America's Ideological Divide - John McWhorter

John is my model for what it means to be an academic and a public intellectual.

"seeing how far I could get without my notes." Good job John. Smart, honest and transparent. Love it

John is a beautiful human being. I’ve learned so much from him and esteem him very highly.

I'm so often impressed with the way John McWhorter articulates what I feel but have not been able to articulate. There's wisdom and great vision in this talk. I can see him dissecting Roger Kimball's book, too, in interesting ways.

I don't know much, but I know sanity when I encounter it. Thank you, John

I love the way that McWhorter is very accessible and good at popularising his discipline, but also has the academic credibility to back it up.

Wow, what an impressive individual John is, I love listening to him. That story of what his mom told him when he asked about the difference between college-educated vs those who dont go to college is such an indictment on current college students and grads. Shared with kindness, of course, but an indictment nonetheless. The perspective and well-roundedness that a college education should offer society is sadly no more. In fact, I am seeing less tolerance and openness in college students than in others who havent gone to college. It’s frankly a cancer in society right now, not an edifying source for our youth and future.

John is a gift , clear and precise pointing out the irrationality and subjectivity behind extreme woke

Thomas Sowell should get out more and discuss/debate with John & others

" Feelings " are Not facts! John McWhorter is Spot on!

Enjoyed this, both the speech and the q&a part. Mr McWorther is very interesting.

“We’ve identified problems with social media, but why aren’t we doing anything about them?”

Thank you professor McWhorter. Insights as well as action steps for caring for ones own authenticity without losing your shit...excellent :)

Love John so much. Wish he'd been my colleague.

It sounds a little bit like Thomas Sowell's "A Conflict of Visions."

Jefferson's expanded view on poverty: “I am conscious that an equal division of property is impracticable. But the consequences of this enormous inequality producing so much misery to the bulk of mankind, legislators cannot invent too many devices for subdividing property, only taking care to let their subdivisions go hand in hand with the natural affections of the human mind. The descent of property of every kind therefore to all the children, or to all the brothers and sisters, or other relations in equal degree is a politic measure, and a practicable one. Another means of silently lessening the inequality of property is to exempt all from taxation below a certain point, and to tax the higher portions of property in geometrical progression as they rise. Whenever there is in any country, uncultivated lands and unemployed poor, it is clear that the laws of property have been so far extended as to violate natural right. The earth is given as a common stock for man to labour and live on. If, for the encouragement of industry we allow it to be appropriated, we must take care that other employment be furnished to those excluded from the appropriation. If we do not the fundamental right to labour the earth returns to the unemployed.” Thomas Jefferson “I consider our relations with others as constituting the boundaries of morality... Nature [has] implanted in our breasts a love of others, a sense of duty to them, a moral instinct, in short, which prompts us irresistibly to feel and to succor their distresses... The Creator would indeed have been a bungling artist had he intended man for a social animal without planting in him social dispositions. It is true they are not planted in every man, because there is no rule without exceptions; but it is false reasoning which converts exceptions into the general rule." --Thomas Jefferson to T. Law, 1814. * It is a duty certainly to give our sparings to those who want; but to see also that they are faithfully distributed and duly apportioned to the respective wants of those receivers." --Thomas Jefferson to Megear, 1823. * "The only orthodox object of the institution of government is to secure the greatest degree of happiness possible to the general mass of those associated under it." --Thomas Jefferson to M. van der Kemp, 1812. The Obligation to Provide Asylum: "Shall we refuse the unhappy fugitives from distress that hospitality which the savages of the wilderness extended to our fathers arriving in this land? Shall oppressed humanity find no asylum on this globe? The Constitution, indeed, has wisely provided that for admission to certain offices of important trust a residence shall be required sufficient to develop character and design. But might not the general character and capabilities of a citizen be safely communicated to every one manifesting a bona fide purpose of embarking his life and fortunes permanently with us?" --Thomas Jefferson: 1st Annual Message, 1801. ME 3:338 "America is now, I think, the only country of tranquility and should be the asylum of all those who wish to avoid the scenes which have crushed our friends in [other lands]." --Thomas Jefferson to Mrs. Church, 1793. FE 6:289 "It [has] been the wise policy of these states to extend the protection of their laws to all those who should settle among them of whatever nation or religion they might be and to admit them to a participation of the benefits of civil and religious freedom, and... the benevolence of this practice as well as its salutary effects [has] rendered it worthy of being continued in future times." --Thomas Jefferson: Proclamation, 1781. Papers 4:505

It’s sad that simple decency is now considered conservative or right wing.

The problem with the postmodernist obsession with power differentials is the assumption that they are central as a tool, rather than that they are a symptom of a bad system. Their zero-sum-game idea is to shift power around to whatever they want (which turns out to generally be themselves), rather than to advocate for a system where each individual has self-sovereignty. In other words, the problem is the very existence of this system that allows or facilitates coercive power over others, NOT that such a system should be shifted to be used in the way that the person thinking decides is best. We should not give more power to black people, or women, or homosexuals: We should protect the power of each individual over their own life; strip away the (coercive) power of others over them.

Many of us, though too few, want to care for ourselves, our families, and our neighbors if needed, and we want to do it ourselves. We don't need or want politicians to confiscate the product of our labor and enterprise to buy votes for themselves. From whom do they buy votes? They buy votes from the recipients of their generosity, from the bureaucrats they hire to administer it, and from those who don't do charitable work but can avoid guilt because "we" are doing good, even if it's with other people's resources.

Yeah I did that