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Taboo: Why Black Athletes are Better and Why We'RE Afraid to Talk about it
 
 

Taboo: Why Black Athletes are Better and Why We'RE Afraid to Talk about it (Paperback)

by Jon Entine (Author) "Imagine an alien visitor chancing upon a basketball arena on a wintry night ..." (more)
4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
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Product details

  • Paperback: 400 pages
  • Publisher: PublicAffairs,U.S. (20 Dec 2000)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 158648026X
  • ISBN-13: 978-1586480264
  • Product Dimensions: 22.6 x 15.5 x 2.5 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 335,357 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Product Description

Product Description
In virtually every sport in which they are given opportunity to compete, people of African descent dominate. East Africans own every distance running record. Professional sports in the Americas are dominated by men and women of West African descent. Why have blacks come to dominate sports? Are they somehow physically better? And why are we so uncomfortable when we discuss this?Drawing on the latest scientific research, journalist Jon Entine makes an irrefutable case for black athletic superiority. We learn how scientists have used numerous, bogus scientific methods to prove that blacks were either more or less superior physically, and how racist scientists have often equated physical prowess with intellectual deficiency. Entine recalls the long, hard road to integration, both on the field and in society. And he shows why it isnt just being black that mattersit makes a huge difference as to where in Africa your ancestors are from. Equal parts sports, science and examination of why this topic is so sensitive, Taboo is a book that will spark national debate.

From the Publisher
Praise for Jon Entine and TABOO
New York Times - Robert Lipsyte sports page Back Talk column, 11/28 "consistently interesting, readable, provocative."

USA Today - Keeping Score columnist Christine Brennan, 1/13 "I don't know if Entine is right or if he is wrong, although I hope someday after decades of bickering we'll find out. But I do know this. The dialogue that he almost certainly will provoke is not the problem. It's the solution."

New York Times - Richard Bernstein review, 1/14 "Mr. Entine makes a careful and reasoned case for this point of view, and he argues forcefully against whatever tendency there may be out there in the world of racial politics to misinterpret it. ….Mr. Entine's conclusion that racially distinctive features are an essential element of the picture is part of a sophisticated argument that, whether entirely persuasive or not, cannot be dismissed."

Washington Post Book World - 2/6 "Entine marshals such an impressive array of evidence that we should no longer be content to explain why blacks excel at certain sports by simply resorting to the old cultural argument that athletics have been the only avenues of upward mobility that were truly open to them. He's raised the argument to new heights."

Emerge: Black America's News Magaine - Carolyn White, March "Taboo is a good read for anyone interested in the history of Black athletes in the United States and worldwide….Whether you agree with Entine or not, Taboo illustrates that some controversies are too complex to be solved in terms of Black and White."

Sports Illustrated, S.L. Price - 2/7 -2/14 issue "[T]he timing has never been better for Entine's balanced, well-reasoned and-above all-calm explanation of the issue….Entine convincingly argues for the overwhelming on-field evidence, allows for the determining X factors of environment and depoliticizes the discussion by attempting to kill the long-held cultural bedtime story about the link between athletic excellence and low intelligence."

National Review - John Derbyshire, February "The great value of TABOO is that it lets off another stick of dynamite under the nurturist consensus, which is already beginning to crack and split. The evidence Entine presents is overwhelming, the larger conclusions plain: we can have equal outcomes by race, or we can have meritocracy, but we can't have both."

Kirkus Reviews - 1/1/00 "A brave sprint in the marathon of genetic racial equality. Journalist and award-winning TV producer Entine writes lucidly about a forbidden topic....Courageous enough to ask tough questions about the uneven playing field, forthright enough to present hard evidence."

Salon.com - Gary Kamiya, 1/28 "Entine takes several gratifying swings at postmodern academic fog machines, who in their scholastic zeal to make sure everything comes out racially rosy simply throw science overboard."

St. Petersburg Times, Bill Maxwell - 2/6 "At long last, someone has the guts to tell it like it is….In addition to beiong an analysis of performance research, Taboo is a powerful history of African-Americans in sports itself….Thanks to Entine, the genie is out of the bottle, and the debate about race and athleticism will never be the same again."

Business Week, Mark Hyman - 2/28 "A notable and jarring work.…Perhaps Entine's topic alone will offend some readers. But that shouldn't detract from the author's balanced and thorough treatment....the science chapters establish Entine as a serious chronicler of his subject.…Entine's treatment of his central theme is laudable. And because it brings intelligence to a little-understood subject, so is this book."

Seattle Times, John C. Walter - 2/27 "Written in a breezy and informal style, yet thoroughly researched and properly footnoted, "Taboo" is both provocative and informed. Entine has provided a well-intentioned effort for all to come clean on the possibility that black people might just be superior physically, and that there is no negative connection between that physical superiority and their IQs."

Psychology Today, Michael Levin - March/April issue "Entine boldly and brilliantly documents numerous physiological differences contributing to black athletic superiority….Entine's work stands to open the conversation on racial differences to a broader range of topics-even intelligence-because success in sports is so unambiguous, and the scientific data so unarguable." --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.


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Imagine an alien visitor chancing upon a basketball arena on a wintry night. Read the first page
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12 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Nothing better to do, 4 Dec 2003
By Dennis Littrell (SoCal) - See all my reviews
(TOP 50 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   
The first thing to note is that this is an excellent book, well-written, well-researched, balanced and fair without even a hint of racism anywhere.

The second thing to note is that a taboo is irrational to the point where it doesn't matter what the evidence is one way or the other. The taboo holds simply because it is a taboo, a combination of instinctive and learned behavior that will not and cannot yield to reason or evidence. Consequently it doesn't matter how well Entine's book is written, how rational his arguments are or how well supported by evidence. The taboo won't change because a taboo is the ultimate expression of the kind of behavior we call politically and socially correct; that is, behavior that is judged from the standpoint of whether it is in agreement with the tribal view. It has nothing to do with objectivity or scientific truth. Taboos are beliefs that the tribe deliberately holds regardless of the evidence. That is the whole point. The political and social truth is so important to the tribe that the "actual" or "objective" or scientific truth is secondary. The only way to change a taboo is to change the learned and instinctive assumptions (usually hidden from the conscious mind) on which it is based. In the case of many taboos, murder, for example, the taboo can be re-directed through the coercive and/or persuasive power of the society. But this relearning process only works on young, unindoctrinated minds. The old people will die with their prejudices intact. In this sense Entine's is a book whose influence will not really be felt until the generation growing up today comes of age.

The third thing to note is that it doesn't matter whether blacks are superior in sports or not. Sport is a social construct with arcane rules and an underlying tribal psychology. The purpose of sport is to keep the young occupied with a socially-acceptable channel for their energies, and to allow the herd instinct of the populace some kind of focus for their aggressions and loyalties. Our nearly worshipful attitude toward athletes is an artifact of this purpose. The fact that somebody runs the 100 meters a tenth of second faster than somebody else is of enormous significance in the social construct of sport. But in the greater world such a difference is trivial. The fact that some athletes can sky so high and have such "hang time" as to be able to take a quarter off the top of the backboard "and leave change" is no more significant that the fact that somebody can hold his breath for five minutes, or can stand on his head for a week, or cry real tears on cue into the eye of the camera. These "accomplishments" are significant only to the extent that the tribe makes them significant.

Jon Entine finds it hard to understand why so many otherwise intelligent people cannot open their eyes to the truth of black superiority in sport. But what I think he is missing is that those intelligent people know there are better ways of spending their time than discerning or not discerning a fine distinction of little import, especially when their work--if they are scientists, or their perception, if they are lay people--is liable to be judged not on intrinsic qualities but on the fit with the political zeitgeist. What I find hard to understand how some people can devote so much of their lives to watching other people run and jump, and/or throw, kick and hit balls or each other. Maybe they have nothing better to do.

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