LETTERS: REPORT NEEDS A FAIR HEARING

To the editor:

The book, "The Bell Curve," has generated a bit of controversy and discussion, much of it focused on one chapter in particular. In our society of ruthless fearmongers and licentious purveyors of divisive rhetoric, the truth and facts often become food for the jackals. They would kill the messenger and turn a blind eye to the message.

The truths the book espouses do not fit their self-serving view of the world. The facts it presents undermine their socio-political agenda. So they damn it out of hand as biased and would censure it out of reasonable discourse and debate. If the science is faulty, hold it accountable. I would like to believe that objective, fair-minded individuals would seek out truth and knowledge rather than bask in the bliss of ignorance. Knowledge is the power to set one free from the manacles of repression and self-loathing, to achieve in spite of the facts and to become an exception to the rule and perhaps to change the rules entirely.

If the science supports the facts, if blacks score a percentage point or so less than whites on the average, what of it? Is this a self-perpetuating prophecy? I think not. For those among the reactionary crowd of brow-beaters and rabble-rousers, though, this is indicative of just what a racist society we live in.

However, is not the public policy they so often advocate based upon the very notion that certain demographic groups of people need assistance to acquire even life's most basic needs, that these hapless, helpless people's self-interest is served best when serviced by others? Their statements and actions are at the very least disingenuous, if not criminal.

So let's be objective and rational. Let us examine this report, in context, to determine its validity and value. Perhaps it may be used as a tool by which to gauge the success of past public policy and determine what future policy may be. In any event, let us not become hung up on numbers, for numbers cannot define the heights to which the human spirit may rise.

DONALD COLTRAIN

Cape Girardeau