Final Commentary on "Race Realism" Debate with James Allsup

The days of debating on the Red Elephants YouTube channel are over.

Debate is not a matter of interest, it seems. The commitment to seeing white identity or race of any kind as the key determinant for any civil society is all wrong.

At any rate, I was so unhappy with the arguments that they had been sharing, that I had to speak out. Vincent James offered for me to debate someone on this issue. I had never heard of this James Allsup guy until the day of the debate, which took place the same day as the San Dimas City Council meeting to discuss potential steps against SB 54.

Here's the video of the debate with James Allsup (Click the link)

This write-up was very complimentary towards me.

After dinner last night, I went on YouTube to catch up on my subscription feed. I noticed that the Red Elephants were live streaming, which was unusual. Even more unusual, James Allsup and Arthur Schaper were debating each other on the topic of “race realism.” I never expected to see that, but I do know that both James and Arthur are friends with Vince from the Red Elephants. The debate was well underway by the time I tuned in, and I was immediately intrigued to hear what was happening. I then went back and watched a replay so I could catch the debate in its entirety. I’ve been a fan of the work of both of them in the past. James’s position was that differences between races matter. Black Americans will never achieve parity with white Americans because they have a lower average IQ. Arthur’s position was that religious and cultural values have much more to do with a civilization's achievements than race and IQ.

I am astonished at the degrees to which alt-right figures, or paleonconservatives, or "whatever-cons" will go to make the race the focal issue of political thought.

Pat Buchanan, one of the foreign policy nationalists with a grave distrust of Israel, wrongly predicted that the Georgia US Senate seat would go to a Democrat because the demographics are changing. He hasn't paid attention to the fact that more "minority" voters are voting conservative, voting for policies that make America Great Again. Why?

Because the stultifying imposition of race and identity politics is not working anymore. More people are recognizing that they can vote anyway they please, and they no longer have to be accused of "Voting against their race". That's the primary reason why minority voters have been seduced into voting Democrat.

One of the pillars of James’s argumentation was that white civilizations far surpassed anything achieved by black civilizations. He also cited statistics showing that white and Asian students score higher on average on SAT exams than blacks and Hispanics by a sizable margin. Arthur retorted by saying that the achievements of European civilizations had more to do with the culture and civilizing values brought about by Christianity and Judaism. 

Chad B.'s post was a massive summary of what James and I debated.

This part was the most pertinent for me:

James later fired back that there are African countries that are majority Christian, yet they haven’t been progressing much at all. They haven't even been putting up tall buildings since the end of colonialism. Arthur asked how intellect should be defined. Is intellect based on artistic talent or scientific rigor or something else? He noted that IQ tests aren’t always accurate and that being a good test taker doesn’t mean that you can run a business, create a great work of art, or write a book. James responded by saying that SAT’s and IQ tests are meant to prove an ability to solve problems rather than demonstrating memorization skills.

David Brooks affirmed my view that intellect is far more than passing a tests:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L_Fc4Vpikdg

Responding to James' assertion that African nations have largely floundered despite being given significant amounts of monetary aid, Arthur said that family and values matter more than aid money. The money often falls into the hands of warlords and dictators and gets squandered. He also noted how unfortunate it is that so many black children grow up in broken homes and how many blacks face generational poverty due to the governmental policies of the Democrats.

Then Chad offered his comments about these alt-right views:

When I hear some of these Alt-Right personalities continually bringing up race and a hope for a future ethnostate, I start getting turned off. I agree with some common stances on the Alt-Right, but not this one. Yes, there are obvious physical and maybe even intellectual differences between races, but there are also many other factors at play, such as culture, climate, values, and religion. All human beings have far more in common than they have differences. Outward racial appearance is only a small part of what comprises an individual. Similarly, IQ is far from being the most important predictor of success in life.

I would further add that these differences are the crucial distinctions.

The intelligence of people could easily be offset by laziness, lack of focus, or lack of common sense. People with lower IQ’s might have a good work ethic, a strong ability to focus, and abundant common sense. I bet that we could all think of someone who has plenty of book smarts, but they can barely figure out how to program a TV remote or row a canoe. 

Or even change a tire. There's street smarts as well as books smarts. Intellectuals have offered a number of predictions, and they have often been wrong. They are out of touch with the varieties and vagueries of real life. Many intellectuals are in bondage to this false notion that just because they are well-read, and surrounded by other academics who are well-read, that they are smarter than everyone else.

Yet the sailors on Christopher Columbus' ships knew more about the New World than the wild and crazy fantasies of academics in elite universities. Some of them were writing about men with heads in their chests, for example, and still peddling other Aristotlean myths about natural laws and sciences.

Similarly, we could probably think of people who only have a high school diploma, yet they successfully manage a store or do well in sales. Some people with high IQ's cannot perform well under pressure. Some people with low IQ's are skilled at a particular trade. This irony is exemplified on reality TV shows like Undercover Boss. On this show, a CEO or president of a large corporation goes undercover and works a menial job at their business. Often times, despite their multi-million dollar salaries and top positions, they struggle with assembling tacos or successfully dealing with customers.

In a sense, then, IQ doesn't really amount to much of anything. It's almost meaningless, then.

Regarding an ethnostate, if the United States was hypothetically fractured into smaller ethnic countries, people would still face the same issues that afflict all human beings: food, water, sewage, housing, an electrical grid, trade, law, crime, taxes, education, poverty, transportation, and finance. Plus, you would still have a wide spectrum of political ideologies. I just don't see an ethnostate as the panacea to life's problems. White people definitely don’t all think the same way, and I’m far from certain that there would be a clear majority way of thinking.

Human nature and human struggles have an inescapable, universal aspect about them. That does not mean, however, that nations and citizens should strive at all costs to erase borders and remove nations. Nations are the spice of life, and God's plan for mankind.

I’ve known far too many dumb white people, including ones with college degrees, to ever believe in inherent white supremacy. I’ve also known far too many smart Africans, Asians, and Latinos. Of course, this anecdotal evidence would be dismissed, but even when looking at average IQ’s across races you would still have to evaluate people at the individual level. 

One of the chief arguments from Allsup and others who push this race realism argument is that speaking about individual contacts is ultimately "anecdotal". Those statements do not make the point any less true. Widespread judgments about people based on their skin color, the shape of their eyes and heads, or other superficial genetic features does not add up under scrutiny.

When James brought up specific inventions of white people, they’re creations of individuals – not a collective. Claiming that on average certain races have more inventors than others doesn't seem to matter across an entire population. As Arthur started naming black inventors, James chuckled. At some point, judging which inventions matter and which ones don't would start getting subjective. Arthur said that differences between ethnic and racial groups have become more nebulous, but James stridently disagreed.

The very concept of race is falling apart with further research and discovery into human genomes and genetic findings. What is race, exactly? Certainly it matters, from a political perspective, but as the political and cultural differences become greater and wider among people with fundamentally the same skin color, it becomes clear that every person has too much diversity within himself to be lumped into any one group or race.

Arthur really nailed James when he asked him, “Do you think black people are stupid because they're black?” He never answered that question with a direct yes or no. Arthur noted that the founders of our country wrote that “all men are created equal.” James then quoted Thomas Jefferson who pondered future racial strife between blacks and whites in America. Arthur said that people often change their views as they receive more information.

Indeed, they have. At one time, Abraham Lincoln agreed with then Speaker of the House Henry Clay's repatration program, which would have freed all the black slaves then sent them back to Africa.

By the time the country was founded, however, these slaves were not African in any way. They have dark skin, and all of them were of African descent in some way, but they were Americans! Eventually, Abraham Lincoln formed a different set of views on the matter. Part of what makes America Great--and what we need to Keep America Great--is to hold onto the promise of the Founders and the natural laws on which this country is founded: that all men are equal, that anyone can come from another country and assimilate into the wonders and culture of the United States.

E Pluribus Unum is our nation's motto, after all.

By the way, James never answered my question: "Do you think that black people are stupid, and that they are stupid because they are black?"

Arthur then got to the crux of the matter. If James is an agnostic who doesn’t know whether or not God exists, there’s an irreconcilable difference in their worldviews. For a believer in the God of Christianity and Judaism, every person has been created in the image and likeness of God, meaning everyone has an intellect and a will. Each human being has intrinsic value. For the atheist or agnostic, human beings evolved from lesser creatures and are ultimately comprised of stardust and carbon that somehow came to life. It’s much easier to put down entire races of people if we’re all just some cosmic accident. They truly believe in the survival of the strongest and smartest.

This part of the debate was fundamental to me. Worldviews do matter, and the logical or illogical bases of a man's understanding will affect for better or for worse their appraisal of his fellow man, whatever his skin color may be.

Here's the final downfall of the debate for James:

By the end of the debate, I lost some respect for James Allsup. His good debate points were peppered with childish name calling that made him appear egotistical and smug.  Here’s a list of some of his insults:

• "Hold on, old man. I know it’s probably past your nap time."
• "Boomer"---I was born in 1980, so this Boomer talk simply gets funnier every time I hear it!
• "Stop crying. Stop whining, old man.” 
• "I'm trying to have a debate, and you're losing your mind sitting in your car."
• "How many lines of coke today, Arthur?" The only Coke I take in -- I drink.
• "You really can't be this f**king stupid." He was really losing at this point.
• "Vince, I'm disappointed in you guys. I didn't know that you and David just went out and found like homeless people and gave them a bunch of crack and like told them go and debate James Allsup. Jesus Christ."

After watching the debate in its entirety and digesting its content, I have to ultimately side with Arthur. 

At least one debate that went my way ... I guess.

I have no problem with people being proud of the accomplishments of their race or ethnic group. I grew up in a region that was nearly all white, but there was always a strong sense of ethnic identity tied to religion, food, language, and history. 

Culture, not color. Heritage, not hate.

I don't even have a problem with people wanting to live around people of their own race or wanting to marry within their race. When it comes to demonizing entire races of people by saying that their average IQ is too low to function in society, I have a problem with that. I also see more important ideals to strive for in life than racial pride and purity. Feel free to watch the debate here and to come to your own conclusion.

Final Reflection

All the data in the world to push one point of view does not amount to much when it's all based on fundamentally flawed premises. The definitions of race and the proper ways to define and measure intelligence as so varied and mired in controversy and challenges, that the very debate falls apart.

One part that I hammered at length on James Allsup was this simple question:

"Define an average African." I asked that question three times, but was smeared as "sperging out". He refused to answer that question, which goes back to my chief challenge with the whole argument. What is race? It's getting harder to define, and therefore to peg IQ with race is an every more slippery argument altogether.

Thanks for watching and sharing your views, Chad B!