Salatiso Mdeni

I enjoyed this book, it's factual and contrary to the populist agenda that's informed only by emotion. There's not much the book reveals to me, I just completed Heather MacDonald's brutally honest War on Cops as well as Jason Riley's Please Stop Helping us to mention a few. Also being a huge fan of Dr. Walter Williams and Larry Elder I am familiar with the concepts and ideas. What was new was the perspective, a young black male American's perspective. I am a huge fan of research-based of publications because of their pursuit of the facts rather than what's appealing to the latest batch of victims. I don't agree however with the author about his commentary on Dr Thomas Sowell who rose up to the highest echelons of academia and philosophy, to mention a few, not because he had the best of circumstances but because he made the most of the little he had. Thomas Sowell in fact could easily be Taleeb Starkes a couple of years now. Great book though and I love it when people offer solutions to their own problems instead of expecting others to solve them. How this emotionally fueled rhetoric persists puzzles me but we all will pay the price. Instead of investing in finding solutions to help us solve more of humanity's problems we are busy trying to save perpetual victims who made choices and now are suffering the consequences of their decisions. A great thing for the race peddlers and populist politicians who can then monetise supposed suffering, self-inflicted or not, at the expense of those who work hard, play by the rules no matter how uncomfortable they feel so that they can positively contribute to the advancement of humanity.

Definately one of my favourite books with Steven Pinker ranking just as high. For so long at school I was taught we are mostly a product of our environment, hence the justification for compulsory schooling. I believed the nonsense even though it was totally against reality, if we're such blank slates how is it that children look like their parent or other family members? If nature could overcome nurture how is it someone who didn't go to school or went to the least resourced schools can outperform someone who went to prestigious schools? So many of these questions were answered in this book.