Race Inquiry Digest (March 29) – Important Current Stories On Race In America

Feature – Why are white men stockpiling guns? According to a growing number of scientific studies, the kind of man who stockpiles weapons or applies for a concealed-carry license meets a very specific profile. These are men who are anxious about their ability to protect their families, insecure about their place in the job market, and beset by racial fears. Taken together, these studies describe a population that is struggling to find a new story — one in which they are once again the heroes. Read more 

Lynching in America: Targeting Black Veterans. A Report by the Equal Justice Initiative. The end of the Civil War marked a new era of racial terror and violence. No one was more at risk of experiencing violence and targeted racial terror than black veterans who had proven their valor and courage as soldiers during the Civil War, World War I, and World War II. Because of their military service, black veterans were seen as a particular threat to Jim Crow and racial subordination. Read more 
Asians are being used to make the case against affirmative action. Again. The Department of Justice (DOJ) recently dug up a two-year-old complaint against Harvard University that alleges the school has quotas on how many Asian Americans it accepts. It has opened an investigation into Harvard’s admissions practices, which could create a chilling effect on other schools with affirmative action programs. Read more 
Race still trumps class for black Americans. A new study shows shocking inequality persists for black men and women despite their social background. The evidence from the study makes clear that being upper class does not protect black children from a future of precariousness. Read more 

White Supremacist Men See White Manhood Under Siege. All these men are motivated by the desire to defend the myth of a country ‘created by and for’ white men like them, which they believe is fading into the rearview mirror of history. Read more 

Sam Harris, Charles Murray, and the allure of race science. Harris’s conversation with Murray was titled, tantalizingly, “Forbidden Knowledge,” and in it, Harris sought to rehabilitate the conversation over race and IQ as well as open a larger debate about what can and cannot be said in today’s America. This is not “forbidden knowledge.” It is America’s most ancient justification for bigotry and racial inequality. Read more 

Racial segregation doesn’t just belong to the South. It belongs to all of us. Linda Brown, the central figure in the 1954 Supreme Court ruling that ended segregation in U.S. public schools passed away Monday in Topeka, Kan.. Read more 

50 Years After Dr. King’s Death, New Lessons for Today. The National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis is a monument to a movement, and to its leader. It offers crucial insights for 2018, and for the future. Read more 

2020 Census Will Ask Black People About Their Exact Origins. The change means many black people in the U.S. may have to take a closer look at their family trees to answer what can be a thorny question: Where are you really from? While many black immigrants can cite ties to a specific country, that question is difficult, if not impossible, for many U.S.-born African-Americans to answer. Read more 

NAACP lawsuit seeks to prevent undercount of minority communities. The lawsuit, whose lead counsel is the Yale Law School Rule of Law Clinic, charges that the bureau’s plan to use digital technology for the count for the first time while canceling field tests due to funding shortages, will result in “a massive undercount of communities of color.” Read more 

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