 percent increase since July 2000. Tennessee saw 8.1 percent growth; North Carolina, 7.8 percent; Georgia, 7.1 percent; Alabama, Mississippi, and Kentucky, 7 percent each; Arkansas, 6.8 percent; and Louisiana, 6.5 percent. Utah, with a 6.9 percent increase, is the only non-Southern state in the top ten.
The state with the largest number of Hispanics (13.2 million) continues to be California, where they make up 36 percent of the population. These days, however, more Hispanics — 21.2 percent of new immigrants — are moving to Texas than to California, which got 18.5 percent. Texas now has 8.6 million Hispanics. “It bears repeating,” says Larry Gonzalez, founder of the Hispanic Lobbying Association, “the future of Americans is going to depend on the future of the success of Latinos.” [Hispanic Population Growth Centered in the South, AP, May 1, 2008.]
Further evidence of America’s Hispanic future is found in the nursery. According to US Census Bureau estimates, one in four of all children under the age of five is Hispanic, up from one in five in 2000. “Hispanics have both a larger proportion of people in their child-bearing years and tend to have slightly more children,” says Jeffrey Passel, a senior demographer at the Pew Hispanic Center. “So this means that in five years, a quarter of the 5- to 9-year-olds will be Hispanic, and in ten years a quarter of the 10- to 14-year-olds will be Hispanic. It’s just going to move up through the age distribution with each successive cohort being slightly more Hispanic.” Mr. Passel predicts the Hispanic share of the population will double to 30 percent by 2050.
Several states are already far more Hispanic than the nation as a whole. In New Mexico and California, more than half the children under age five are Hispanic. In Texas, Arizona, Nevada, and Colorado, one-third of children under age five are Hispanic. In Virginia, Hispanics make up seven percent of the population and 11 percent of the children under five, but in fast-growing Fairfax County, a Washington, DC, suburb, Hispanics are 13 percent of residents and 17 percent of public school students. In another DC suburb, Montgomery County, Maryland, 14 percent of residents and 22 percent of school-age children are Hispanic.
Although the country is getting darker, one part is getting whiter: Washington, DC. Over the past ten years, whites have been gentrifying DC, pricing out poor blacks. In 2000, 60 percent of DC’s population was black; in 2007, it was 54 percent. The white population grew from 28 to 33 percent, while Hispanics and Asians held steady at eight and three percent, respectively. [N.C. Aizenman, Nearly 25 Percent of Children Younger than 5 are Latino, Census Says, Washington Post, May 1, 2008.]
Are Any Americans White?
A Martian who saw a US Department of Education newsletter called The Achiever could be forgiven for thinking the United States was somewhere in Africa. Almost every issue of what calls itself “a bimonthly publication for parents and community leaders” is full of smiling, happy school children, almost all of whom are black. In three of the last four issues there was not a single white student and only an occasional white teacher. The Achiever has always been illustrated this way, since its first issue in 2002. (Archives are at www.ed.gov/news/newsletters/achiever/index.html.) On its website, the Department of Education says it is “promoting educational excellence for all Americans.”
American Renaissance Goes to College
On March 13, American Renaissance editor Jared Taylor spoke at the College of William and Mary on the subject of whether diversity is a strength. There was an excellent turnout of nearly 200 people for the 40-minute talk, which was followed by more than an hour of questions.
As is always the case at colleges, the questions were antagonistic, but the students were clearly fascinated by an articulate critique of orthodoxy. Even though the question period continued until it was time to clear the room, almost no one in the audience left the hall, and a dozen hands shot up whenever it was time for a new question. Even after the event was officially over, a score of students crowded around Mr. Taylor to ask more questions. The audience was desperate to believe that diversity is a strength for a nation or institution, but willing to listen to contrary arguments.
The talk was written up in considerable detail in the college paper, The Flat Hat, and reasonably objectively in the Newport News Daily Press. Columnist Tamara Dietrich of the same paper, however, wrote a silly piece in which she said Mr. Taylor was working for the cause of “evil.” She insisted that if integration has failed, it is because “we never gave it a chance in the first place.” Her conclusion: “He [Mr. Taylor] panders to and attempts to elevate a portion of the population whose solutions to race problems tend, too often, to be final ones.” Wild talk, indeed, for someone who was not even at the lecture.
On April 1 Mr. Taylor spoke on the same subject to a smaller audience at Texas A&M University. The students were less lively, except for one black. He asked twice what policy conclusions should be drawn if diversity really is a weakness rather than a strength. Mr. Taylor explained — twice — that he had only two policy recommendations. First, because immigration is the primary cause of increasing diversity in the United States, it should be sharply cut back. Second, since it is natural for people to prefer the company of people like themselves, we should stop condemning that preference and should repeal anti-discrimination laws.
The student then accused Mr. Taylor of wanting to expel all blacks from the United States, and walked out, saying such views should not be allowed on campus. This kind of reaction is not uncommon. People who disagree with a race-realist view often make silly assumptions about motives, and ignore what they have actually heard. It is also common to insist that such ideas should not even be allowed. The dogma of diversity is so pervasive — and its supporters have so little to say in its defense — that they would rather silence dissent than try to argue against it.
University appearances are valuable. They can be a very effective way to reach people who would not ordinarily hear race-realist arguments. We are planning engagements at other campuses, and urge all readers who have university contacts to encourage a student group to invite Mr. Taylor for a lecture or debate.
Since mid-April, gang-style graffiti reading “Jump White People” have been appearing at Public School 224 in Brooklyn, New York. The phrase, sometimes abbreviated as “JWP,” has appeared a dozen times on playground equipment, desks, walls, and on two teachers’ cars. Teachers say authorities are not taking the graffiti seriously. “It just quietly gets erased,” says one. “Nothing gets done.” Forty staff members signed a letter to the principal, the school district’s chancellor, and other officials asking for a more vigorous response, such as sending a letter to parents or having meetings with students in each grade.
So far, four students ranging in age from 8 to 11 have been “disciplined,” but that’s not good enough for teachers’ union rep Sterling Roberson, who says the problem “requires more than punishment.” A spokesman for the New York City Education Department says only that it is “investigating the issue.” [Carrie Melago, Brooklyn Elementary School Hit with ‘Jump White People’ Graffiti, New York Daily News, May 2, 2008.]
Race and Coke
In the 1970s and 1980s, powder cocaine was a popular drug for high-status whites. Colombians shipped it to Miami, and mules smuggled it up to New York for distribution. At $50,000 per kilo, it was expensive, so only people with money — mostly whites — could afford to be regular users. In the 1980s, crack cocaine, much cheaper and more potent than the powder variety, became popular among blacks, who often turned violent under its influence. Although they later denied it, black leaders clamored for stiff penalties, and they got them: federal sentences three to six times longer than for possession of equivalent amounts of powder cocaine. Since 80 percent of federal crack defendants are black, “social justice” lefties howled, and last winter the US Sentencing Commission voted to ease penalties for crack offenders. Less well known is the fact that only 13 of the 50 states treat crack and power cocaine differently, and the differences in sentence lengths are much smaller than for the feds — and that the states lock up far more drug users than the feds do.
In any case, powder cocaine users are becoming more “diverse,” now that the price has dropped to about $15,000 per kilo. Hispanics make up 60 percent of those arrested on powder charges, versus only 14 percent for whites. Hispanics account for half of all federal arrests for cocaine trafficking and 61 percent of those charged with smuggling more than 5 kilos.
At the state and local level in 2006, more than 875,000 whites and Hispanics were arrested for drug crimes of all kinds, as were 483,800 blacks, which means blacks were arrested at a rate 3.5 times higher than non-blacks. What about the difference in arrest rates between whites and Hispanics? The bureaucrats aren’t telling. “Statistics only look at differences in race, not ethnicity,” says FBI researcher Nancy Carnes. [Lara Jakes Jordan, Powdered Cocaine Not Just for White Yuppies Any More, AP, May 2, 2008. Heather Mac Donald, Is the Criminal-Justice System Racist? City Journal, Spring 2008.]
The ‘C-Word’
Last month we reported on the end of the multi-year probe into whether Joey Vento of Geno’s Steaks in Philadelphia discriminated when he posted a sign asking customers to speak English when ordering (he did not). Now Asians are upset with Chink’s, a restaurant in the same city that has been serving cheesesteaks since 1949. Owner Joesph Groh says the name came from the previous owner and founder, Sam Sherman, who was nicknamed “Chink” because of his supposedly Asian-looking eyes. “Nobody ever called him Sam,” Mr. Groh explains. “That was his name from the age of six.”
Asians don’t like the word “chink” — some even call it the “C-word” — and started a campaign in 2004 to try to get the name changed. That effort succeeded only in creating a backlash, but it galvanized Asians. When Mr. Groh tried to open a second location at a site owned by the Philadelphia River Port Authority, Asian pressure resulted in the lease being denied. “We actually stopped it from expanding,” crowed Tsiwen Law of the Organization of Chinese Americans. “Going outside of his neighborhood will be difficult, because we will respond.”
Mr. Groh is annoyed but won’t change the name. When his mother suggested he rename it “Joe’s” he replied, “Why would I? This is Chink’s.” [Keith B. Richburg, Asian Groups Fight to Change Eatery’s Name, Washington Post, April 15, 2008.]
Brigitte Bardot
Legendary French actress Brigitte Bardot has been convicted four times since 1997 for violating French anti-racism laws. Her most serious brush with the law was in 2004 when she was found guilty of inciting racial hatred with her book, A Cry in the Silence. It cost her several thousand dollars to write that she opposed race mixing and “the Islamization of France.” Her latest case goes back to 2006 when she wrote an open letter to Nicholas Sarkozy, who was then minister of the interior, complaining that Muslims slaughter sheep without stunning them first. “We’re fed up with being led by the nose by this population that is destroying us, destroying our country by imposing its acts,” she wrote. In April the police once again hauled her into court.
Prosecutors have promised to throw the book at her this time. “It is time to hand out heftier sentences,” says prosecutor Anne de Fontette. “She might as well write that Arabs should be thrown out of France.” Another added that Miss Bardot had “no special rights” to be a “racist.” [Henry Samuel, Brigitte Bardot in Race Hate Row, Telegraph (London), April 16, 2008.]
USA Swimming, the national body that governs competitive swimming, recently commissioned a study to find out why so few Hispanics and blacks — currently fewer than 2 percent of its 252,000 members are black — can swim. The study surveyed 1,772 children aged 6 to 16, two-thirds of whom were black or Hispanic. It found that 58 percent of black children and 56 percent of Hispanics can’t swim. For whites, the figure is 31 percent. The study found that so many non-whites can’t swim because their parents can’t either, and think swimming is dangerous. Another reason: The belief among blacks, fueled by what the report calls “flawed academic studies,” that blacks sink. “There are people who still give credence to these stereotypes, even in the black and Hispanic community,” says John Cruzat, USA Swimming’s “diversity” expert. Mr. Cruzat is pleased by one finding in the report, namely that blacks and Hispanics are not avoiding swimming because they think it is too “white.”
USA Swimming wants more non-whites because it can read census reports as well as anyone else. “We’re something of a niche sport and for us to remain relevant, considering the changing demographics of the population, it’s important we get more kids involved at the mouth of the pipeline.” [Nearly 60 Percent of Black Children Can’t Swim, AP, May 1, 2008.]
Mayday, Mayday
May Day demonstrations by illegal Hispanic immigrants have become a tradition, though the turnout is declining from the massive protests of 2006: 500,000 in Los Angeles in 2006; 35,000 in 2007; and just 8,500 this year. In Chicago, the trend is the same: 400,000 in 2006, down to 150,000 last year, just 15,000 this year. Still, in all these cities, the crowds have been some of the biggest seen this year. Even if the numbers are down, the message is the same:
“We come here to fight for legalization. We’re people. We have rights,” says Erik Molina, an illegal from Mexico who marched in Chicago. Mr. Molina’s 13-year-old daughter is an anchor baby.
Margot Veranes, who helped organize the Tucson, Arizona, protest, says turnout was lower because of stepped-up immigration enforcement. “People have been stopped and deported in the last week,” she says. “This is a community living in fear. You never know when you’re going to be stopped by police. We’re marching to end the raids and deportations, but we’re also marching for health care and education and good jobs.”
Many demonstrations targeted state and local efforts to control illegal immigration. In Washington, DC, protesters demanded that suburban Prince William County, Virginia, rescind its measure allowing police to check the legal status of anyone they arrest. In Oregon, a crowd of 1,000 at the state capitol in Salem protested a February decision requiring proof of legal residence to get a driver’s license. [Sophia Tareen, Thousands Rally in May Day Effort for Immigration Reform, AP, May 1, 2008.]
In order to become a Canadian citizen, an immigrant must swear an oath to “be faithful and bear true allegiance to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, Queen of Canada, Her Heirs and Successors,” much in the same way would-be Americans swear to “support and defend the Constitution and laws of the United States of America against all enemies, foreign and domestic.”
Charles Roach is a Canadian permanent resident who was born in Trinidad and moved to Canada more than 50 years ago. He says he has not become a citizen because he objects to swearing allegiance to the queen. He claims British monarchs had ties to slavery, and argues that requiring citizens to swear allegiance to the queen violates the freedom of conscience guaranteed by Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms. He says the oath should be ditched.
Mr. Roach sued to this effect in Canadian federal court in 1994 and lost. He has now filed a similar case in Ontario provincial court, and may win. On Feb. 19, the Ontario Court of Appeals dismissed a government challenge to throw out the case, which now goes to trial unless the government appeals to the Supreme Court of Canada. [Joseph Brean, Queen’s Place in Canada Will Go to Court, CanWest News Service, Feb. 20, 2008.]
