7:50 in and squirming....

Muggers in poor black neighborhoods targeting white people probably has less to do with them thinking white people are more vulnerable and more to do with them thinking white people have more money or valuables on them.

Good to see you, Brian! Glad you are doing so well!

I just had a conversation about "scared white people" and was particularly interested in this conversation. I am Hispanic. I went to a predominantly black high school in New York City. My college and post-graduate social circles have been mostly white. Being ethnically ambiguous I've been able to see both ends of the 'scared white person psychology'. I've walked around black neighborhoods with white friends and have been the scared white person. In high-school, I remember, walking around the city with my group of black friends and sensing the hesitation in the part of whites as we approached - and my black friends sensed it too. Actually, they were amused by it. Even the gentlest of my black friends derived pleasure out of freaking out the white guy..... and even played it up. I've always wondered what affect this had them.... My experience going to school in the "inner city" was a bit unsettling. I am fully aware that many more elements play in each of our developments than I could ever describe.... but this the narrative I've given myself in order to make sense of everything. Even back then, I recall sensing how my friend's pleasure in

Who's more afraid?
The blacks who can't walk outside without a weapon, or the whites who are weary of such petty beings. As Brain said, "Really guys? Really, joking right?", almost a moment of comedic refrain when faced with a gun. Same conversation over and over.

Thanks for that essay, sealrock. Very thought-provoking.

Great vlog. The hurdle in discussing urban gun crime, in my opinion, is that none of the competing narratives get it right. On the one hand, the NRA's 'armed society is a polite society' meme doesn't have much to say to a story like Brian's. And on the other, it's hard to imagine that Brian's going to a middle school to humanize the victims of gun crime is going to really make a dent because the reality is that it's not a lack of humanity that causes situations like that. No amount of nurturing or community meetings or church attendance is going to change the dynamics of gang life. The drug trade funds it and gives it a reason for existing. Everything we do short of drying up the money has definitively shown itself to be futile. Even those kids who don't join up are still going to feel the need to arm themselves, which means that even more handguns are floating around at parties and in the jackets of young people. Anyway, at the risk of sounding dumb for bringing in our 'Black President', I am

Great post SR! I would love to see a diavlog with TNC and Glenn Lowry about this topic in particular. IE- how to make white people less scared, and black youth less eager to play into that fear. Excellent diavlog. Welcome, Brian. Please come back to Bloggingheads again. You don't even have to get shot this time. And Ta-Nehisi is the man. Any dude who can blog about politics, race-relations and Ric Flair, is fine by me.

Good diavlog - I prefer TNC more as 'head' than as a blogger. (Waaaay too much football chatter on his blog. Really, the only thing worth reading at the Atlantic's website - as opposed to the print magazine, which is still superb - is James Fallows' blog.) And call me a cynic, but I do think that Brian Beutler is fooling himself if he thinks that giving talks in Middle Schools is going to have any effect. Cultural habits are waaaaay to ingrained for a little talk to be efficacious. I mean, when I was growing up, every year we had lessons on the dangers of smoking. Now excuse me as I go outside for a Pall Mall Light.

I'm a 6' 3" 38-year-old white guy, living in Central Harlem for 5+ years. I've never been mugged or even confronted directly. I do wonder if my good luck has something to do with my size and my game face and my affected confidence walking down the street like I belong there. I worry for the other white people I see on the sidewalks, who lack these qualities. The blonde girl staring at her ipod instead of straight ahead. The hipster kid in flipflops and a silly t-shirt. The hottie in tights giggling on her cell phone. One day my neighbor, white, female, 30ish, cute - was walking her chihuahua at 3AM near the corner of my block and Lenox Ave. Two black girls on the opposite side of the street started talking smack. The white girl tried to ignore them and started walking home, when suddenly a beer bottle crashed into her face breaking her nose. Turned out the girls lived a block away, my neighbor had to ID the girls and they went to jail for a while. My neighbor had to move out because, as she saw it, this was their neighborhood, and they'd be back. She lives downtown now.

Thanks for the warm welcome everybody. And just for the record, nikkibong, my motivation for doing something like motivational speaking is not to change any systemic problems kids face, but to teach, and learn, and possibly make a difference in peoples' lives, even if only a few of them (though possibly I didn't make that clear when speaking about it extemporaneously). Cheers!

Quoting uncle ebeneezer: And Ta-Nehisi is the man. Any dude who can blog about politics, race-relations and Ric Flair, is fine by me.

Yeah, but he lost serious nerd points for not knowing about that xkcd cartoon. I mean, dude.

I'm going to pass on this one. I've been mugged, beat up, but not shot, and while it was a long time ago, I'm not over it. Those asshole white hipsters in hoodies? Don't be fooled. You gotta watch out for them. As for race and crime, way back when I read the UN Human Development Report. The USA is usually ranked tenth or so on the UNDP index, but there was one year where they broke out the stats for white America (#1) and black America (#31). The Bureau of Justice stats aren't pretty either. I'm not sure what to do with this info. You have to address this stuff head-on, but what did John McWhorter say, no group in the world has been studied as much as black men? Cryptoracist handwringers like Steve Sailer are a dead end. From eyeballing the murder stats it seems like anytime the heel of oppression is lifted off a people there's a spasm of violence. You see it in South Africa and Russia, and even in cute country like Estonia, which had a super high murder rate in the 1990s. Oh yeah, and Iraq. Nobody could have predicted that. :P

And on the other, it's hard to imagine that Brian's going to a middle school to humanize the victims of gun crime is going to really make a dent because the reality is that it's not a lack of humanity that causes situations like that.

Every little gesture helps. He'd be better off, probably, working in a custom-made early intervention and prevention program that targets at-risk youth.

No amount of nurturing or community meetings or church attendance is going to change the dynamics of gang life. The drug trade funds it and gives it a reason for existing.

Disagree. Street gangs are a function of poverty and multiple risks among youth: single parent or foster care, learning disability, abuse in family, drug addiction-alcoholism in family, etc. These are kids heading for the prison system, and adolescent gang life is one stop on the way. The PROVEN remedies against gangs are early and sustained intervention in the child's life. The short version is this: kids who have music lessons and sports and mentoring and yes, church groups, after school, don't join gangs. They go to college or the military or get decent jobs (if there

Quoting Wonderment: [...]

Good answers, Wonderment.

I remember listening to a interview with a black woman on NPR about nothing in particular. She was reminiscing about going to movies and budging in front of the white people who were too scared of her (because she was black) to speak up. She was a successful, educated black woman who was on NPR because she was, and she laughed as she told her story. I was taken aback. On the one hand, I get the perverse, ironic joy of taking advantage of others prejudices in order to benefit one's self. But, in her telling of the story, there didn't appear to be any sense of regret for youthful indiscretion, and that was disappointing. I don't think instances like this have anything to do with race per se. For the most part these anecdotes seem like a natural, human response to an opportunity, and most young people would respond likewise. It is just that in this case, the particular instance arises only because of mutually reinforcing beliefs about race. The white people probably really are afraid of the young, aggressive black guy. The black guy senses this, feels it is unfair, and therefore doesn't feel bad when he takes

Quoting olmeta: I'm a 6' 3" 38-year-old white guy, living in Central Harlem for 5+ years. I've never been mugged or even confronted directly.

I do wonder if my good luck has something to do with my size and my game face and my affected confidence walking down the street like I belong there.

I worry for the other white people I see on the sidewalks, who lack these qualities. The blonde girl staring at her ipod instead of straight ahead. The hipster kid in flipflops and a silly t-shirt. The hottie in tights giggling on her cell phone.

One day my neighbor, white, female, 30ish, cute - was walking her chihuahua at 3AM near the corner of my block and Lenox Ave. Two black girls on the opposite side of the street started talking smack. The white girl tried to ignore them and started walking home, when suddenly a beer bottle crashed into her face breaking her nose.

Turned out the girls lived a block away, my neighbor had to ID the girls and they went to jail for a while. My neighbor had to move out because, as she saw it, this was their neighborhood, and they'd be back. She lives downtown now.

I'm

Quoting nattybumpo: I remember listening to a interview with a black woman on NPR about nothing in particular. She was reminiscing about going to movies and budging in front of the white people who were too scared of her (because she was black) to speak up. She was a successful, educated black woman who was on NPR because she was, and she laughed as she told her story. I was taken aback.

On the one hand, I get the perverse, ironic joy of taking advantage of others prejudices in order to benefit one's self. But, in her telling of the story, there didn't appear to be any sense of regret for youthful indiscretion, and that was disappointing.

I don't think instances like this have anything to do with race per se. For the most part these anecdotes seem like a natural, human response to an opportunity, and most young people would respond likewise. It is just that in this case, the particular instance arises only because of mutually reinforcing beliefs about race. The white people probably really are afraid of the young, aggressive black guy. The black guy senses this, feels it is unfair, and therefore doesn't feel bad when he takes

The PROVEN remedies against gangs are early and sustained intervention in the child's life. The short version is this: kids who have music lessons and sports and mentoring and yes, church groups, after school, don't join gangs. They go to college or the military or get decent jobs (if there are any).

Well said. I think this is an important aspect to focus on. Many of our culture-based problems, whether it's crime, teen pregnancy or drug use etc., come down to things that are best handled on a personal level. When a parent tells a child not to drugs (or better yet, explains the risks to them, as an adult, and leaves them to ultimately make the decision on their own) it's far more effective than any DARE program. Assuming there's is a good relationship between parent/child, there is nothing more influential than the worry that we might "disappoint" our loved ones. Obviously, children base alot of their behavior on that of their peers. But the direct, personal approach seems to me the only way (along with activities and other positive options) to try to get children to choose to the "right" friends. It always annoys me somewhat when Republicans

I agree. I think sometimes people forget that there *is* a feedback loop.

I don't need to have my guard up 24/7 as a white guy in Harlem - I know many locals in the area (shop-keepers, old dude on the bench, etc.) and I chat and joke all the time. But there are also times when there are semi-shady looking characters all over, and we're all strangers to each other, and then it helps to pose as someone who isn't scarred a bit, and just might kick some ass if messed with. In a weird way, posing as a confident tough guy helps everyone on the street avoid trouble because no one spots the weak link, an opportunity to attack a weaker person. Maybe we keep the peace in a tough neighborhood by appearing equally tough to each other, or equally passive as in the case of say, a suburban area where everyone is polite and gracious and says "sorry" and "pardon me" all day long.. We also need to keep in mind that most people on this planet live in far more dangerous places than Harlem, Newark, or DC. White America, generally speaking, lives in a cocoon of affluence and non-violence which is extremely rare historically, is almost

In the historical period Ta-Nehisi refers to in Mississippi, the situation was a greatly magnified version of the one sealrock described. A white person could approach any black person and treat them like garbage. In my book, that only proves that the white person was, in fact, garbage, yet the black person was obligated to treat that garbage as a prince. If not, that garbage would be more likely to attack them, which he could do without fear of legal reprisal. That must have been fun for the garbage. If the garbage in question belonged to a gang, such as the Klan, he had a whole social support structure dedicated to the idea that he was a prince among men. In that gang, such acts raised his status. Eventually, other people got sick of that situation. They smashed the Klan as a violent organization. If local police were too busy to prosecute, the Feds did it for them. No excuses were allowed. Even as attitudes towards criminals in general softened, there was no softening towards white-on-black hate crime. The program was extraordinarily successful; such hate crimes have been quite rare for a long time. Now that a similar

It's so frustrating to listen to what two blogging heads are trying to say, but aren't and to know that you can say it! What I think they meant about the whole being targeted because he was white conversation was that perhaps he was targeted because as a whitey, he would not have the connections to retaliate and bring justice beyond what the police might bring, but probably won't/can't. And that as a whitey (and therefore non long time resident of that AM neighborhood), he would not be as intimately familiar with the perps as a black person would have - so goes the thinking of the perps. I hope my terms don't offend anyone. I used them in the interest of brevity. Oh, and thank God this guy is alive.

I remember that program on NPR. She had moved to France, and tried the same thing in France, but the French people weren't having it. She was kind of bragging about being a bully, when she used the white guilt or fear to cut in line, and reveled in it. It offended me a bit too.

You'll quit by 45, I bet.

This was very interesting to read. Thanks for sharing. The escalation of scaring people is something that we sadly see a lot of in the DC metro area (not just the city). And it's not just about race, though that could be an initial trigger. It's about de-humanization by a group of an individual.

Sounds good.

Minute 28....ah, youth. It's sweet he thought all the haters from NoVa who regularly post on the Metro section of the WaPo web site whenever a gun so much as falls out a pocket, would be populating this site to scold him into carrying a gun! Or chastising him for being a liberal.... Ok discussion, but come on guys, get to the point and MOVE ON!

Wow, so the French showed more fighting spirit than Americans?? That's going to shatter the worldview of many Americans;-)

Quoting Wonderment: Every little gesture helps. He'd be better off, probably, working in a custom-made early intervention and prevention program that targets at-risk youth.

Disagree. Street gangs are a function of poverty and multiple risks among youth: single parent or foster care, learning disability, abuse in family, drug addiction-alcoholism in family, etc.

These are kids heading for the prison system, and adolescent gang life is one stop on the way.

The PROVEN remedies against gangs are early and sustained intervention in the child's life. The short version is this: kids who have music lessons and sports and mentoring and yes, church groups, after school, don't join gangs. They go to college or the military or get decent jobs (if there are any).

I am a big supporter of legalization of drugs AND doing everything possible to keep guns out of the communities, but what at-risk kids need most are community-based programs that offset the bad hand they've been dealt and show them someone cares.

i'd tend to agree with doctormoney as gangs are still rampant and "community help" doesn't seem to get much bang for its buck.
http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?msa=0...,0.493698&z=11
secondly, both the quoter and the "quotee" advocate decriminalization of drugs but countries that

Quoting Wonderment: Disagree. Street gangs are a function of poverty and multiple risks among youth: single parent or foster care, learning disability, abuse in family, drug addiction-alcoholism in family, etc.

Family abuse, drug addiction, learning disabilities: all functions of poverty. But armed gang violence is always a function of the drug trade and is really a totally separate issue from community outreach. Its funding comes from outside the community and, frankly, no church or civic center is a match. I'm only arguing that the 'culture of poverty' has next to nothing to do with what happened to Brian. That was an initiation into a business that exists only because of the black market. In the absence of the drug money (which both funds and necessitates the ownership of lethal weapons) these kinds of events would be unheard of. /edit: ok, hyperbole. How about instead of 'unheard of', I say 'as rare as in smaller communities'. Either way, it seems that we all agree that the enforcement-only approach has been a failure.

Either way, it seems that we all agree that the enforcement-only approach has been a failure.

Yes, absolutely. It's worth noting that almost everyone who works in high-crime areas understands this, including the enforcers. Certainly everyone who works in juvenile justice gets it. It is only the politicians who suddenly get very stupid (or self-serving).

Quoting Wonderment: It is only the politicians who suddenly get very stupid (or self-serving).

While I wouldn't want to be accused of misunderestimating the stupidity of politicians, I think it's much more the latter that's the case. It's easy to campaign on "tough on crime" slogans and it's doubly easy to demonize a candidate who advocates approaches like decriminalization, treatment versus incarceration, community outreach, funding for after-school programs, and (cue scary music) needle exchange programs. It's the people (who respond to the sloganeering) who are very stupid.

Quoting Sactownxsv: Who's more afraid?
The blacks who can't walk outside without a weapon, or the whites who are weary of such petty beings. As Brain said, "Really guys? Really, joking right?", almost a moment of comedic refrain when faced with a gun.

Same conversation over and over.

"The blacks who can't walk outside without a weapon" ... huh? What does that mean?

From Jason Linkins's 2008: The Year in Media Hightlights:

And this Bloggingheads conversation between Brian Beutler and Ta-Nehisi Coates is probably the best thing Bloggingheads has ever done.