Reggie White, RIP

The New York Times obituary of the great NFL defensive lineman and minister says:

"White created a stir in March 1998 with a speech to the Wisconsin State Assembly. In it, he referred to homosexuality as "one of the biggest sins in the Bible" and used ethnic stereotypes for blacks and whites."

In reality, the Reverend White's much-denounced "ethnic stereotypes" speech was one of the more thoughtful celebrations of racial and ethnic diversity in recent years. Across Difficult Country quotes the most vilified section of White's speech in context:

Why did God create us differently? Why did God make me black and you white? Why did God make the next guy Korean and the next guy Asian and the other guy Hispanic? Why did God create the Indians?

Well, it's interesting to me to know why now. When you look at the black race, black people are very gifted in what we call worship and celebration. A lot of us like to dance, and if you go to black churches, you see people jumping up and down, because they really get into it.

White people were blessed with the gift of structure and organization. You guys do a good job of building businesses and things of that nature and you know how to tap into money pretty much better than a lot of people do around the world.

Hispanics are gifted in family structure. You can see a Hispanic person and they can put 20 or 30 people in one home. They were gifted in the family structure.

When you look at the Asians, the Asian is very gifted in creation, creativity and inventions. If you go to Japan or any Asian country, they can turn a television into a watch. They're very creative. And you look at the Indians, they have been very gifted in the spirituality.

When you put all of that together, guess what it makes. It forms a complete image of God. God made us different because he was trying to create himself. He was trying to form himself, and then we got kind of knuckleheaded and kind of pushed everything aside.

I attempted a more elaborate description of black advantages, the ones that can't be measured by IQ tests, in my 1996 National Review article "Great Black Hopes" and in this long book review of Arthur Jensen's The g Factor called "The Half-Full glass," in which I declared myself a "Reggieist."

My published articles are archived at iSteve.com -- Steve Sailer