Oui Monsieur, Tout Le Monde En Parle
So it was late, TSN had cut to commercial, I was pondering whether to head to bed, no I thought, I remembered that there was a wind storm in Montreal, my former home of some 8 years, so I surf over to Radio-Canada, the Telejournal was on. Great I'd catch up, I would see if the Big O blew over, I'd see how the Cokehead was doing vs. the Dragon Woman in the P.Q leadership race, I'd at least try to maintain some comprehension of la belle langue francais. There was a panel discussion, the anchor was talking to a leader of the Montreal Haitien community, and a council of First Nations leader. So at first I thought they must be gabbing about Michaelle Jean, the new Gov. General, boy was I wrong.
It seems that on the Radio-Canada talk show Tout Le Monde En Parle, one of Guy Lepage's guests was a relatively well known psychiatrist Pierre Mailloux, he has a radio show on CKAC, and he is like a guest psychologue on the hit Quebec reality show Loft Story. Anyway, the whole controversy, and the subject of this panel discussion was that Doc Mailloux had spouted racist and throughly outdated theories, concerning I.Q. and race. It seems that the good doctor, with studies in hand, old school shite like The Bell Curve et al. likes to believe that because of the artificiel selection due to slavery, Blacks and other minorities in America are disadvantaged intellectually.
The same old crap, so I on a quest for knowledge and vengence, scour the web, I read shite from the Aryanesque, white power, super race side, whom claim evidence of brain size and bell curve correlation to I.Q. scores across races and thus intelligence is genetic, and one race is thus intellectually superior to another....... I then in utter despear begin to read the more rational side of the argument, that state that I.Q. tests are quite often culturally biased, meant to test intelligence in the white middle class, and are not a true test of intelligence at all. Modern I.Q. testing has tried to systematically deal with racial and cultural bias, however, a child that was brought up in a house surrounded by books, and who recieves a good education, with well trained and ingaging teachers is undoubtable going to acheive higher marks on a standardized test then a child that has not been afforded the same intellectual advantages.
It would seem to me then that socio-economic factors and access to a high quality and ingaging education are the key to better I.Q. scores. Now, like Katrina in the US has shown there seems to be a disporportionate amount of Blacks that live in proverty when compared to whites and thus many black children may not recieve the same level of education, therefore when a crosscultural study on I.Q scores is done, it is almost certain that whites would recieve better scores. Now bigots and racists might have you believe that this may have something to do with the intelligence or drive or genetics or what have you of a certain race. This is crap, racism exists in North America and has marginalized Blacks, and Natives, forcing many to live in slums, and reserves, and this marginalization, and the socio-economic hardships that it has caused has a direct influence on the education, and crystallized knowledge that they might have acquired.
Therefore, Doc Mailloux, your argument all though perhaps statistically correct, are both scietifically erroenous, in relation to the genetics of intelligence, and socially insensitive. Instead of spouting nonsense about artificiel selection, and certain races being intellectually disadvantaged, why not address the bigger issues which are that Canada and the US are 2 of the wealthiest nations in the world, and yet we still seem to continually fail when dealing not only with poverty and a subpar education system, but to deal with the deep-seated racism that still exists in our culture.
Okay thats all I got, listen if through anything I have written I offended anyone I am sorry, I am not a psychologist, nor a sociologist, nothing I have said here can be claimed as absolute truths. I do not want to make it sound that all blacks or native people live in slums or reserves, or that they are all uneducated, or poor, I am simply trying to say that I believe that underlying socio-economic factors are more important to I.Q. scores then any genetic or race factor, again I am not an expert, I am just a guy with an opinion.
So it was late, TSN had cut to commercial, I was pondering whether to head to bed, no I thought, I remembered that there was a wind storm in Montreal, my former home of some 8 years, so I surf over to Radio-Canada, the Telejournal was on. Great I'd catch up, I would see if the Big O blew over, I'd see how the Cokehead was doing vs. the Dragon Woman in the P.Q leadership race, I'd at least try to maintain some comprehension of la belle langue francais. There was a panel discussion, the anchor was talking to a leader of the Montreal Haitien community, and a council of First Nations leader. So at first I thought they must be gabbing about Michaelle Jean, the new Gov. General, boy was I wrong.
It seems that on the Radio-Canada talk show Tout Le Monde En Parle, one of Guy Lepage's guests was a relatively well known psychiatrist Pierre Mailloux, he has a radio show on CKAC, and he is like a guest psychologue on the hit Quebec reality show Loft Story. Anyway, the whole controversy, and the subject of this panel discussion was that Doc Mailloux had spouted racist and throughly outdated theories, concerning I.Q. and race. It seems that the good doctor, with studies in hand, old school shite like The Bell Curve et al. likes to believe that because of the artificiel selection due to slavery, Blacks and other minorities in America are disadvantaged intellectually.
The same old crap, so I on a quest for knowledge and vengence, scour the web, I read shite from the Aryanesque, white power, super race side, whom claim evidence of brain size and bell curve correlation to I.Q. scores across races and thus intelligence is genetic, and one race is thus intellectually superior to another....... I then in utter despear begin to read the more rational side of the argument, that state that I.Q. tests are quite often culturally biased, meant to test intelligence in the white middle class, and are not a true test of intelligence at all. Modern I.Q. testing has tried to systematically deal with racial and cultural bias, however, a child that was brought up in a house surrounded by books, and who recieves a good education, with well trained and ingaging teachers is undoubtable going to acheive higher marks on a standardized test then a child that has not been afforded the same intellectual advantages.
It would seem to me then that socio-economic factors and access to a high quality and ingaging education are the key to better I.Q. scores. Now, like Katrina in the US has shown there seems to be a disporportionate amount of Blacks that live in proverty when compared to whites and thus many black children may not recieve the same level of education, therefore when a crosscultural study on I.Q scores is done, it is almost certain that whites would recieve better scores. Now bigots and racists might have you believe that this may have something to do with the intelligence or drive or genetics or what have you of a certain race. This is crap, racism exists in North America and has marginalized Blacks, and Natives, forcing many to live in slums, and reserves, and this marginalization, and the socio-economic hardships that it has caused has a direct influence on the education, and crystallized knowledge that they might have acquired.
Therefore, Doc Mailloux, your argument all though perhaps statistically correct, are both scietifically erroenous, in relation to the genetics of intelligence, and socially insensitive. Instead of spouting nonsense about artificiel selection, and certain races being intellectually disadvantaged, why not address the bigger issues which are that Canada and the US are 2 of the wealthiest nations in the world, and yet we still seem to continually fail when dealing not only with poverty and a subpar education system, but to deal with the deep-seated racism that still exists in our culture.
Okay thats all I got, listen if through anything I have written I offended anyone I am sorry, I am not a psychologist, nor a sociologist, nothing I have said here can be claimed as absolute truths. I do not want to make it sound that all blacks or native people live in slums or reserves, or that they are all uneducated, or poor, I am simply trying to say that I believe that underlying socio-economic factors are more important to I.Q. scores then any genetic or race factor, again I am not an expert, I am just a guy with an opinion.
posted by Joseph at 10:13 a.m.
2 Comments:
Joe I did a project last year based on socioeconomic status and education. Anyone who does not acknowledge the affect that socioeconomic status has on the minority population in North America is completely closed minded and uninformed. The statistics he may be offering are incomplete and "scientifically" inadequate if they don't account for variables. I think they taught us that in junior high. I think some of my students at my school would understand that one!
ya the good doc is totally off base, and spouting a whole lot of crud, which if you were to look at from a broader prospective, like socio-economic and educational oppurtunities, then the bell curve, and I.Q test scores are not truely indicative of intelligence, at least not along racial or cultural lines.
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