Moral Health

Rape and the false accusation of Rape are two of the most heinous deeds that human beings are capable of committing.  As I noted in a previous post on this subject: Both rape and the false accusation of rape have to be particularly willful and malicious.  Murder is wrong, but we can at least grasp how blind rage might result in someone killing another.  If, for example, you stumble upon someone who was sexually molesting your child, surely it would take the very hand of God to keep you from instantaneously and instinctively trying to inflict deep, and very likely deadly harm, upon the sexual molester.  However, neither rape nor the false accusation of rape stems from the natural response of anger to a most insidious and morally repugnant wrong that is being done to an innocent loved-one.

The remarks of this blog are animated by the Hofstra University case where a female student, Danmoll Ndonye, had voluntarily participated in an orgy with at least 4 male students and then charged that she had been gang-raped by the males.

What I am now about to say will no doubt seem sexist.  However, it needs to be said nonetheless.

By and large, feminism has accorded women an integrity that it does not accord men.  This should come as no surprise, since feminism has defined itself as essentially a response to the wrongs committed by men against women.  One of those wrongs was the idea that a woman was essentially “asking for it” (namely asking to have sex) if she walked about with a certain comportment; accordingly, one could not blame a man for “giving her” what she was asking for.  It goes without saying that this view of how women should be treated was a most indefensible view.

Alas, the problem with the contemporary feminist view of sexual equality between women and men is that a woman’s body and a man’s body are treated as identical except for some “minor” differences in body parts.  True, a woman has a vagina and a man has a penis.  But that reality, so the argument goes, is utterly irrelevant in terms of how women and men should behave sexually.

Well, the preceding view is really quite stupid, as I shall show in just a moment.  But imagine someone saying that there are no differences at all in how a 3 feet tall adult should behave vis-à-vis how a 6 feet tall adult should behave.  Well, from a merely prudential point of view there are enormous differences in how these two adults, with quite significant differences in their height, should behave.  For instance, the 3 feet tall adult has to be mindful of the reality that it will be more difficult for others to see her or him than it will be for others to see a 6 feet tall adult; and that difference is hardly trivial.

Well, the penis-vagina difference is simply not an insubstantial difference in body parts.  It is, for one thing, part of the explanation for why it is extremely difficult for a woman to rape a man.  As wrong as it may be for a woman to insert a man’s erect penis in her vagina against his will, it is simply not possible to see this as analogous to a man inserting his erect penis in a woman’s vagina against her will.

Then there is the issue of pregnancy.  Women can become pregnant.  Men cannot become pregnant.  This entails this it is not possible for a psychologically healthy women and a psychologically healthy man to view sex in exactly the same way.  Consider for instance the difference between ethnicities.  I can think of all sorts of contexts where the fact that some is of a different ethnicity simply slips in the abyss of oblivion.  After all, among friends there is a very real sense in which being of a different ethnicity is much more like simply having different physical characteristics, of whatever sort, than not.

There is no way for the female-male divide to be simply like there being different physical characteristics between two female friends or two male friends.  Accordingly, it is not possible for a psychologically healthy woman to have exactly the same attitude towards sex as a psychologically healthy man might have.

One of the horrendous mistakes of feminism consists in advocating the view that the attitude which women have toward sex should, in all respects, be no different from the attitude that men have toward sex.

Of course, women should love sex just as men should.  Alas, what does not—and cannot—follow from this is that the attitude of women should, in all respects, be identical to the attitude of men with regard to sex.  We have nothing other than a form of schizophrenia on the part of women when they attempt to embrace the view that, with regard to sex, they are no more than men with a different part.

The relevance of all this to the Hofsta University case of the false accusation of rape by Danmoll Ndoyne is that precisely what we see is the schizophrenia on her part.  It is not possible for a psychologically healthy woman to take her body seriously and, at the very same time, want to participate in an orgy.  There is no set of considerations that will make what she does analogous to having an erection and then ejaculating.

On the one hand, Nodyne wanted to have sex with several men.  This desire occasioned here participating in the orgy.  On the other, she did not want to be seen as a woman who is indifferent to the very make-up of a woman’s body.  This desire occasioned the false accusation of gang-rape.  It was an attempt to “redeem” herself.

With women, there is a vagina, a uterus, and a womb.  This is part of the reality of a woman’s sexuality.  With men, there is simply the penis.  Accordingly, sexuality has a complexity for women that has absolutely no analogue in the lives of men.  So it is although women and men may be equally desirous of sex.

I conclude with an insight from Dr. Laura that is relevant here.  Anyone who has listens to her knows that she takes seriously the joy of sex for both women and men.  Just so, Dr. Laura maintains that as psychological healthy individuals women must take seriously the complexity of their sexuality and, moreover, they must take seriously the reality that this complexity has no analogue in the lives of men.  Owing to this complexity, women have reason to be circumspect that men do not have.  Accordingly, she holds that any social theory which denies this complexity does women more harm than good.  So, far from being guilty of not taking women seriously, as many of her critics charge, Dr. Laura can be characterized as a consummate feminist.  This is because she insists that women must take seriously the complexity of their lives.  What is more, she insists that women must require that men take them seriously in precisely that regard.  Sounds to me like gender equality just the way that it should be.  It is certainly vastly more preferable than the schizophrenia that comes with women trying to suppose that they are just like men.  So to Dr. Laura, I say: You Go!

It is appalling that the weekly Newsweek would publish an article, “See Baby Discriminate” (14 September 2009) suggesting that very young children are apt to be racist.  The report is based upon experiments conducted by Brigitte Vittrup at the Children’s Research Lab at the University of Texas.  The proof that the article was so very ideologically motivated is that the weekly was very much interested in pointing out the so-called biased assessment of white children—as if non-white young children are biased free.  Needless to say, only a fool would think that non-white young children are biased free.  Alas, there are fools claiming to be doing scientific research.

We are told that “Kids as young as 6 months judge others based on skin color”.  But alas what is really meant here is this: “White kids as young as 6 months judge others based on skin color”.  And once one bears this in mind the very article becomes so incredulous as to be comical.  This is because it would be truly stunning if something analogous could not be asserted of Asian babies and black babies and Arabic babies.  And so on.

Then there is this problem.  What exactly is the judgment that a 6-month old or a 3-year old even a 6-year old is making?  Whatever else is true, no child is making the kind of visceral and supposedly rational judgment about ethnicity that an adult is making.  Why?  Because it is not possible for a child to do such a thing.  So even if a child claims that “Those kind of people are not nice”—which the Newsweek article claims that white young children say about blacks—it is simply not possible for such a claim on a child’s part to have the same moral gravity that a like claim on an adult’s part would have.

We can readily see this by looking at an example that has nothing to do with race.  We can easily imagine a young child saying to an adult with big ears whom the child has just met: “You have big ears!”  Contrast that with an adult making the exact same claim under exactly the same circumstances: the two adults have just met.  It goes without saying that this utterance on the part of the adult constitutes a level of mean-spiritedness that simply cannot be attributed to the child.

So a white adult saying that “Blacks are not nice” and a white 6-year old saying “Blacks are not nice” are hardly tantamount to the adult and the child meaning exactly the same thing.  In terms of the vast differential in the psychological development between the child and the adult, it is simply not possible that the two could mean exactly the same thing.

The child most certainly is not harboring anger and resentment over a single unfortunate experience with one black which the child then takes to be indicative of how all blacks behave.  And if one form of racism is this kind of unwarranted generalization, then it absolutely inappropriate to suggest that this is what a 6-year old is doing in claim that “Blacks are not nice”.

As I have already noted, it is particularly revealing of an ideological bias that the experiment did not involve Asian children; for I am as confident as the night follows the day that any number of Asian children might have said “Blacks are not nice”, just as any number of black children might have said that “Asians are not nice”.  Oh right, I forgot: Minorities cannot be racist.  Only whites can.  For reasons that escape me, I cannot seem to hold on to this ideological truth.

A researcher is none other than a fool or a despicable hypocrite if she or he would suggest that racial attitudes in a child, whatever the child’s ethnicity, are the moral equivalent of racial attitudes in an adult, whatever the adult’s ethnicity.  What is more, Vittrup’s results defy ordinary experience.

For one thing, many a white child has had a black nanny.  And there is no evidence at all that the child suffers from any psychological scarring or trauma owing to being cared for by a black.  And on airplane flights from one side of the part of the globe to another: I have played with and talked to children of virtually every ethnicity.  There have been black children who do not want to have anything to do with me.  There have been non-black children who have adored me.  I recently walked into a friend’s home and his three year-old asked: What color are you?  That question was about as racist as a leaf falling on my nose would be.  And without discussion or commentary or reflection between us adults, we all took the child’s question to be cute.  There was simply no malice on the child’s part.

What, pray tell, would Vittrup say?  Do children notice differences?  Absolutely.  Black babies do.  White babies do.  Yellow babies do.  Red babies do.  And so on.  Do children attach significances to these differences that can be rightly characterized as racism?  Absolutely not.

What is more, children do not naturally define themselves by their ethnicity in the way that adults do.  Children are much more likely to define themselves by the activities in which they engage than their ethnicity.  It is we the adults who make the ethnicity of children a defining feature of their identity.  From an evolutionary perspective, it would disastrous for helpless infants and young children to be too motivated by ethnic differences and differences in physical appearances generally.

At the website RoyalGenes.Com, I found the following remarks:

White babies raised in white environments spent an average of 63 percent
more time looking at white faces, the study found. Their African-raised
counterparts spent 23 percent more time looking at faces from their own
race than the other. Black babies raised in mixed-race environments
spent roughly equal amounts of time looking at both types.

This suggests that ³significant exposure to other-race faces can block
the development of own-race preference,² Bar-Haim and colleagues wrote.
Kelly¹s team found the preference for own-race faces doesn¹t exist at
one month of age, so it is not innate, they noted. They conducted a
study similar to Bar-Haim¹s, but tested only white babies, viewing
photos of four different ethnic groups, at the ages of one and three
months.

It is most appalling and disconcerting that people are so determined to see mere glances of an infant into matters of racial significance.  For there is no reason whatsoever ‑‑ absolutely none ‑‑ to think that the glances of an infant have any bearing whatsoever to the infant being marvelously responsive to a loving adult, whatever color the adult might have.  Yet, one would not know that from the way in which people are talking.  This is ideology standing in the way of commonsense.

Would women and men be perfectly identical in their roles in a world that was perfectly just?  Alas, the answer to this question is a resounding “No”.  And it is this truth that animates Dr. Laura’s often made remark that in a loving home it is the home woman who has the power.

To begin, with there is the asymmetry of sex.  In the absence of a woman’s consent, there can be no sex between a husband and a wife that does not amount to rape on the part of the husband of his wife.  It is, of course, that men in meaningful sense that men can be aroused against their will.  Just so, there is no analogue to the penetration that occurs with women; and that difference makes all the moral difference in the world.  A wife who gets her husband around, against his will, and then inserts his penis in her vagina has not penetrated him.

So this straightforwardly entails that the husband has to ask his wife for sex and she has to give her consent.  Now, to be sure, this can be done nonverbally and with great passion.  Alas, this does not change the fact that the wife has to give her consent.  With respect to all sorts of things, there are ways in which we can consent non-verbally.  And the simple truth of the matter is that the non-verbal consent matters.

In a perfectly moral world, the importance of women giving their consent to a sexual encounter would not disappear in any way whatsoever.  Not at all.  This truth is at the heart of Dr. Laura’s observation.

Here is a second consideration.  It is women—and not men—who bear children.  This is relevant on two accounts.  For one thing, bearing a child is a most extraordinary emotional and physical experience for which there is nothing even remotely similar in the life of a man.

Needless to say, a father may love his children as much as a mother may.  Indeed, that is the way it should be.  This reality, though, will not change the fact that, from the outset, the mother has had an experience with the children that the father has not had can and cannot have.

Test-tube babies, à la Huxley’s Brave New World, may change all of that.  Alas, this is a change that may be for the worse in terms of the well-fare of the child.  The extraordinary asymmetry between women and men with respect to bringing children into the world has tremendous survival value for the infant.  In evolutionary terms, the difference is one of parental investment.  The greater the parental investment is at the outset, the less likely it is that a parent will abandon the newborn.

A mother’s initial investment far surpasses a father’s initial investment.  At the very beginning, both are equal: one egg; one sperm.  Then with incredible rapidity the investment of the mother far exceeds the investment of the father.  The child develops in her body and she puts her life on the line in bringing the baby into the world.

It is owing to this difference that the story Sophie’s Choice is done in terms of the mother rather than the father.  The Nazi asks the mother to choose which one of her two sons shall live and which one shall die.  Instinctively, intuitively, and at a most profound visceral level, we automatically understand the mother’s angst.  With a father, the very same sentiments on our part do not get off the ground in a like manner; and this difference is owing to none other than the striking difference that between a mother and a father in terms of the role they play in bringing a child into this world.

For those who do not believe in evolution, the preceding point can be put in terms of the difference in the way in which God created women and men.  A father-to-be putting his hand on his wife’s stomach and feeling the movements of the baby will never ever be tantamount to the mother-to-be having that baby growing inside of her stomach.  The mother-to-be has an investment in the child that the mother-to-be cannot possibly have.

From an entirely different direction, there is issue of trust.  With respect to the biological tie, the husband has to trust his wife in a way that the wife never has to trust the husband.  If there is anything that the wife knows, she knows that the child who comes out of her stomach is her child.

Of course, the father could in all cases insist upon a paternity test.  Needless the damage that does to the marriage is rather like the damage that a friend causes in sexually approaching the spouse of a dear friend.  One never ever fully gets beyond the friend’s betrayal.  Likewise, a spouse who routinely insists upon a paternity occasions a rupture in the marital relationship that is never fully repaired.

In an unjust world, husbands have tried to eliminate the need to trust their wives by formally restricting the freedom that the wife has.  It goes without saying that nowadays such measures are entirely out of the question.

The differences between women and men are ever so real.  And there is no better indication of this truth than the fact that even in a morally perfect world there would be fundamental difference between the two in terms of two of the most significant aspects of the interactions of the wife and the husband, namely sex and children.  In both cases, the woman has a moral power that the man simply does not have.  This, in effect, is Dr. Laura’s point.

I have not claimed that women are morally superior to women.  I think no such thing.  Superiority is thing.  Fundamental differences are quite another.  Unfortunately, we live in a world that has become so ideologically driven that truth now takes a backseat to ideological commitments.  One of the ways in which ideology manifests itself with respect to the topic at hand is that moral differences are immediately seen in terms of either inferiority or superiority.  Women and men are morally equal human beings.  Just so, they are far from being identical.  So it would be even in a morally perfect world, given that human nature does not change.

In a very straightforward sense, Joe Wilson’s outburst that President Obama was lying was indeed inappropriate.  There is a respect and decorum that the office of the presidency (of any country) is owed, even when one is entirely at odds with the views that are being articulated by the president.  Or so it is, given that outright immoral behavior is not being advocated by the holder of the office in question.  The same holds for the office of the pope, as well.

Now, to Wilson’s credit: he apologized.  And he did so immediately.  So this readily raises the following question: What exactly was the point of the resolution to condemn Wilson and the call for yet another apology on his part?  The answer is painfully simple: The point was none other than to humiliate Wilson.  And for that very reason, I stand by Wilson’s refusal to offer a second apology.

There can indeed be forms of punishment that are unquestionably humiliating.  Just so, mere humiliation should never be the point of any action taken either by an individual or the members of an institution.  The desire merely to humiliate another reveals none other than a depraved moral character.  Such depravity was characteristic of Nazi Germany in its treatment of Jews.  Such depravity was characteristic of American Slavery in the treatment of blacks.

There is no way to put a positive spin on those who take sheer delight in humiliating another.

So we have a most disturbing insight into the character of American politics.  And if American politics is any indication of what this nation is like in general, then America can indeed be characterized as a morally depraved nation.  Just think of the moral lesson that has been conveyed to children: “Never mind that a person has apologized of his own volition for his inappropriate outburst and that the apology has been accepted.  Let us nonetheless pass a resolution that condemns the person for the outburst”.  This is precisely the kind of behavior and mindset that one expects from those who are besotted with exercising power over others rather than doing what is right with the power that they have.

So it is, then, with what we have in Congress; for what we have in Congress is essentially a bunch of petty politicians who are far more interested in humiliating someone than in doing what is right.

Had Joe Wilson not apologized, a resolution against him would have been ever so appropriate.  But he did apologize and, as I have noted, President Obama accepted his apology.  The resolution contained no moral lesson for Wilson or anyone else.  Nor, again, did the resolution underwrite some fundamental moral principle in a more profound way.  The resolution was utterly pointless accept for one small thing: It served to humiliate.

For the people in Congress who voted for the resolution against Joe Wilson, you should know that insofar as I had any respect for you prior to that moment, I now have no respect for you.

As we all know, former President Jimmy Carter has graced us with his “wisdom” that racism is a factor in the way that people are reacting towards Obama.  Well, when I think of all the nasty and horrific things that people have said about President Bush, I am more than a little curious just how Mr. Carter arrived at his conclusion.

Surely, Mr. Carter does not suppose that if Obama were white, then everyone—especially whites folks—would be entirely supportive of Obama’s views regarding the way in which healthcare should be revamped in the United States.  Mr. Obama has put forward some quite radical proposals.  And guess what?  There are lots of people who do not like them and they want to make it known that they do not.  There is a term for this kind of exchange: It is called a democracy.

Alas, it is arguable that Mr. Carter himself is being rather patronizing towards Mr. Obama; and unless I am quite mistaken about things, patronizing behavior on the part of a white towards a black can be countenanced as racist.

Finally, in this regard: If Joe Wilson’s outburst counts as the worse instance of racism that President Obama will experience during his term in office, then I dare say that things will have turned out quite nicely for Obama.  And thus with all due respect Mr. Carter: You have revealed yourself to be more than a little incompetent in your assessment of matters.

I demand that my students—the vast majority of whom are white—fully challenge me.  I cannot do that and then turn around and characterize as racist those who do precisely that.

The readers of this blog entry will notice that I have stayed away from signaling out Democrats or Republicans.  I see no reason to reason whatsoever to draw attention to that difference.  For insofar as we have a difference at all, it is one of degree and not kind.

I am ashamed of the Congress of the United States.  This is because in this simple episode you have revealed yourselves to be truly mean-spirited and thus morally bankrupt.

I now understand much better than I used to why the moral climate of the United States has changed so dramatically for the worse.  The explanation is not technology as such or some virus that is a threat to health.  Quite the contrary, the explanation is that the leaders of the United States have set a most despicable and unsavory moral tone.  The leaders of the nation are far more interesting in having and maintaining power than doing what is right.  More than I would ever have supposed once upon a time, the declining moral climate of America can be attributed to none other than what we might call “trickle-down immorality” on the part of the leaders of the nation.

No one has ever succeeded without being persistent. Insofar as it is this truth that animated President Obama’s speech on education, his speech is brilliantly radical.  The speech gets at the very reality of life.  In pursuing an education, there will invariably be obstacles.  And the fundamental key to success is not to become discouraged by those obstacles.

Some conservative folks have sought to discount his speech.  Others have claimed that President Obama’s speech on education constitutes some kind of political agenda.  This is just so much nonsense.  Indeed, what Obama said speaks to a very deep and abiding truth about success—so much so that it seems to me that the speech is more radical than many realize.

There are many obstacles in life.  Some are financial, some are personal, and others are social.  For some the financial obstacles overshadow the person ones.  For others, the personal obstacles overshadow the social ones.  And so on.  At the risk of offending some, it is a simple truth that there are forms of racial discrimination that utterly pale in comparison to physical disabilities.  And history shows that anyone who wallows in self-pity, be it owing to racial discrimination or significant physical disabilities, is pretty much destined to fail.

President Obama’s speech is profound in the following way.  In a word, he said that notwithstanding the misfortunes that students may encounter in the pursuit of their studies, they must nonetheless persist in the pursuit of their studies.

Notice what this entails.  This line of reasoning does not deny that there may be obstacles of injustice of some sort or the other.  Rather, the line of reasoning holds that one must not allow oneself to become discouraged by them.

In this respect, minorities might do well to think of themselves on the order of individuals with physical disabilities who persist notwithstanding the extraordinary obstacles that they face.  On the one hand, this is not tantamount to denying the reality of racial injustice, any more than those physically challenged are even remotely tempted to deny the reality of their circumstances.  Not at all.   One the other, Obama’s extremely substantial point is that success is not possible if people allow themselves to be too easily discouraged by either type of obstacle.

So far from finding Obama’s speech objectionable, the speech should be music to the ears of conservatives.  Indeed, in their rush to criticize Obama, conservatives missed a truly wonderful opportunity to echo a truly fundamental social ideal.

I do not know whether Obama fully intended this, but it is arguable that his speech signals to minorities that they need to stop using racism as an excuse for their failures.  And this makes Obama’s speech radical in a way that conservatives can roundly embrace.

And then there is this: What Obama has said is surely true.  As we veer towards moral and social perfection, we must now allow obstacles to discourage us.  Indeed, it is impossible to veer towards moral and social perfection if we too easily allow obstacles to discourage us.  It is this simple truth that makes President Obama’s speech, at once, so significant and so radical.

Moral and social progress is inextricably tied to individuals not allowing themselves to become too readily discouraged by the obstacles that they face in life.  Our acceptance of those with physical abilities owes so very much to the unfailing persistence of so many with physical disabilities.  More generally, it is precisely because so many endured in spite of social injustice of one type or the other that we have a most just society today.

There is a fundamental difference between trivializing an injustice and being determined not to let that injustice be an impediment to one’s flourishing.  Far too often, nowadays, folks wrongly think that doing the latter (not letting an injustice be an impediment) is tantamount to doing the former (trivializing the injustice).  In effect, what President Obama does in his speech is draw attention to this difference and extols individuals not to do the latter.  It does not matter whether the character of the injustice might be.

The substance of Obama’s point can be masterfully put as follows: When we can maneuver around an injustice is it much more important that we do that, then that we invest so much energy in complaining about the injustice that we faced.  This holds whether we are talking about injustices against those with physical disabilities or injustices against those who from an impoverished economic background (be they white or black or Asian or whatever) or simply racial injustices.

With respect to minorities, especially, and blacks in particular, what President Obama majestically maintains is that it is far more important to have an investment in getting ahead than it is to have an investment in playing the race card.  After all, if all it takes to derail a black is the slightest amount of racism, this is to give the enemy far too much power.  Only a conservative in need of lobotomy can disagree with that.  And judging from the reaction of some conservatives to the President Obama’s speech on education, a lobotomy is precisely what they need.

Thus, Obama’s speech on education was indeed a moral and social gift.  Alas, as is so often the case: even precious gifts can be undervalued.

Trust stands as one of the most beautiful moral gifts that any two individuals can give to one another.  Romantic love underwritten by mutual and profound trust between two individuals is a most rhapsodic relationship between two individuals.  Alas, I fear that technology is unwittingly undermining trust at its best between romantic partners.

I claim that technology is “unwittingly undermining” trust because it is most unlikely that any supposed that trust between lovers would diminish as a result of technology.  I do not claim that trust has diminished between all lovers.  I merely claim that this is so in a great many cases.

As we all know, a most interesting consequence of cell phone technology is what I shall refer to as “whereabouts accountability”.  Thanks to technology people can be reached 24-7; and owing to that very reality, it is increasingly the case that people call wanting to know where their partner is and was.  Thus, a telephone call these days is as likely to begin with “Where are you?” as it is to begin with a warm greeting.

Not only that, we expect our romantic partners to answer when we call.  Nowadays, there are increasingly few exceptions to this expectation.  Air travel remains the most notable one for the moment.  For the moment, no one expects a person to answer if she or he is on a plane that is in flight.  However, that may change in the near future.

I suppose that a surgeon in the operating room or a firefighter answering a call is not expected to answer a call.  No doubt there are other instances.  Alas, the well-defined exceptions where a person is not expected to answer a call serve to prove the point.

Now, there is a vanishingly thin line between “just calling to see how a person is doing” and “calling to find out what a person is doing and where the person is”.  And the slide from a routine call to see how a person is doing to a routine call to what a person is doing and where the person is the slide from trust to an increasing absence of trust.

In this odd way, technology lends itself to a most disconcerting form of self-deception.  This is because people can deceive themselves in thinking that they expressing concern for the well-being of their romantic partner when in point of fact they are only calling because they want to make sure that their romantic partner is not doing something unacceptable.

Needless to say, the difference between wanting to make sure that one’s partner is all right and having the concern that one’s partner may be up to no good constitutes a fundamental difference between a loving relationship that is sustaining and a relationship that sits upon the rock of instability and suspicion.

Alas, a most interesting point here is that not reaching a romantic partner can serve as a basis for suspicion in a way that it typically did not a mere 15 years ago when, of course, it was an accepted part of life that people could not be reached 24-7.  Accordingly, insofar as people were suspicious it took more than not being able to reach the person whenever, since that was typically not an option in the first place.

So here we have a most surprising result: The cell phone was introduced as a marvelous means of reaching others regardless of geographical location, and so deemed ever so superior to the land-line.  The surprise, alas, is that the cell phone has also turned out to be, albeit ever so unexpectedly, a catalyst for suspicion precisely because one is able to reach another whenever.

As far as I can see, the phenomenon to which I have drawn attention arises only between romantic partners—and not between friends.  And this is particularly interesting, since there is the thought that romance is none other than friendship at a higher level.  Thus, one would have thought that if “whereabouts accountability” is not a factor in friendship, it should not be a factor in romance.  Given that one of the most striking difference between friendship and romance is sex and living together, then it seems reasonable to ask: How is it that either or both of these factors occasion the mentality of “whereabouts accountability”?  To that question, I do not have an answer.

I suspect that part of the answer, though, is that there is an on-going affirming quality to friendship precisely because the nature of friendship does not easily lend itself to either friend taking the other friend for granted.  People understand that friendship is dynamic.  By contrast, it is often the case with romance that the most important work is thought to be that of “getting one’s partner” and then everything else can be taken for granted.  We know that this cannot possible be right; for love should never, under any circumstances, be about taking the other for granted.  In this respect, then, love at its best should also be a form of friendship.

The National Association of Black Social Workers (NABSW) stands opposed to black children being adopted by loving white families.  Indeed, the association has gone so far as to call the placing of black children in white families as none other than a form of genocide.  It is to me extremely disconcerting that the NABSW should take this stand.

It is even more disconcerting that the organization should use the term “genocide” in this context.  Genocide is the willful attempt to eliminate a people off the face of the earth.  Whatever else is true, the adoption of a black child by a loving white family cannot be characterized as a willful attempt to harm a black child.

The genocide argument, alas, is that a black child in the care of loving white family will be utterly deracinated from her or his black roots.  The presuppositions behind this line of thinking reveal just how much ideology trumps truth.

First of all, being black is hardly tantamount to knowing the history of blackness all the way back to the continent of Africa.  Most blacks in the United States do not have any such knowledge.  Indeed, I am rather confident that most black social workers do not have any such knowledge.  Indeed, I would go so far as to say that the typical black American social worker is not likely to know anything at all about Africa.  And if the typical black social worker does not, it is even more unlikely that the typical black is well-informed about the black experience all the way back to Africa.

Second, there is the issue of what happens to the black children who go without being adopted unless they are adopted by a white family.  And it is in this regard that the National Association of Black Social Workers (NABSW) proves itself to be morally bankrupt even to the point of being evil.  For surely the argument cannot be that it is better for a black child to stay in foster care than to have the loving care of a white family.  And if that is the argument, then the NABSW is an organization that is entirely lacking in moral credibility.  I mean why not push the organization’s line of thought even further: Better that a black child should die than that she or he should be raised by loving white parents.

Painfully, it seems to me that the NABSW has to be committed to the morally bankrupt view that a black child should die than that she or he should be raised by loving white parents.  And if that is so, then the real genocide—if indeed we are going to use that bastardly word—is being perpetrated by blacks against blacks: the National Association of Black Social Workers (NABSW) is perpetrating genocide against black children.  Alas, far too many people lack the moral courage to accuse the NABSW of effectively being committed to the genocide of black children.

Now, if the NABSW would retort that in a life-or-death situation, white loving parents for a black child are preferable to the child’s death, then the NABSW is no position whatsoever to maintain that foster care for black children is preferable to loving care from white parents.  For nothing has ever been or ever shall be the equal of magnificent parental love.  And parental love at its best is a basis like none other for psychological health at its best.

As an aside, it is my view that either psychological well-being or life roundly trumps the preservation of culture.  And there are, I suppose, people who not hold that view.  Alas, in the case at hand, the issue is inconsequential.  There certainly are enough blacks in United States that there is absolutely no chance whatsoever of black culture dying in view the number of whites interested in adopting blacks.  So even if should place the preservation of black culture over the psychological well-being of black children, the issue is mute, since there is no external threat to black culture.

And it is this consideration that makes it so palpably clear to me that the National Association of Black Social Workers is a morally bankrupt organization.  Insofar as there is a threat to the survival of black culture, he irresponsible behavior of numerous blacks is far more of a threat to the survival of black culture than is the number of whites interested in adopting black children.  This point holds all the more so when one considers that there is nothing at all which precludes loving white parents from making sure that their adopted black child is richly exposed to black culture and black history.

Finally, in this regard there is the issue of the experience of racism.  And one might very well argue that only those who have experienced racism first hand can speak to its character.  There is, of course, a way in which this is trivially true.  After all, only those who have in fact been raped can speak to its horror.  Just so, no one would ever think that a man whose wife died could not be a good and loving and more than adequate father to his daughters merely because he did not know first-hand the experience of rape or the fear of rape or sexism as such.

Human beings are capable of great malleability; and when we love someone dearly, we are more than capable of acquiring sufficient understanding to serve as a moral beacon even if we cannot always speak to all the details.  And it is rare, anyhow, that anyone can always speak to all the details of whatever form inappropriate behavior or attitude might take.

There are no good arguments to show that loving white parents should not adopt black children.  And it is patently obvious that there are no good arguments to that effect.  This is precisely why the National Association of Black Social Workers shamelessly spoke of black genocide.  This was and is none other than a pure rhetorical move.  After all, who isn’t opposed to the genocide blacks or whites or Jews or Asians or Arabs or whomever?  What is more, in terms of what is known as moral suasion we tend to be very reluctant to question whether the term is applied correctly.  The analogous case is that of a woman who claims that she has been raped.  It takes an awful lot to ask: Are you sure that you were raped?

Well, to the National Association of Black Social Workers: I ask is there any reason whatsoever not to see your strident stance against loving white parents adopting black children as none other than a form of genocide against blacks?  You have made ethnicity more important than love and the well-being that parental love affords.  And there is no argument, nor will there ever be one, that lends one iota of credibility to that stance.  To see this, just try generalizing your argument against love whites adopting black children to loving whites adopting, for instance, Asian children.  And then there is the issue of loving Asians adopting black children or, dare I say it, loving blacks adopting Asian children or even white children.

Consistency requires that the National Association of Black Social Workers (NABSW) be against any of the adoptions mentioned in the preceding paragraph.  Accordingly, the NABSW stands as the poster organization for Emerson’s observation that “Foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds”.