Of Knuckleheads and Political Prisoners

“When your children are dying, you don’t worry about what the neighbors think. When the whole future of a race is jeopardized by self-destructive fads, you put public relations on the back burner.”

Anyone who has taught black, white, and Asian students will know that they do not work equally. Studies show it but you don’t need studies. Just go into a university library on a Saturday night and see who is there and who is not there.”

Thomas Sowell in “Bravo for Bill Cosby” (capmag.com)

I love it when the news gives me another example of a principle that I want to figure out for myself. The first example I wrote about was the John Bolton nomination in “The Problem with Bolton” on April 22, 2005. In that piece I claimed that “The truth is such a rare commodity in our political world that when we hear “it” we are stunned into a kind of silent horror as our minds grapple with the unexpected words and try to make sense of them.”

Now I can say that the truth is such a rare commodity among the people as well. Actually there are two examples very much related. The first is Bill Cosby’s indictment of our black youth when he stated: “Everybody knows it’s important to speak English except these knuckleheads.” The second example is his indictment of people who referred to “the incarcerated” as “political prisoners”.

The “knuckleheads” are young blacks who are not taught to value an education. What they value are rap “music”, baggy pants and the “cool attitude”. But then these same knuckleheads and their parents and teachers and community leaders then cry that they are discriminated against when they can’t get into college or find good jobs. This is why Asians outperform even whites in school – they DO value education and their parents are there with a “big stick” if they don’t study. It’s really very simple. Strong parents who keep their kids off the streets and their noses in books produce educated young adults who go on to successful and fulfilling lives.

The online dictionary defines knucklehead as “a stupid person; a blockhead”. So what’s the big uproar about Bill Cosby’s choice of words? If you don’t know math, American History, the beauty of the Sistine Chapel or where Colombia is then maybe you are a knucklehead. Why try to hide the fact that whole generations of kids are being sent into the world with very little knowledge in their heads?

Again, as with John Bolton, you have another person, Bill Cosby, who speaks the truth without obfuscation and certain types get in a tizzy. As the old saying goes - the truth will set you free…and more than that it will perhaps wake you up to the reality confronting you: Blacks, whites or Asians will only achieve poverty if they do not take their education seriously and consequently they just might end up as “political prisoners”.

As the 20th century philosopher and novelist, Ayn Rand wrote:

“Truth is the recognition of reality; reason, man’s only means of knowledge, is his only standard of truth.”

If our knucklehead youths and their parents do not face the truth, what they are not facing is reality…. and reality always wins in the long run.