Watch Glenn Loury on 'Uncommon Knowledge'
Stream the famous economist's episode on Fox Nation today.
Glenn Loury, a professor, economist, and self-described "woke-buster," candidly opened up about race relations and crime in an episode of "Uncommon Knowledge" on Fox Nation.
The "woke-buster" voiced concerns over the claims some people assert about police specifically targeting African Americans.
"The metaphor that Al Sharpton invoked at George Floyd’s funeral, ‘America take your knee off of our neck,’ is fiction," Loury said. "It’s a lie. It’s not an apt description of the actual circumstance. For a Black person to fear going out of their door, that the police might somehow... inappropriately treat them, it’s like not going outside because you’re afraid of being struck by lightning."
Loury, who himself is Black, explained the history of race relations in the United States from a different vantage point, commenting on the 1968 Kerner Commission, which blamed the summer riots of 1967 on racism, lack of economic opportunity, and failed social programs.
He explained that, though the commission's recommendations were mostly heeded, there are still ways to go.
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"Blacks yield vastly more political clout at all levels of government today than was the case four decades ago, yet it is arguable that conditions are much worse," Loury said during a 2005 lecture. "The prisons of the nation overflow with young Black men. Two-thirds of Black babies were born to unwed mothers nationwide."
The professor explained his past comments, arguing that the idea the problem could be solved by "expanding the great society... enacting more anti-discrimination laws...(and) doubling down on affirmative action...is an error."
"Whereas in 1968, it was a compelling argument to say two nations, separate and unequal, that’s what the Kerner Commission said... in the year 2021 the ball is in our court," he argued.
"I speak now about African Americans. This is basically a level playing field that we are dealing with right here. In the freest, most prosperous, most dynamic society on the planet, that millions of people are willing to risk everything just to get into, we are birthright citizens here. The ball is in our court."
Loury recalled a quote from his friend Shelby Steele explaining the current problem is not one of oppression, but a problem of freedom.
"Outsize rates of criminal participation of violence, of the kinds of uncivil behavior that get you locked up in prison, that’s why the jails are overflowing with African Americans," he explained, "not because there is a conspiracy in the state legislature or in several police departments to go around locking up Black people, but because too many of our youngsters, of our young men, are behaving in ways that end up leaving them in confrontation with the law and leaving them susceptible to imprisonment."
Loury called on political leaders to stop making excuses and condemn "despicable behavior."
The professor also expressed the importance of community support in a world that often suffers from the breakdown of the family:
"There’s space for appealing to people at the level of their spiritual responsibilities and urging them to look differently at how it is that they should live their lives," he explained. "I said in (a past) essay: ‘What program could be more effective at encouraging parents to take responsibility for their children than persuading them that they’re God’s stewards in the lives of their children?’ A clever economist could come up with all kinds of schemes to motivate them financially, but if they embrace that idea, that this is a precious responsibility, this is a sacred obligation, they’re going to get the job done that we want them to get done."
To learn more of Loury's insight this Black History Month, sign up on Fox Nation and watch ‘Uncommon Knowledge.’
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