Opinion
DIG ANO
Dry Bones MR HIS SHUL
006 000131E
Editorials are posted and archived on JNonline.us .
ISRAEL
INDEPENDENCE
DAY!
Editorial
SURROUNDED BY
ENEMIES, BOMBED BY
TERRORISTS, THREAT-
ENED BY DICTATORS,
AND YET. .
Voicing Outrage At Darfur
T
. he tragedy of Darfur has
been slow to make an
impression on America.
It is, for one thing, in a remote
part of the world and involves
people that few of us know much
about. Cutbacks in interna-
tional coverage by network news
organizations and all but a few
newspapers also have cast these
events in shadow.
But the full magnitude of this
murderous frenzy is becoming
apparent.
Jewish delegations from
Detroit and other cities will travel
to Washington this Sunday, April
30, to join a coalition holding a
march and demonstration urging
intervention in Darfur. A signifi-
cant Jewish presence is appropri-
ate because what is happening
there is clearly genocide.
Groups of Arab militias, the
Janjaweed, are deliberately driv-
ing blacks from the western part
of Sudan off their land through
a government-sanctioned cam-
paign of murder and rape. An
estimated 2.2 million people have
either been killed or displaced.
The militias are Muslim and
so are most of their victims,
although some are Christian or
animists. There is also a com-
plicated interplay of tribal loyal-
ties and political grievances at
work. But the decisive factor in
this slaughter appears to be race
— Arabs killing blacks.
Almost two years ago, the
United Nations Security Council
passed a resolution demanding
that the Sudanese government
disarm the militias. It has been
ignored in Khartoum, which
piously denies it has any connec-
tion with the Janjaweed. Sudan,
incredibly, continues to hold a
seat on the U.N.'s Human Rights
Commission. •
Now the terror campaign has
spilled across the border into
neighboring Chad, with the mili-
tias going after refugees in camps
established in that country and
threatening to destabilize Chad's
government.
Many regimes with blood on
their own hands are hesitant
to approve U.N. military action
against crimes that occur within
a nation's sovereign territory.
They no longer can use that as an
excuse. This is now an interna-
tional calamity.
Unlike other global flashpoints
involving Muslims, this has little
to do with religion. Blacks are
being targeted regardless of reli-
gious belief.
Australian anthropologist
Roger Sandall, who reports on
Darfur on his Web site, says that
Arab raiders taunt their victims
with cries of "Slaves, run! Leave
the country. You don't belong;
why are you not leaving this area
for the Arab cattle to graze?"
Sandall writes that Sudan
was a flourishing center of the
Arab-led slave trade for hun-
dreds of years and such attitudes
toward black Africans continue
to animate the Janjaweed. Maybe
Nation of Islam leaders in this
country such as Minister Louis
Farrakhan, who claim that Islam
is the most tolerant of religions
toward black people, can explain
that.
The United Nations should
have the decency to honor its
own resolution and act while
there may yet be an opportunity
.to halt a greater disaster. It's past
time for the voices of protest to
be heard. ❑
ness organization and
political candidate in
the state opposes it.
But racial preferences
are such an inflam-
matory issue that
the MCRI still might
carry in Noyember if
the campaign were
based solely on that.
So, while its oppo-
nents say the initia-
tive would bean impediment to
diversity, they prefer to talk about
gender instead. They.argue that
it would also be used to end all
preferences for women.
Gender disparities do exist,
and they continue to hang on
even after years of affirmative
action program s designed to
fight bias and attract women.
But if affirmative action ended
tomorrow, I cannot imagine
a scenario in which women
would stop entering fields such
as medicine and law. Too much
positive momentum,
too many role models
have been created
over the last 40 years
to turn the clock
back. And who would
want to?
Among the lead-
ing advocates of
the MCRI, in fact,
is Jennifer Gratz, a
woman who feels
she was denied admission to the
University of Michigan in favor
of a far less qualified minority. I
guess she just doesn't understand
the issue.
Affirmative action cannot fix
every disparity. It is not the all-
purpose remedy. There are many
reasons other than bias why race
and gender stubbornly refuse
to disperse themselves evenly
across all fields of endeavor.
All things are never equal.
There are strong ethnic predis-
positions. Many women make
career choices based on family
considerations, and the special
demands of science and engi-
neering require that one's best
work is done in the prime child-
bearing years.
But as Summers found out,
none of this is admissible evi-
dence. A strong set of taboos has
attached itself to these programs.
Affirmative action has accom-
plished good things. But the real
issue here is not gender. It is quo-
tas, and it does no good to wave
off that question and change
the subject simply by repeating
that quotas are illegal; as if that
settled the matter.
The voters know otherwise
and smug condescension is not
going to work. The campaigners
against the MCRI better realize
that before it's too late. El
BUT SINCE "THE •
NATIONS" ALL
HAVE THEIR
EYES TIGHTLY •
CLOSED.
THE BRAVE LITTLE
DEMOCRACY REMAINS
A "LIGHT UNTO THE
NATIONS"
www.drybonesblog.com
E-mail letters of no more than 150
Words to: letters@thejewishnews.
com.
Reality Check
Gender Politics
T
he president of Harvard
University, Lawrence
Summers, recently
turned in his resignation after
running afoul of the school's
Liberal Arts faculty.
At a private conference last
year, he pondered aloud about
why so few women go into
math, science and engineering
programs. He wondered if differ-
ing abilities in abstract thought
could explain some of this phe-
nomenon and suggested it would
be a good subject for a formal •
study.
He didn't say that was the
answer, mind you. Merely that
in the spirit of free academic
inquiry such a study might turn
out to be informative.
Well, that tore it. No amount
of apologies could atone for
his even raising the question.
Although Harvard's professional
school faculties and the student
newspaper supported the former
Clinton Administration official,
Summers was toast.
It is a matter of unquestioned
faith on the feminist left that
discrimination is the only expla-
nation for disparities between
the percentage of women in
a population and their repre-
sentation in any given field.
Suggesting that other factors
may be at work is regarded as a
form of bigotry.
The issue is relevant to this
area because the turf on which
opponents of the Michigan Civil
Rights Initiative (MCRI) will
take their stand appears to be
opportunities for women. The
MCRI will be on the state ballot
this fall and would ban all prefer-
ences in hiring, promotions and
admissions in Michigan public
institutions.
Its primary intent is to dis-
allow race-based affirmative
action. Almost every newspaper,
religious group, civic and busi-
_
George Cantor's e-mail address is
gcantor614@aol.com.
April 27 • 2006
29