McWhorter: Diversity is nice, but it cannot be weighted above competence. The diversity rationale was created as a kind of fig leaf. Basically, I think we can sacrifice diversity, which is a rather weak concept anyway, because we have a very selective sense of what kind of diversity we want.
REASON: Doesn't it worry you that if elite schools stop picking by race, there would be a large decline in the number of black students attending those institutions?
McWhorter: If all schools quit using race as an admissions criterion, there would be a bleak 10 years where there would not be as many black kids on elite campuses as we might like. There would still be a good number, though. It's not as if black students are so utterly, uniformly awful that Harvard could not find any black students for its freshman class. Yes, the numbers will fall. But during that 10 years, word would get out in the black community and in the education community that black kids have to do as well as everybody else. Black people have shown that they can rise to any obstacle. We're not allowed to rise to any obstacle when it comes to academics. We're always given these lowered bars.
REASON: What about the argument that if you repeal racial preferences there will be an even greater dilution of standards as college administrators push to eliminate SAT scores and admit everyone from the top 10 percent of high schools?
McWhorter: It's very troubling, and it's going to happen. Admitting every student in the top 4 percent or top 10 percent or whatever is not an ideal policy. But at least you would have a situation where every black kid on campus can say they are on campus because they were the best among the people with whom they went to school. The SAT is a valid, if partial, measure of a person's preparation for a school.
If Berkeley and the University of California abolish the SAT, I would resign. It's so clear that the only reason UC President Richard Atkinson even proposed the idea is because he can't bear to see minority students actually challenged to do as well as everyone else.
REASON: You have taken advantage of affirmative action in your career, from fellowships to job offers. Why criticize it now?
McWhorter: There was a juncture in my life where I did use affirmative action to get a postdoctoral fellowship that got my foot in the door at Berkeley. It was a decision I made at a time when I was much less politicized than I am now. You evolve as time goes by. It was also a time when my back was up against a wall because of a very narrow job market. I look back on it and I realize that it diminishes my sense of accomplishment. I defend my right to question the policy after having gone through it. The "pulling in the ladder" argument is actually a rather nihilistic one, because any black person who got anywhere in life has been affected by affirmative action.
REASON: What changes have you noticed at Berkeley since racial preferences were abolished throughout the UC system in 1996?
McWhorter: The black kids are just as qualified -- or sometimes, unqualified -- as the white and Asian students. They are exactly the same. There is no longer a two-caste system at Berkeley, where the black and Latino students are obviously of lower preparation and lower caliber than the white and the Asian students.
REASON: You write a lot about how some African Americans are "culturally black," and others are not. What does it mean to be culturally black?
McWhorter: One, your speech reflects the conglomeration of traits linguists call black English. At the very least, you could be identified as black over the phone. Two, devout Christianity is central to black culture. Three, you sense residual racism as an obstacle to advancement. Today, that is a keystone to having what is a proper "black" identity.
REASON: You report problems with culturally black students regardless of their class and family background. What is your experience with black students who are culturally white?
McWhorter: Black students who are culturally white generally do not have the kind of disconnect from learning that I see in other blacks. Black students who are culturally black yet who are sailing through school are almost invariably people with Caribbean or African parents.
REASON: You've largely been rejected by black academics and intellectuals. The novelist Ishmael Reed, who also teaches at Berkeley, has even called you a "rent-a-black." You've been embraced by the conservative establishment. What's your reaction to that?
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