Word: kilson
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Exchanges about Jackson's experience follow a predictable enough pattern. Now, according to this ritual, it is time for someone to argue that the real racist would spare Jackson's record the scrutiny it would receive were he white. This might trump Kilson's trump, countering his slander with another slander...
Charges of racism are blunt political instruments that shut down discussion and crush understanding. In the debate Kilson would have, the winner is whoever invokes the most stunning cloture...
Joseph makes a by-now standard case against Jackson. His view is less troubling to one favorably disposed toward Jackson's candidacy than Kilson's response. The professor's letter contributes not at all to any debate in which standards for those who would hold high elective office might be formed...
...professor takes pains to point out that Joseph's views betray "neo-racism," which "is essentially different from old-racism." In Kilson's full explanation, "neo-racism" is "a twisted-neurotic racist virus abroad among some white students--mainly white-ethnic newcomers to the middle classes--and while this neo-racism is essentially different from old-racism, it must be met and fought head-on, and the pressure must be kept on college administrations across the country...
What--any professor might ask if Kilson's letter were a student's paper--does this cryptic sentence mean? Calling neo-racism a twisted-neurotic virus, while vivid, leaves the term undefined. Its essential difference from old-racism evidently has to do with those who propound it, namely "white-ethnic newcomers to the middle class." Could the reference be to Jews (like Joseph) and Catholics (like...