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John McWhorter & Jason Riley – The Affirmative Action Myth

John McWhorter & Jason Riley – The Affirmative Action Myth

The Glenn Show

May 16, 202547m 14s

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Show Notes

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Video Links

0:00 Intro

1:00 What is the “affirmative action myth”?

8:02 Black progress before and after affirmative action

11:41 Ground News ad

13:29 How far does Jason’s critique of affirmative action extend?

17:03 Contesting The Shape of the River

26:37 Respectability, responsibility, and upward mobility

32:40 Is Jason blaming the victims?

35:54 Jason: No one’s buying the reparations argument

43:26 How do figures like Ibram X. Kendi and Nikole Hannah-Jones end up at the center of progressive discourse?

Recorded May 7, 2025

Links and Readings

Jason’s new book, The Affirmative Action Myth: Why Blacks Don’t Need Racial Preferences to Succeed

Jason’s book, Please Stop Helping Us: How Liberals Make It Harder for Blacks to Succeed

Jason’s book, False Black Power

Jason’s book, Maverick: A Biography of Thomas Sowell

Derek Bok and William G. Bowen’s book, The Shape of the River: Long Term Consequences of Considering Race in College and University Admissions

Melissa Kearney’s book, The Two-Parent Privilege: How Americans Stopped Getting Married and Started Falling Behind

An Amos & Andy YouTube playlist

Julia pilot episode

Ta-Nehisi Coates’s Atlantic essay, “The Case for Reparations”

Ibram X. Kendi’s book, How to Be an Antiracist

The NYT’s 1619 Project

The Woodson Center’s 1776 Unites Project



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