The ever-enterprising Jamie Glazov, whose symposiums-by-correspondence are one of the great strengths of Front Page, (not just because they have noticed us in the past) posted one today to discuss Jared Taylor's definitive essay on the New Orleans disaster, Africa in our Midst: Lessons from Katrina.

Glazov defined his proposed subject carefully:

1) ...nobody else has reported these outrages in the comprehensive manner Taylor has and 2) many black leaders like Jesse Jackson have used the events surrounding Hurricane Katrina as an indictment of white people.

Jared Taylor is a white nationalist who has clearly rejected a multi-racial society. At the end of his report, he draws racist conclusions that we here at Frontpagemag.com find repugnant. At the same time, we are appalled that no other journalist or commentator has had the courage or the integrity to describe these horrific events without which the picture of this disaster — and the way we understand our responsibility as a nation — is not and cannot be complete.

Today Frontpagemag.com has assembled a distinguished panel to discuss what happened and why someone like Jared Taylor is singled out to be the messenger

The "distinguished panel" consisted of Carol Swain, the black Vanderbilt Professor (who actually is a real scholar, and who had the temerity to invite Peter Brimelow to speak at her Princeton Conference this year, for which she was brutally condemned.) Debra Dickerson, a black journalist, and Jennifer L. Hochschild and Marc Cooper, who manufacture ethnic propaganda from comfortable slots at Harvard University and the Nation (and LA Times) respectively.

The result is worth glancing at if only to appreciate the contrast betweeen the febrile, hysterical hatred which characterised three of the four participants and Taylor's considered, reasonable, and fact-based style.

Debra Dickerson, in fact, did a New Orleans Police Officer, and ran away. Glazov was obliged to say

It is Debra Dickerson’s turn in this second round, but unfortunately her schedule became very hectic and she regrets she could not find the time to continue

(Keep in mind this was a written exchange, and Dickerson's web site shows little sign of any work for several years.)

Cooper furiously objected to Jared Taylor being mentioned at all. Asserting that

If I would extract one grand lesson from the incidents of violence, whatever their real scope, it would be that these prove that blacks are pretty much like everyone else in the world

he berated FP

just what is the point that FP is so eager to make here? And what is so compelling about it that they would go to the extreme of quoting an avowed racial extremist to make that point?

so that Glazov was fully justified in his sad concluding remark:

Mr. Cooper...we are much dismayed by your inability to see past Jared Taylor and to effectively deal with the issues we have asked you to discuss.

Harvard Professor Hochschild displayed a similar commitment to free speech and open debate

Some parts of the essay are simply despicable and don’t warrant discussion

and although displaying some nascent neo conservative sensitivity to being mugged by reality

My one point of agreement with Mr. Taylor is that rapists and shooters should be held to account... Christian exhortations for humility ...notwithstanding...people who shoot at rescue helicopters should not be able to get away with it

she then defaulted back to the conventional left line:

It is the structure and dynamics of permitted inequality, not the relative degrees of evil of a given looter or political official, that we should focus on.

Carol Swain, who has concerned herself with studying the Radical Right was reasonably fair to Jared Taylor:

Although we are united in our condemnation of Jared Taylor, it is important to note that the New Century Foundation, an organization he heads, has recently published the second edition of a volume called The Color of Crime: Race, Crime, and Justice in America, where he uses FBI statistics to support his contentions that blacks are more criminal than other racial and ethnic groups. In the past, Taylor’s data have been reanalyzed by researchers who have not quibbled with his numbers... Because of his ability to reach a wide intellectual audience, we need to take him seriously by addressing his arguments about the unacceptable levels of crime within the black community

.

She added:

The diatribes of black leaders hurling accusations of white racism, while carefully avoiding any serious condemnation of the lawbreakers, were unfortunate because such predictable behavioral patterns merely serve to reinforce negative stereotypes about the group...

But in fact Carol Swain appears to have seen New Orleans primarily as a religious problem:

These horrid events highlight a critical need for people to be guided by moral and ethical principles such as those found in the Ten Commandments ... It is a spiritual poverty as much as a material poverty that explains the desperation of many black people and their failure to fully overcome the vestiges of the past...Black people need to rediscover their spiritual roots and their once deeply held belief in a living God that holds people accountable to a moral code of behavior.

This was hugely offensive to Hochschild and Cooper

Hochschild: I am not a Christian(email to hochschild@latte.harvard.edu)

Cooper: Finally, I don't share Ms. Swain's religious beliefs nor do I care much to focus worldly events through a biblical prism

Consequently they gave no consideration at all to her point of view.

After Jared Taylor is repressed, could Carol Swain be next?