Jerry Hough, a white Duke University professor shared some confounding theories on race relations, in particular how Black people should be more like Asian-Americans. His comments were triggered by a NY Times op-ed titled, “How Racism Doomed Baltimore,” which he vehemently disagreed with and was compelled to address.
In the comments section of the article, Hough, an 80 year old political science professor who has been at Duke for four decades, calls Baltimore’s mayor incompetent for “badly” handling the aftermath of Freddie Gray‘s death at the hands of city police. Then he goes into what Black people should be doing instead of feeling sorry for themselves.
He praised Asian-Americans for working doubly-hard to integrate into American society, before criticizing his African-American students for rejecting it – as evidenced by the ‘strange’ names they go by.
“Every Asian student has a very simple old American first name that symbolizes their desire for integration. Virtually every black has a strange new name that symbolizes their lack of desire for integration, ” he wrote.
The self-described disciple of Martin Luther King, Jr. goes on to say, “The amount of Asian-white dating is enormous and so surely will be the intermarriage. Black-white dating is almost non-existemt [sic] because of the ostracism by blacks of anyone who dates a white.”
School officials were incensed, especially since the commentary comes at a time when campus race relations are tense.”The comments were noxious, offensive and have no place in civil discourse,” stated a representative of the university’s public affairs and government relations office via email. However, the note also defended faculty’s right “to act and to speak in his or her capacity as a citizen without institutional censorship or discipline.”
In a statement to the Daily News, Hough expressed remorse for some of his language – mainly the usage of the word ‘every’ – but doesn’t back down from his stance. He’s not sorry one bit, only offering that his comments were misunderstood and not conveyed as well as intended.
“The point I was raising was why the Asians who were oppressed did so well and are integrating so well, and the blacks are not doing as well,” Hough told the News & Observer. “The comments have convinced me to write a book which will add the Asians to all the research I did on blacks.”
Read Hough’s complete response to the NY Times op-ed here:
“This editorial is what is wrong. The Democrats are an alliance of Westchester and Harlem, of Montgomery County and intercity Baltimore. Westchester and Montgomery get a Citigroup asset stimulus policy that triples the market. The blacks get a decline in wages after inflation.
But the blacks get symbolic recognition in an utterly incompetent mayor who handled this so badly from beginning to end that her resignation would be demanded if she were white.The blacks get awful editorials like this that tell them to feel sorry for themselves.
In 1965 the Asians were discriminated against as least as badly as blacks. That was reflected in the word “colored.” The racism against what even Eleanor Roosevelt called the yellow races was at least as bad.
So where are the editorials that say racism doomed the Asian-Americans. They didn’t feel sorry for themselves, but worked doubly hard.
I am a professor at Duke University. Every Asian student has a very simple old American first name that symbolizes their desire for integration. Virtually every black has a strange new name that symbolizes their lack of desire for integration. The amount of Asian-white dating is enormous and so surely will be the intermarriage. Black-white dating is almost non-existemt because of the ostracism by blacks of anyone who dates a white.
It was appropriate that a Chinese design won the competition for the Martin Luther King state. King helped them overcome. The blacks followed Malcolm X.”
– Colby Carrington