Forty Years On: Kerner and the Liberal Media

It spawned the famous -- infamous? -- line: Our nation is moving toward two societies, one black, one white -- separate and unequal. Its true name was the National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders. Most people know it as the Kerner Report -- so called because it was chaired by Illinois governor Otto Kerner, Jr. -- and it was published forty years ago today.

The report was commissioned by President Johnson in an effort to determine and help quell the rising tide of urban violence in the middle 1960s. The Commission's main conclusion can be summed up in that oft-quoted line.

Forty years later the situation for black Americans is not by any means perfect, but it is much better.

However, for all the areas of society in which blacks -- and by extension all minorities -- have enjoyed some measure of parity, there is one glaring and ironic omission: the very media which is so often accused of having a liberal bias. It is, in fact, only liberal in its decades-long run of institutionalized discrimination.

Take a look back. The Kerner Report broke it down like this: The journalistic profession has been shockingly backward in seeking out, hiring, training and promoting Negroes.

The italics mine.

Fast forward ten years and the American Society of Newspaper Editors decided to make it their mission to have news rooms reflect the real world in their racial breakdown by calendar year 2000.

And it only took them ten years to come up with that bit of genius.

And they gave themselves twenty-two years to get the job done.

They didn't.

So they gave themselves another twenty-five years. And if they don't get it done by then, eventually the world'll end and that'll be that with that.

What's shocking is the blind spot the media has for its own failings. The exemplar prime is a recent op-ed piece by Frank Rich of the New York Times. Entitled "The Grand Old White Party Confronts Obama," Rich wrote that the problem with John McCain's posse -- way to throw in a dated urbanism -- is not just its age but its demographic monotony: all white and nearly all male.

Really, Mr. Rich? You mean, like the Masthead of the New York Times? Like the Editorial Board of the New York Times? Do you mean such as the Corporate Officers of the New York Times Company?

It's not that Rich doesn't have a point regarding the Republicans. However, why waste ink -- or bytes -- hectoring a political party that risks its own demise when he would do better to take his bosses to task?

The New York Times and Frank Rich are, of course, not alone in their hypocrisy. However, as the self-styled standard bearer of liberalism they would do better to lead by example rather than rhetoric. It has, after all, been forty years.

Comments

[LBKN]

Mr Ridley,


Please can you write a commentary revealing racism in the hot-air-ballooning community?

[LBKN]

Please Mr. Ridley:

I want to know...

What avenue will you choose to inject race into the subject of "Fishing". I admire your creativity when developing tangental connections... but for the life of me... I can't quell my curiosity over this one.

[musselmanm]

As a white 57 year old male and 35 year Union member, I hate getting put into a steriotypical box. I do not Support the Bush/McCain ticket or the Clinton ticket. These are the two groups all jounalists try to put me in.
Please allow me to explain. For fourty years now, I have been mostly without hope. If you look at that year, It was the election after Robert F. Kennedys' assasination. I was becoming aware of polotics even when Ike was president. I was 7 when he was our president. I remember and supported the movements. Kennedy, King, Kennedy, the million man march. the racial riots of the entire 60's.
By my belief in the spirit of hope offered by Barack Obama, is the first time since those years.
We must move forward while we have a chance to allow racial healing to transpire. Not just for journalists, but for all American people, Black, While, Hispanic, Asian, Indian all the rest too numorous to name here. We must also allow religions to heal from the hatred.I believe that Barack Obama will give us the best chance to accomplish these noble goals.
If you do not mind I will show you now just how much of an old white, middle class hippie I am. I am quoting John Lennon. Please people, (Give peace a chance).

[Jazz42]

I agree with you completely.
Very well stated.

[situationcritical]

Just want to remind everyone. John Ridley voted for George W. Bush.

[LeoMarvin]

Isn't it obvious?

[bayman]

Bob Herbert (an African-American, if you were not aware) is one of 10 NY Times Op-Ed columnists. 10 percent. What percent of those majoring in Journalism across American colleges are African-American? We can play with arithmetic further to reveal that 12.5% of Times op-ed pieces are written by African-Americans (8 of the 10, including Herbert, write twice/week). Perhaps you should aim your whining elsewhere. Frank Rich was spot-on in that column. That you choose to repeatedly complain about it, while still acknowledging the validity of his point, says more about the accuser than the accused.

[Nommo]

Columnists are not reporters. Take another look at the Times and other majors and see how many Black reporters there are.

[jhamm1]

If anything, this should highlight an essential point, in that, regardless of the persistent whining of die-hard conservatives, the fact remains that the so-called "liberal media" has never been that liberal to begin with. While they do tend to favor such causes as gay rights and democratic candidates, they simultaneously oppose affirmative action, are more-or-less "on the fence" where feminism is concerned, and furthermore have been actively engaged in the negative stereotypes of persians and arabs, which concerns a further bias in that they remain almost unequivocally tend to favor Israel and its policies.

[yappnmutt]

please don't speak for this minority. the civil rights movement made a big mistake in not emphasizing an economic bill of rights that included the right to open businesses. the silver lining in segregation was the economic strength of the black community as a result of the money being brought back to the community from jobs in the white community spent in businesses based in the black community. obviously the black community wasn't as rich as the white community but the local black economy was strong. the civil rights movement had the unintended effect of dispersing these tradional black communities, leaving behind the poorest community inhabitants, and the vast potential economic power of a close knit community that , i hypothesize because of the dispersion, hasn't been adequately harnessed 40 years later. the civil rights movement would have done much better to fight for the right to open a black owned diner in white town then the right to sit at a white owned diner and give the white owner black money, the way it always has been.

[Nommo]

Thank you. A most apt comment.

[TomPaine07]

Why should anyone get a job because of their race? If you have evidence that the NYt is a racist organization discriminating against Blacks, then let's hear it. All this kind of talk about race based quotas does ,is to make it harder for those members of a particular race who have earned a position through their personal competency to function without others thinking that are not qualified to do their job. So, put up or shut up.

[MsLiz]

I checked your profile. Angry white male, I guess.

Sometimes having a particular point of view, derived from life experiences, is a qualification. For example, when I worked in the juvenile courts, it helped to have a Black Probation Officer help me talk with my juvenile delinquent clients, because the POs knew to trust my advice. Black bailiffs were less likely to get a fight out of unruly delinquents. Black judges could tell Black parents to shape up and be heard.

[Nommo]

Why shouldn't anyone get a job because of their race? Apparently, it happens all the time. As for the notion of "personal competency" and "qualified", those are matters that never get past race or if one is the right race, are never counted.

It is like the "experience" question in the current race for POTUS. That question would never have been on the table if it were not for Obama's "race".

[Madampotential]

Interesting that you criticize Frank Rich for not focusing on his bosses at the NY TImes but you did not focus on the lack of diversity at MSNBC.

MSNBC is a 'good ole white boy' network and you know it. Therefore, who are you to call out Frank Rich???? How many black journalists work for MSNBC? ONE! I have seen one black female anchor on that network and they damn sure are not going to hire any black MALE journalists b/c white boys like Abrams, Scarborough, Matthews, and Carlson would be threatened by an intelligent black man.

[MsLiz]

I see Ridley and Eugene Robinson on there regularly, and just sent off a letter to [e-mail] to ask them to set up a webpage showing their newscasters and increase their Black presence. I mentioned sending Matthews to re-education camp and letting either Ridley or Robinson sub for him, that was fun.

[ProfessorDuh]

Well, the New York Times hired Jayson Blair, didn't they, much to their regret? I would rather have my news from qualified, honest journalists of whatever skin color.

[tenilla]

The hypocrisy here is a little hard to take. The only reason that Ridley got his very short stint
on "Morning Joe" was because he is black. The week of Imus's demise, MSNBC dug up one
Latino who appeared on almost every panel all week (and has not been sighted since), and trotted out their Central Casting group of black Republicans. To get "Monring Joe" started, MSNBC needed a black. Because of Ridley's lack of talent, not his race, he only lasted for a few weeks -- although he stills calls himself a co-anchor of "Morning Joe".

I have often wondered why the cable news networks cannot seem to find moderate or liberal
blacks to address issues.

[Rankfart]

Ridley agrees with Frank Rich's comments, but yet still maligns him. Ridley's blogs, including this one, appear to be based on flawed logic and anecdotal stories that do not coalesce very well. My advice to Ridley: stick to film and novels - in those forms of expression you make more sense.

[tenilla]

You will notice that this blog has been posted for several days and there have been fewer than 50 responses.

I couldn't agree more about his flawed logic and anecdotal stories, not to mention his snarky,
condescending tone.

In one of his masterpieces a few months ago, Ridley got away with criticizing a Frank Rich
column. It was painfully obvious that Ridley simply did not comprehend what Frank Rich was
saying.

Since no one seems to be reading him, perhaps HuffPo has a quota to fulfill.

[maggipost]

The real question which neither Ridley nor the above replies address is -- what is the evidence that qualified African-Americans are being turned away by the media. One notes, for instance, that CNN has quite a diverse cast of on-air broadcasters, including even an overweight and not all that attractive white woman, and notwithstanding the many hours during which we have to put up with Wolf Blitzer.
This entire line of thought reminds me forcibly of the immigration debate -- that illegal immigrants are taking jobs that might otherwise be filled by working-class African-Americans or whites. And yet, little evidence is presented that demonstrates working-class parents want their children to become construction workers, strawberry harvesters or the like. Similarly with more upscale African-Americans -- employment progress has been made in so many areas (corporate, Hollywood, etc) -- might we not wonder if perhaps the media is not an avenue that is necessarily appealing to African-Americans?

[fullkelly]

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0208/8762.html
If anyone has any doubt where all the nasty racial politics is comeing from in these primarys should read the article at the above link. I have a feeling most of the Obama followers will just laugh about it and continue to trash the other candidates.

[tracydolls]

The media never talks about race honestly. I never hear reports that DNA says we ALL come from Africa, Tanzania to be exact. We have become too politically correct, which in turn has just created more in the closet racists. I live in a very liberal state, (MN)and see a very insidious form of racism here because they have fooled their selves into thinking they are not. You cannot cure a problem until you admit that you have one. ]

Between the two evils, you have to look at it like this. If we were back in slavery what kind of massa would the Democrats be, kindly, would make sure the children were'nt mistreated too badly, not work you too hard. Your whippings would be few and far between, it would hurt them more than its hurts you. Now think of the Republicans as massa. Mean, hires mean overseer, doesnt care if your fed well. Has no problem selling familes off. Lots of cruel punishments, the only time you see them is when they and their friends get drunk and come to watch a whipping.

Obama running has brought all kinds of divisons concerning race to the forefront. But it seems real superficial. And it still has not addressed what is going on here in America, the lingering feelings left over from slavery and segration. AfricansAmericans that can trace their history to slavery in this country are the real losers in this election.

[fullkelly]

Here in the bible belt the talk of slavery is still one of the main topics of conversation when it comes to politics. Civil rights should be for all people . However Obama's campaign theme is "hope and change". But in his campaign he has made Bill and Hillary Clinton his whipping boy and whipping girl in the process of his campaign for "hope and change". What hope or change has Obama shown ? NONE. Then going back to the subject of slavery among the bible spouting christians (both black and white) there is a topic never brought up. That is to say , biblically speaking, the black people of today say the Ancient Egyptians were black, some even go so far as to trace their roots to the Ancient egyptians. Now every bible reader knows that Egypt once held the Children of Israel captive and made slaves of them. However there has never been any appology from any black individuals or black nation(s) to the Israelites. Indeed civil rights SHOULD belong to all people but reverse discrimination whether in just talking or in deeds is harmful to all people just as lies are harmful to good government.

[MsLiz]

I don't hang out with the people you are talking to, and I think that it is ludicrous to expect anyone to apologize for an act that happened over 2000 years ago. The Statute of Limitations has run. Get some perspective, and worry over what is happening in the Black Belt today. That is related to history within the past 200 years.

BTW, the Bible is not literal, just thought you ought to know that.

[situationcritical]

Do you honestly think Americans shouldn't be accountable for their atrocities? Not only were blacks enslaved, but they were also forced to help slaughter the great Indian people who lived here long before white europeans came over.

BTW, the original children of Israel were dark-skinned. The people of Israel today are the result of, again, caucasians moving into the middle east.

Ya, the bible causes people to assume the world is white. Actually the world is pretty much yellow and Asian.

Don't get me wrong - I love my white peeps, but ya'll sometimes think everything is about you.

[Purple Girl]

This is the only area you see we have not made adequate gains over the last 40 yrs.
Woman still make only about$0.77 to a mans $1.00. The 'Give A Hoot,don't Pollute' is now Global Warming!!! There is still No Peace in the Middle East and we are back to driving Lead Sleds causing blood shed. Terrorist attacks started in the 70's -Highjacking ('who would have thought they run a plane into targets'...ME! Screw You we are not all that stupid or comatose), remeber the Hostage Crisis. This shit has been going on for 40 yrs because we have seen the Nexus of the Corp Agenda.
Rights and Freedoms for any sector of the Masses- are you kidding me, it's in direct conflict with their Business Stratedgy!
Perhaps if we all stopped focusing on our narrow idiosyncratic issues we could make a more devastating impact on these entities that have Plagued Mankind. It's not a Sexist thing, Nor a racist thing .. It's the Labor Market, Futures Market... It's Indentured Slavery from the 20th Century.
Until we REMIND Gov't , Industry , Communications and Relgion that they are Mere TOOLS to Man, We will not be Free.
You seem to be Complacant with the crumbles YOU have been thrown- what about the rest of your fellow man (and Woman)?I've come to the realization that organizations created back about 35 yrs ago were deveolped to blow smoke up our asses- NOW, GREEN PEACE, ACLU, NAACP have done nothing, were are seeing their 'accomplishements' presently.
Perhps Our real Strength lies in scraping the shit off our boots and entering the House of Man.
Expand Your Scope!

[nihilon x]

"NOW, GREEN PEACE, ACLU, NAACP have done nothing, were are seeing their 'accomplishements' presently."

If you truly think that organiztions such as these have done nothing to help women and other minorities get a fair shake in society, then you obviously don't understand just how racist and sexist this nation was just 50 years ago -- let alone 150 years ago prior to such organizations being formed. The fact that you think that the NAACP was created "about 35 years ago" speaks volumes about your ignorance on this matter.

I agree with what you are saying with regards to unifying rather than dividing, but to condemn organizations such as NOW or the NAACP without viewing them in the context of a historically racist and sexist society that at one time needed such organizations to protect the rights of "minorities" and others is short-sighted as things weren't always as "fair" as they are today.

[LBKN]

Mr Ridley,

This comment has little to do with your article... it is more along the line of a personal request. I really love to read a creatively flexible commentary. I have been hoping for some time that you would pick a particular subject.

I wish you would comment on "Fishing" sometime. I can't figure out how you would bring race into the subject. I am confident that the avenue you would choose to inject race would be fascinating.

Thank you.

[Tator]

After reading most of the posts I see the author and Liberals in general do not understood why there are so few blacks in upper positions. It is lazy, convenient and provides cover to Liberals to say the cause is racism.



As someone, who 35 years ago, was introduced to Affirmative Action (AA), I can inform the ignorant here the problem is not racism: the problem is the result of Liberalism run amuck. AA was a well intended program to offer equal opportunity to blacks with equal skills of non-blacks, but in reality it is nothing more than a quota system to compensate for the fact so few qualified blacks, especially males, existed to fill upper positions.



For 35 years (semi-retired now) I was in positions to hire folks into jobs that required an applicant to understand multiple fields of science. In all those years I have had hundreds of meetings with Human Resource Mangers who advocated AA (most HR folks are Liberals). It normally went like this, "The Company has too few minorities, except Asians," to which I replied, "Find me ten qualified minorities today, and I will hire them on the spot."



This author and Liberals look at the "end of the assembly line( upper positions)" and do not see blacks and conveniently see the cause as racism, because it fits their world view and allows them to ignore the problem is at the "front of the assembly line" where Liberalism has its strongest influence.



The "front of the assembly line" constitutes the youthful years of academic education and social mores. In a nutshell, the families, schools and social culture the blacks grow up within. Look at black males today that are of college years: they are the males who in the future are ones who could possibly fill upper positions in 15 to 20 years, but due to their plight, they will not be qualified to hold any of these positions. With a disproportionate number in prison, or in gangs, or having several children without the means to support them does not put them in the "assembly line" for advancement. In 20 years Liberals will be saying the same thing, "It"s racism," when it has nothing to do with racism, only too few developed the skills and education to fill the positions because of the influences of Liberalism in there youth.



Liberalism is the dogma of our current education system, and has been for 40 years. Liberalism is the "shield" that prevents a honest evaluation of the black culture where all social rules have broken down. That shield is so effective that simply repeating a "documented statistical fact", like 60% of births to black women are out-of-wedlock, is deems a racial slur. That shield prevents any discussion of the real problem and prevents any solution from ever being developed.



In summary, the reason there are so few blacks in upper positions is because Liberalism prevented them from ever becoming qualified to hold them.

[axefan1]

Tater, I was going to respond in a similar fashion but you nailed it. Nice work..

[Tator]

Thank you.

[nihilon x]

Myth 10: Support for affirmative action means support for preferential selection procedures that favor unqualified candidates over qualified candidates.

Actually, most supporters of affirmative action oppose this type of preferential selection. Preferential selection procedures can be ordered along the following continuum:

1. Selection among equally qualified candidates. The mildest form of affirmative action selection occurs when a female or minority candidate is chosen from a pool of equally qualified applicants (e.g., students with identical college entrance scores). Survey research suggests that three-quarters of the public does not see this type of affirmative action as discriminatory (Roper Center for Public Opinion, 1995e).

2. Selection among comparable candidates. A somewhat stronger form occurs when female or minority candidates are roughly comparable to other candidates (e.g., their college entrance scores are lower, but not by a significant amount). The logic here is similar to the logic of selecting among equally qualified candidates; all that is needed is an understanding that, for example, predictions based on an SAT score of 620 are virtually indistinguishable from predictions based on an SAT score of 630.

3. Selection among unequal candidates. A still stronger form of affirmative action occurs when qualified female or minority candidates are chosen over candidates whose records are better by a substantial amount.

4. Selection among qualified and unqualified candidates. The strongest form of preferential selection occurs when unqualified female or minority members are chosen over other candidates who are qualified. Although affirmative action is sometimes mistakenly equated with this form of preferential treatment, federal regulations explicitly prohibit affirmative action programs in which unqualified or unneeded employees are hired (Bureau of National Affairs, 1979).

http://www.understandingprejudice.org/readroom/articles/affirm.htm

[Tator]

Well, I hate to break it to you, but in the real world your " myth" is fact. As I said, in my profession, which required an applicant to understand the relationships of several disciplines of science (thermodynamics, gas flow principles, radio, microwave, spectrometer) the government put pressure on the companies to hire non-whites, regardless of qualifications.

The result actually was extremely damaging to the non-white applicant and even worst placed non-white new hires in position of "not being expected to qualified". This set up a resentment among all currently qualified workers (white and non-white).

The way it would go down is like this. We would need a new hire. Managers would put the word out to find applicants among our customer base who used our products and understood them. We did this because there was a huge learning curve associated with the complexity of the instruments.

Because the "front of the assembly line" was never populated with blacks that studied science, blacks among our customer user base was small. Our management made it very clear, go after black applicants first, then women next (any race) and whites guys last. Now you have to narrow down the black customer base even more because they stood a high probability of being hired into the current job because of AA and they were unqualified in their current jobs, so we screened them out.

The result was this: We could on day one have ten highly qualified white guys to step into the job and hit the ground running. Maybe one qualified women and we would have to search the region of the country for a semi-qualified black. In one case, because HR demanded we hire a black, we had to wait four months to fill a position we could of filled in a week, and even after that it took them TWO YEARS to be able to do the job the qualified white guy could do after six months. Co-worker had to follow the blacks for two years and hand-hold them and fix problems they created.

The real damaged done by this was it "tainted" any black applicant. Because of past experience with hiring unqualified blacks, coworker of all races (even blacks that were now proficient) looked as the new black hire as someone that was probably not qualified and that they would make everyone"s job harder for a year or two until they came up to speed.

You can peddle that "myth" theory all you want but in the real world, what you read above was fact, and it hurts blacks more in the long run by establishing, based on historical precedent, a black applicant is expected to be unqualified, and they were hired in a discriminatory manner just because the were black. A quota.

I will add, a truly qualified black can name their ticket in today"s marketplace.

[MsLiz]

Tator said that? I am surprised, he usually throws rotten vegetables. I think your point is sound, to a point. I have worked in a welfare department, juvenile courts and grocery business, and have family members who are teachers. Black children are being sabotaged in the cradle, metaphorically.

However, blaming liberalism is too easy. There were unintended consequences of good programs, as Moynihan pointed out in the 1960s. By giving AFDC to widows and orphans we helped people of all backgrounds (most recepients were white) who were excluded from the workforce, and we inadvertantly encouraged fathers to abandon their children. However, liberalism does not imprison Black men for drug and property offenses at a disproportionate rate to white men, and did not draft them to serve in Vietnam. Liberalism doesn't encourage them to join the military today as the only means of getting a college education. Liberalism created the Title IV-D Child Support program in the 1970s that establishes paternity and enforces child support obligations.

Tator, their ancestors did not learn the Puritan work ethic, because slavery turned it upside down. Black children are sabotaged by parents who teach them the lessons of slavery, Jim Crow, and sharecropping: If you work hard, you won't get rich, but the master will. The master will expect you to work harder every day. If you show leadership, initiative, or intelligence, you will be viewed as a trouble maker, and that could get you beaten or killed.

Look at life from someone else's point of view, and you may learn something, Tator. Like how it is to be a Yam.

Standard liberal white woman disclaimer: If I offend any Black people, it is out of ignorance, not intent, and I appreciate being educated with courtesy.