--:-- [Sound of a news broadcast fades out, and the host, John Bickley, begins speaking]
--:-- John Bickley: The chaotic footage from rioting in Chicago, as well as the shooting of a young black man who knocked on the wrong door this week, have sparked more discussion of systemic racism, policing, and public policy.
--:-- John Bickley: In this episode, we talk with Manhattan Institute fellow Heather McDonald, bestselling author of Win Race, Trump's Merit, about how the concepts of systemic racism and disparate impact have shaped the national narrative on race, as well as key policies in our institutions.
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--:-- John Bickley: Welcome, Heather. We often hear about systemic racism in the U.S., and you've done a lot of research on this very topic for your new book, When Race Trumps Merit, that's published by The Daily Wire, I should note.
--:-- Heather McDonald: Thanks for having me on the show.
--:-- John Bickley: First, let's get to the question hanging over all of this. Does systemic racism exist in this country now?
--:-- Heather McDonald: I don't believe so, John. I think that the evidence that is put forward for systemic racism tends to be what I call disparate impact, which is a colorblind, constitutional, meritocratic, objective standard that happens to have a negative impact on certain underrepresented minorities, above all on blacks.
--:-- John Bickley: But that does not mean that the standard is racist or that we are systemically racist. What it means is that we have an academic skills gap that makes it literally impossible to have proportional representation in our mainstream institutions.
--:-- Heather McDonald: So what those propounding the thesis of systemic racism do, their argument is to look around and say, well, let's see here, there's not 13% black engineers at Google, or there's not 13% black oncologists working in this cancer research lab, 13% being the proportion of blacks in the population. Therefore, somehow there's systemic racism.
--:-- John Bickley: They never tell us where it is or what it is or how we measure it.
--:-- Heather McDonald: Now, the proponents of the systemic racism argument might say that the reason there is a skills gap is that the system is racist, unequal access to education and resources, et cetera. Is there merit to that argument?
--:-- Heather McDonald: Well, that's a different issue. We can argue about why those skills gaps exist, but that is a second issue that does not justify tearing down meritocratic standards.
--:-- John Bickley: And that's what's going on across our culture today. We are getting rid of The LSATs, the SATs, the medical college licensing exam has gone from a graded basis to pass/fail. Many medical schools now are getting rid of the MCAT entrance requirement.
--:-- Heather McDonald: The MCATs are the objective standardized colorblind test for medical school admissions. They too have a massive disparate impact on blacks, not because the tests are racist. They've been scoured for any possible racism for decades.
--:-- John Bickley: The solution to these skills gaps, we can discuss whether they result from systemic racism. But the solution for the lack of racial proportionality in our institutions is not to get rid of meritocratic standards.
--:-- Heather McDonald: So you've discussed how standardized testing is being pushed aside, rejected by many of these programs. We also see many schools and programs embracing diversity, equity, and inclusion statements for students and particularly for faculty.
--:-- Heather McDonald: Yes, it's not clear today that Albert Einstein would necessarily be hired at a college physics department if his diversity, equity, and inclusion statement was not sufficiently enthusiastic about the mission of anti-racism.
--:-- John Bickley: Every STEM department practically in the country now has declared itself a racist institution, which let me just say, John, is preposterous. Science is not racist. Medicine is not racist, but they have all declared themselves racist because they do not have 13% black engineers.
--:-- Heather McDonald: And what we're going to try and do to solve that are all these window dressing initiatives like making our science applicants, if you're applying for a job in nanotechnology, you have to fill out a form that explains how deeply committed you are to diversity, equity, and inclusion, how your lab is going to advance diversity, equity, and inclusion.
--:-- John Bickley: Cancer research labs and drug developers are tearing their hair out, trying to couch their research in cell signaling in nematodes, which is essential to understanding cancer pathways, how to couch that as a diversity and equity enterprise.
--:-- Heather McDonald: And if your diversity, equity, and inclusion faculty statement is not sufficiently persuasive to the DEI bureaucracy in your college, you go no further. Your application is tossed in the trash can, even though you may be the most qualified nanotechnologist out there.
--:-- Heather McDonald: In my book, When Race Trumps Merit, I outlined how pervasive this issue is and that it's not just in traditional four-year colleges and universities, anti-racism and DEI initiatives, you note, are playing a massive role in the fine arts now and the fine arts programs and even museums.
--:-- Heather McDonald: Well, it's an absolutely heartbreaking development, John. The leaders of our arts institutions, the guardians of this extraordinary civilizational inheritance, people who have the supreme privilege of curating a tradition, whether it's classical music or art, literature, or the American songbook, for that matter, have decided to turn on those inheritances.
--:-- Heather McDonald: And they declared that Western classical music or Dutch Baroque painting, Golden Age painting, is per se racist, because at the time when a lot of these traditions were being created, Europe was demographically white.
--:-- Heather McDonald: That was simply its demographics, just the way that Africa was demographically and is demographically black, and China is demographically Chinese. Nobody's saying Chinese opera is anti-black because the participants in classical Chinese opera are Chinese.
--:-- Heather McDonald: Only the West is flagellating itself, trying to tear down and nullify its own traditions because they came out of a background that was predominantly white.
--:-- Heather McDonald: You have museum directors now that are going around their museums, putting these preposterous wall labels next to still lifes from the 17th century in Holland, saying that those still lifes are part of the colonialist project because they were created at a time when the Netherlands had overseas colonies.
--:-- Heather McDonald: The Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, its greatest canvas is the Night Watch by Rembrandt. It is a massive canvas, wall size, that portrays the night watchmen in the city of Amsterdam. About 27 individuals in them, each one highly individualized, portraying the guardsmen, people around them.
--:-- Heather McDonald: This is universally viewed as one of Rembrandt's greatest masterpieces. The Rice Museum has now declared that this work, this masterpiece is racist because there are no blacks portrayed in it.
--:-- Heather McDonald: Now, you also address this issue of crime and policing policies in your book. We just had this rather startling spectacle in Chicago. It's not the only time we've seen this. Hundreds of young people rioting, vandalizing, stomping on cars, breaking windows.
--:-- Heather McDonald: After the violence, we had the mayor-elect Brandon Johnson say, It is, quote, not constructive to demonize youth who have otherwise been starved of opportunities in their own communities.
--:-- Heather McDonald: That's an expression of a progressive approach to policing and law enforcement. What's going on there? Is this the right approach? Why is Chicago chaos?
--:-- Heather McDonald: Chicago is chaos because since the George Floyd race riots, the decibel level of the demonization of the police has become ear-shattering.
--:-- Heather McDonald: The police in Chicago, across the country, their ranks are decimated. The resignations, retirements are out of control. Nobody wants to be a cop today when the first day on the job, it is assumed by the New York Times that you are a racist.
--:-- Heather McDonald: Black children die at heartbreaking rates of gun homicide, of drive-by shootings. The black death by homicide rate at the ages of 10 to 24 is 25 times higher than that of whites.
--:-- Heather McDonald: Blacks commit gun homicide in the ages of 10 to 24 at 25 times the rate of whites. So the cops have backed off. The ranks are thinned. The cops have backed off of proactive policing.
--:-- Heather McDonald: And the George Floyd race riots, which were not put down, which were in many quarters celebrated, have sent the message to would-be lawbreakers that we do not believe in enforcing the law.
--:-- Heather McDonald: We have prosecutors across the country, whether it's Kim Fox in Chicago, George Gascon in Los Angeles, Alvin Bragg in New York City, who have declared that they're not going to enforce a whole host of laws, trespass, disorderly conduct, resisting arrest.
--:-- Heather McDonald: Which is the most appalling aspect of what they're not enforcing because it basically says it's open season on cops. They're not enforcing turnstile jumping, shoplifting, drug possession, gun possession for one reason, John.
--:-- Heather McDonald: Everything you need to know about our criminal justice system today is explained by two words, disparate impact. Everything that's going on in the criminal law system today is because we have decided we would rather not enforce the law in a colorblind constitutional objective manner than enforce it and have a disparate impact on black criminals.
--:-- Heather McDonald: That's why Kim Fox is not enforcing the law. That's why Alvin Bragg is not enforcing the law. That's why George Gascon is not enforcing the law, because if they do it, they will have a disparate impact on black criminals, not because the law is racist, but because blacks commit crime at high rates.
--:-- Heather McDonald: So the flash mob in Chicago, as you say, it's not new. Last year, it was lethal. This exact same flash mob, there was a teen boy that was shot in Millennium Park at the so-called Bean.
--:-- Heather McDonald: It led last year, Lori Lightfoot, to actually raise the drawbridges into Chicago. When Brandon Johnson excuses this conduct, he is making sure that Chicago will continue on its descent into anarchy.
--:-- Heather McDonald: This is a breakdown of socialization. It is family breakdown. It is not material deprivation.
--:-- Heather McDonald: Final question. Why is this so important? Why is the debate over systemic racism and disparate impact so vital?
--:-- Heather McDonald: Our standards are not racist. If we continue to tear down the standards of medical achievement, of scientific achievement, while China is going full speed ahead.
--:-- Heather McDonald: It is not destroying its gifted and talented programs. It is throwing everything it's got at its mathematically talented students without caring about disparate impact.
--:-- Heather McDonald: If we continue tearing down our excellence, we are going to become a culture of mediocrity. Lawlessness is going to spread further.
--:-- Heather McDonald: So the fact of the matter is this is only going to turn around when we stop kowtowing to phony charges of racism.
--:-- Heather McDonald: Well, the only way to address any serious issue is to look first at the facts.
--:-- John Bickley: Heather, thanks for joining us.
--:-- Heather McDonald: Thanks for having me on the show.
--:-- John Bickley: That was Heather McDonald, author of the new book, When Race Trumps Merit, and this has been a Sunday edition of Morning Wire.
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