I am a 45-year-old black man. I want to commend The Daily Tar Heel for running the David Horowitz column. I have followed Horowitz's writing before he ever got involved with the reparations issue. I have studied closely his remarks on reparations, not only his ad but subsequent remarks on television and on college campuses. His remarks are not racist.
As a black man, I have experienced racism -- so I know what it is. I do not hesitate to confront it (provided it's not more profitable to sidestep it) when I meet it. But there is something far worse than racism going on. That is the cravenly, knee-jerk reaction of college students to issues they don't like. Issues they obviously haven't even taken the time to study thoroughly.
If Horowitz is wrong, it should not take a great deal of effort to expose him. This could easily be done. Students are in college to learn, and this could be a great learning experience on how to dismantle a defective argument, if indeed it is defective. They have all the resources they need right where they are to assail any false argument.
But we do not seem to have real students. We do not seem to have people who want to learn. What we do seem to have is a bunch of conformist, rigid, unimaginative drones who want to make others do what they want or stop them from being heard. This generation scares me. They are too weak-minded to deal with reality.
Every time they don't like something, they march with a list of demands.
Who the hell do they think they are? What we see is a bunch of spoiled brats, and if the head of UNC had any backbone he'd tell them to get out of his face until such time as they learned how to present themselves in a more dignified manner.
Black people of years past put in a lot of pain, blood, sweat and tears to attain what we have now. It's not perfect, but it is certainly better. Is this all we have to show for it, a generation of spoiled, easily offended brats who'd rather coerce than think? It is very, very pathetic.
Bruce Newman
