I want to start by saying, I haven’t read through this book. I believe it to be more worthwhile to establish the viewpoint of this one of Jason Riley’s books for my dialogue with this group, and to lay out and evaluate the ideological foundation of it, than it is to have processed every thought that’s within it before using it as a reference point. So I’ll give a disclaimer – there may and I’m sure there are progressions of thought or perspectives in it that I don’t agree with, and would silently refute while reading through it if I were to, or would decry if asked about them, but my reference to the book is of the overarching argument Jason Riley is making with it. In my review of the book’s substance and the author’s intellectual framework, I’ve read summaries of it, skimmed excerpts from it, and watched talks the author gave about the book. Please Stop Helping Us presents an argument for an approach to the flourishing/development of the black community, that centers around the estab...
I'll self-depricate by pointing out the irony of my titling this essay “Black and White Matters”, being that the overarching point I’m making about these topics is that the substance of them is far from black and white. I have a variety of thoughts about this, some of which may contradict each other I’m sure. I’ll start by describing my background. I’m the oldest of three, in a family with a father from South Florida, who went to UPenn on a football scholarship and spent 20 years at the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office as a patent analyst; and a mother from a tight-knit matriarchal family who grew up in West Philadelphia, was the first in her extended family to go into the professional services, and went to Swarthmore College before going to law school in D.C. and began her legal career as an employee benefits attorney. I’m “black” or African-American, whichever description used hasn’t been of significant practical importance to me, and in many ways the heritage hasn't als...