JENSEN AND THE FADING LIBERAL DOGMA OF EQUALITY
Meyer, John C.
J e n s e n a n d t h e F a d i n g L i b e r a l D o g m a o f E q u a l i t y by John C. Meyer John C. Meyer, son of Frank S. Meyer has contributed to numerous scholarly journals. This is...
...W h e n I was a freshman in the Yale class of 1963, I used to argue with certain self-assured Liberals that racial equality was not scientifically established, but then I would argue anything with a Liberal...
...Because we were collectivists we had to look at it as a question of the welfare of groups rather than of governmental and individual actions which were either right or wrong, advisable or inadvisable...
...Thus the appearance of Arthur R. Jensen's article, " H o w M u c h Can W e Boost IQ and Scholastic Achievement...
...But I also know that some office holders in this county are beholden to Indiana University, and the university environment is not enhanced by certain kinds of publicity...
...Thus to 'the morality of immorality, as manifested in our churches and our media, we add the culture of barbarism, as it is manifested in our theatres and our streets...
...Jensen's most basic conclusion is that "heritability" of intelligence, as measured by I. Q. scores, is .80...
...His camel spits in his face . . . Benjamin Spock's dishwasher breaks down...
...Brewer, but ascribes his defeat to outside agitators . . John Isenbarger signs a pro contract for $200,000 with the Cleveland Browns . . . Spiro Agnew receives the Peabody Award for "constructive criticism of the television industry" . . . Sen...
...in the Winter 1969 issue of the Harvard Educational Review was a shock to the Liberal community...
...FERRY (Continued from Page 11) small town in South Carolina . . . M a o drowns in his bathtub . . . Justice Douglas' next wife is b o m on top of a mountain . . . Senator Eastland is once again given $50,000 not to grow anything on his two acres in Mississippi . . . Nasser says, " W e will drive the Israelis into the sea...
...The former are tortured with unjustified guilt bcause they are on top...
...Hence it is now acknowledged (though it was known for some time before) that scientifically speaking, one person is at birth not the equal of another in ability...
...Furthermore, there is an intellectual "domino effect" involving the other two cardinal Liberal tenets, collectivism and utopianism, in the collapse precipitated by the destruction of the scientific basis of Liberal egalitarianism...
...It is an open question whether the egalitarian ethic has done more harm to those who are above average or to those who are below average in intelligence...
...It is an index of the present plight of our society that I would probably never even have heard of this article if it had not created a sensation by saying something about race...
...Since then I have gradually changed m y opinion with regard to the pos(Continued on Page 13) I have always accorded enormous respect to anyone holding high public office, especially in Monroe County...
...N o w they have made it available, along with seven answering articles to serve as an antidote, in a soft-cover book (Environment, Heredity, and Intelligence, Harvard Educational Review, reprint series No...
...W h y ? Because w e were Utopians w e had to "solve" the "problem...
...He says that those who fail to reach the average are actually superior, and that those who are successful should not help them but need help from them and should learn from them and be ruled by them...
...August: It is a hot summer, especially in the crowded slums . . . Rev...
...At this impasse the radical comes on the scene with his cure for the ills of Liberal society...
...I as a conservative have always opposed the whole process as outside the function of the state and doomed to ultimate failure like other attempts to legislate morality against strong social resistance...
...Thus, while extremes of environmental deprivation can radically change an individual's intelligence, his basic potential is largely determined by genetic factors internal and specific to the individual, not by external factors...
...Another closely related truth reaffirmed scientifically by Jensen is that socio-economic status, or in nonsociological terminology, class, does correlate positively (.35 to .4D) with I. Q. Furthermore, Jensen shows that most of this correlation is genetic, and not a result of a more favorable environment in the higher class home...
...H o w did we get into such a state...
...the latter are told they can do what they cannot do and denied satisfaction in what they can do...
...Because we were egalitarians, we had to set an inherently impossible goal — to make all the "disadvantaged" at least average...
...he accuses the government of harassment . . . "Jumbo Jim" Garrison confidently announces that he has solved President Kennedy's assassination, and arrests thirty-two more innocent people...
...I really didn't care...
...Berry has had a very difficult time getting his investigation started, at least we have not heard from him...
...D MEYER (Continued from Page 10) sible size of the difference, so I was not surprised to find that Jensen speaks of a difference of about 15 I. Q. points (1 standard deviation...
...Still it is even worse, for example, to try to impose an 1 1 % quota for Yale admissions if 1 1 % of those potentially qualified do not fall in the group getting the quota, than if they do...
...This is his first of what we hope will be many appearances in The Alternative...
...J e n s e n a n d t h e F a d i n g L i b e r a l D o g m a o f E q u a l i t y by John C. Meyer John C. Meyer, son of Frank S. Meyer has contributed to numerous scholarly journals...
...W e have had five Civil Rights Acts, dozens of Supreme Court decisions, hundreds of state laws and local ordinances, thousands of speeches and demonstrations, millions of people working, and billions of Federal dollars spent to get us where we are now...
...It is a paradox that the egalitarian society can thus be particularly painful psychologically for the person of limited abilities...
...after all the same principle of treating each individual on his o w n merits applied anyway and furthermore, I did not believe the difference, if it did exist, was of any great consequence...
...Ralph Abemathy calls the heat "an obvious sign of institutionalized white racism" . . . Britain is finally allowed to join the C o m m o n Market . . . John Mitchell, stung by his ex-wife's criticism, resigns as Attorney General, and is succeeded by former Newark mayor Hugh Addonizio, who appoints Mario (T-Balls) Proscumanio as chief assistant . . . Britain quits the C o m m o n Market when the delegates refuse to adjourn for tea at 4 o'clock . . . Andy Warhol's new movie, consisting of a blank screen and the sound of a man snoring for four hours, is hailed by many critics as "the ultimate viewing experience" . . . Bill Buckley gets his black belt in judo, and becomes a professional wrestler under the stage name "The Gorgeous Syllogism" . . . The Women's Liberation Front, picketing the Miss America contest (which is won by Miss Mississippi for the twelfth year in a row), strip to the waist in a gesture of protest . . . N o one notices...
...The great strength of the genetic component of intelligence also strongly supports the concept of a basically conPage 10 stant, as opposed to an infinitely plastic human nature...
...Thus science comes to the support of the proposition that an individual is irreducibly more than the sum of the environmental influences acting on hipi...
...civilization, are wrong in their entirety...
...George M c G o v e m charges that "thanks to the militaryindustrialcomplex, millions of infants go to bed hungry at night" . . . Edward Kennedy attacks the Nixon Administration's "stubbornness" at the S A L T talks in Helsinki . . . Barry Goldwater attacks the Nixon administration's "policy of appeasement" in Helsinki . . . Robert Welch attacks Edward Kennedy, Barry Goldwater, and Richard Nixon for being "unwitting tools of the international communist conspiracy" . . . Mrs...
...And I a m certain Mr...
...This means that hereditary factors have four times as much influence on the average I. Q. of any sizeable group exposed to a normal range of environment as do environmental factors...
...As a matter of fact, much of the environmental factor includes prenatal environment and infant nutrition...
...September: As the football season begins, President Nixon resigns from the Presidency to become Chris Schenckel's sidekick on the " N C A A game of the week" . . . Vice-President Agnew, rather than become President, resigns to replace David Brinkley as anchor man on the N B C evening news, and becomes a liberal . . . President John McCormack, in his first action after becoming President, raises Social Security benefits . . . Walter McCracken announces that "the fight Page 13...
...And so it seems we shall all live quietly ever after...
...July: H E W discovers that if a duck drinks sixteen bottles of shampoo a day he (or she) will become violently ill, and bans shampoo from the market . . . A Black Panther shoots at a policeman, the policeman shoots back, and the Panther is wounded . . . Panther lawyer Robert Gerry charges "police harassment of the most flagrant sort" . . . George Wallace loses in the primary to Lt...
...H e says "middle-class values," i.e...
...Thus Mr...
...They did not persist in this anti-free speech position for long...
...Berry is a worthy prosecutor...
...It is only because of collectivism that the question of racial intelligence ever became a political issue...
...Nor have we seen his report...
...2, available for $4.95 from Harvard Educational Review at Longfellow Hall, 13 Appian Way, Cambridge, Mass...
...The dogma of equality (not to be confused with the belief that all m e n are equal in the sight of God or the belief that all are entitled to equal legal rights) is the keystone of the Liberal ideology...
...He does not reject the Liberal premise, egalitarianism, but the reality with which it conflicts...
...As rejection phenomena in transplants show, each individual •— with the exception of identical twins — is genetically unique...
...Without a belief in such plasticity of human nature, the lure of Utopia would lose its credibility, and many Utopian schemes which are now adopted, or at least seriously considered, would be rejected out of hand...
...John Mitchell (divorced) calls Robert Welch "a cryptoliberal" The Presidential Commission on the Causes and Prevention of Sex condemns "the institutionalized sex of American society...
...There is nothing more individual than one's genetic inheritance...
...if we are going to try to uproot "discrimination" as presently defined, we will be forced to deal in racial intelligence...
...Such was the outrage that for a time the Harvard Educational Review refused to send interested people reprints of this article...
...Then he proceeds to a complete inversion of the whole hierarchy of values, and of abilities...
...Good night Chet...
Vol. 3 • February 1970 • No. 4
