CRIME AND RACE.
Written by Luis Rumbaut to the Washington Post, October 1, 2005

To the Editor:
William Bennett is right about one thing: that whole issue of crime and race has been on my mind recently. So here‘s a thought experiment for him. If we aborted all white children, the rate of white-collar crime would go way down—think Enron, World.com, Adelphia, etc.

We‘d probably see an even larger reduction in the incidence of Congressional corruption and malfeasance, including among high-ranking Congressional officers. The possibilities are huge, from organized-crime contract murders to hate-related crimes to things like the disappearance of hundreds of millions of dollars in Iraq. Speaking of which: think of the reduction of financial crimes and conflicts of interest in the military-industrial complex as a whole!

As a plus, we’d lose some talk radio shows altogether, and even see a decrease in the number of stupid opinions on race expressed by former Cabinet officials.

Not that I would actually propose doing this. It would be wrong, of course, and impossible, but it's just a thought. You know? I'm just saying.

—Luis Rumbaut
—Washington, D.C.

EDITOR’S NOTE:
Luis Rumbaut refers to events reported on in the following, from The New York Times:

“WASHINGTON, Sept. 30—President Bush believes that recent comments by William J. Bennett, who served in two Republican administrations, about the abortion of black babies “were not appropriate,” a White House spokesman said Friday.

“Mr. Bennett, a secretary of education in the Reagan administration and drug czar in the first Bush administration who has become an author and radio host, said in a broadcast this week that “you could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down.” He said that would be a “morally reprehensible thing to do.”

“Under fire from Democrats and civil rights groups, Mr. Bennett defended his remarks on Thursday as a hypothetical argument that moral questions like the abortion debate could not be linked to pragmatic issues like the crime rate.”

QUANTOMANIA.
Written by Ida R. Hoos, 1979.
This was not originally a letter, but a quotation taken from an obit that appeared in the New York Times, April 5, 2007. We address it to the legion of journalists who presently discuss genetics, neuroscience and mathematical modeling as if such systems of measurement, regardless of other factors, can predict the course of human events.

To the Editor:
“A kind of quantomania prevails in the assessment of technologies. What cannot be counted simply doesn’t count, and so we systematically ignore large and important areas of concern.”

—Ida R. Hoos, from the journal
—Technological Forecasting
—and Social Change, 1979

EDITOR’S NOTE:
Reading about her ideas, we wish Ida R. Hoos was still around to send us her point of view, one that’s been rejected by mainstream American thinking for some time.

One of our favorite citations of her work appeared in Patricia Sullivan’s April 4 obituary for Hoos in the Washington Post. “Using cost-benefit analysis to make policy decisions is ‘about as neutral as asking a fox into a henhouse to observe the color of the eggs,’ she told the New York Times in 1982 as Reagan administration appointees began applying business concepts to governmental matters. ‘There is nothing magic or scientific about it. It is almost always an ex post facto justification of a position already taken.’ ”

Living in the hegemonic age of market think, where is this kind of thinking now that we need it most?

DON IMUS AS THE TIP
OF THE ICEBERG
Written by Mark Naison
to Newsday and The Daily News,
April 11, 2007

To The Editor:
Don Imus’ comments about the Rutgers Women’s basketball team are not only offensive, they dramatize the fundamental irrationality of much of our discourse about black women athletes

How anyone could look at the women on the Rutgers team, whose unselfishness, creativity, skill, resilience, and mental discipline and toughness brought them to the edge of a national championship and think “nappy headed ho’s” makes me wonder whether Mr. Imus and his “sidekick” are capable of seeing black women as anything more than caricatures if they are dark skinned and show evidence of passion and grit

But this is not the first time I have seen stereotypes overwhelm an appreciation of skill and character in black women athletes. Serena Williams, who I believe is the most talented player in the history of women's tennis, has never been given credit for the full range of her abilities. Not only is she one of the most courageous fighters in the game, she is the only woman player in tennis history who has ever had a great first and second serve, overpowering ground strokes from the forehand and backhand sides, and an excellent net game and overhead.

I have been a fan of women’s tennis for 40 years—as well as a competitive player myself—and I can assure you that Serena Williams has more ways of winning points than Steffie Graff, Martina Navratilova, Chris Evert and Monica Seles ever had. But have you ever heard a reporter or television commentator talk about Serena Williams' extraordinary shotmaking ability, touch, and technical skill? No! Instead, you hear snide comments about her “bad attitude,” questionable conditioning, and failure to honor the game's traditions, accompanied by backhanded tributes to her speed, strength and athletic ability.

It makes you wonder? Does something happen to people's ability to see accurately and think critically when they look at a black woman athlete who is dark skinned, strong, and comes from a working class background

Are the images of such women in our subconscious so powerful and destructive that we can’t see who they are and appreciate what they do?

—Mark Naison
—Bronx, NY