LETTER: Venom Exposed

To the Editor: I'd like to thank The Daily Pennsylvanian for reporting the story on black activist/author Del Jones (DP 10/13/92). In doing so, it has exposed as ridiculous the venom of an incendiary headcase whose speech many people likely missed, myself included. Now I can add Jones to my mental list of self-righteous, posturing bigots. His views are comically out of touch. First of all, class stratification is present in any society, including those in Africa -- unless my freshman anthropology professor is part of "the conspiracy." Sorry, but even if Bush had the intellectual capacity to cook up a global plan of disease warfare -- read my lips: he doesn't! -- I'm pretty damn certain he wouldn't go so far as to introduce AIDS and crack to "exterminate the black man." Why would he want to risk contaminating all of us "white breads"? Sounds a little extreme, hmm? Although I really dug the part about Bush's homosexual fraternity romps? And guess what? White people use condoms, too! Or do "they" put microscopic holes only in special boxes earmarked for black men? Unless Jones has some documents and statistics, he is only screaming inflammatory nonsense -- and doing nothing to promote his avowed concern of "black genius." I expect there are members of the African-American community who are not only offended, but embarrassed at Jones' histrionics. Granted, I am a white woman, so I can never fully comprehend Jones' own basis for anguish and bitterness. I do know, however, what it is like to be a religious minority, and harassed non-stop in a school district unaccustomed to Jews. Still, I hope my hurt and anger never grow to such a distorted paranoia as Jones'. Or maybe I should start screaming that Tay-Sachs is a genetic strain developed by neo-Nazi doctors in a "conspiracy." Maybe I should hail the late Meir Kahane, another disgusting bigot, as my cultural representative. Will that solve anything? There are several institutionalized forms of discrimination against blacks. And Jones is right in warning us to be savvy to societal indoctrination undercutting black culture. But Jones is nothing but a prejudiced imbecile -- who just so happens, in this case, to be black. JENNIFER KORNREICH College '92 Former DP Columnist