Paved with Good Intentions: The Failure of Race Relations in Contemporary America

by Jared Taylor

This is the book that established Jared Taylor as an expert and commentator on race relations. The publishers of American Renaissance have reprinted this classic with a new preface for the 2004 edition by Jared Taylor. Race is the great American dilemma. This has always been so, and is likely to remain so. Race has marred our past and clouds our future. It is a particularly agonizing and even shameful dilemma because, in so many other ways, the United States has been a blessing to its people and a model for the world. The very discovery by Europeans of a continent inhabited by Indians was an enormous crisis in race relations—a crisis that led to catastrophe and dispossession for the Indians. The arrival of the first black slaves to Virginia in 1619 set in motion a series of crises that persist to the present. Indirectly, it brought about the bloodiest war America has ever fought, Reconstruction, segregation, the civil rights movement, and the seemingly intractable problems of today’s underclass. Despite enormous effort, especially in the latter half of this century, those two ancient crises remain unresolved. Neither Indians nor blacks are full participants in America; in many ways they lead lives that lie apart from the mainstream. After 1965, the United States began to add two more racial groups to the uneasy mix that, in the heady days of civil rights successes, seemed finally on the road to harmony. In that year, Congress passed a new immigration law that cut the flow of immigrants from Europe and dramatically increased the flow from Latin America and Asia. Now 90 percent of all legal immigrants are nonwhite, and Asians and Hispanics have joined the American mix in large numbers. The United States has embarked on a policy of multiracial nation-building that is without precedent in the history of the world. Race is therefore a prominent fact of national life, and if our immigration policies remain unchanged, it will become an increasingly central fact. Race, in ever more complex combinations, will continue to be the great American dilemma. Nevertheless, even as the nation becomes a mix of many races, the quintessential racial divide in America—the subject of this book—is between black and white. Blacks have been present in large numbers and have played an important part in American history ever since the nation began. Unlike recent immigrants, who are concentrated in Florida, California, New York, and the Southwest, blacks live in almost all parts of the country. Many of our major cities are now largely populated and even governed by blacks. Finally, for a host of reasons, black/white frictions are more obtrusive and damaging than any other racial cleavage in America. In our multiracial society, race lurks just below the surface of much that is not explicitly racial. Newspaper stories about other things—housing patterns, local elections, crime, antipoverty programs, law-school admissions, mortgage lending, employment rates—are also, sometimes only by implication, about race. When race is not in the foreground of American life, it does not usually take much searching to find it in the background.

Genres: Politics, Race, Nonfiction, History, Philosophy, Sociology

421 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1992

About the author

Jared Taylor was born in Japan, where he lived until he was 16 years old. He has a bachelor's degree in philosophy from Yale University and a master's degree in international economics from l'Institut d' Etudes Politiques de Paris.

He has worked as an international lending office for a major New York bank and as a consultant to companies doing business in Japan. For three years he was the West Coast Editor of PC (Personal Computing) Magazine, and has published articles and essays in the following publications:

Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, Baltimore Sun, Washington Star, San Francisco Chronicle, Boston Globe, National Review, Chronicles.

Since 1994, Jared Taylor has been the president of New Century Foundation, which publishes American Renaissance, a monthly magazine devoted to issues of race and immigration (AmRen.com).

Reviews

[Ill D · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's an unflinching look at racial issues within 20th century America culminating in a damning sentencing of Affirmative Action, the modern welfare state, and all sorts of reverse racism policies that have been perpetuated in the U.S. from the Civil Rights act onward all in the name of equal opportunity and with nothing short of the best intentions. Fear-mongering within the penultimate chapter, and the possible cherry-picking of evidence concerning some various statistics aside, it's an excellent book that doesn't just target but, holistically deconstructs the big elephant in the middle of the room that everyone proverbially and casually ignores.

Race.

Taylor correctly criticizes welfare because it a provides a disincentive to hard-work, frugality, living within ones means, and making smart decisions concerning procreation. Ultimately these gubermental policies are products of various Librul delusions premised upon nonsensical and bogus ideas like the Blank Slate and Cultural Engineering. While Taylor has harsh words for the guberment because it's the progenitor of these idiotic policies and he whole-hardheartedly endorses practical conservative solutions to the problems, he doesn't go far enough in this direction. Because, ultimately, the guberment is the issue and its the modern conception of the state, vis a vis fucking Modernism, and that is what needs to be abolished.

Just as libruls abolished the conception of god and religion, being the opiate of the masses and all that jazz, so the state becomes the replacement. Instead of receiving help from your local family/community/religious organization(s) so divine intervention is replaced by the all knowing state, Big-Brother sends you a welfare check in the mail and you're on your way. The state destroys normal, organic, and local relations between people. Severing what should be normal healthy relations that were what us humans have experienced throughout most of our history, instead we are presented with a faceless deity (the state), cold patron saints that administer to our every needs (the local bureaucracy that perpetuates this cycles to it can grow to meet its own needs) and replaces the boogy-man that used to be Ha-Satan, The Devil, and Iblis (take your pick lol) with indivisible, invisible, and ultimately unfalsibiable and disprovable (this is important) boogy-men; in the case of Blacks, its Racism, in the case of Feminism, it's the Patriarchy. Illusory, impossible to disprove, and always active, what a nice neat way to blame all your failings and problems on something else, sounds like human nature at work once again.

Although he makes this statement quite early in the book and doesn't quite come back to it near the end, which basically everything else is well drawn together for a solid conclusion, ultimately, "The Free Market is the solution to racism." If good 'ole boy John, for instance, only hires white people because he's a racist, and he hires mediocre workers, ony because he shares his race. And Bob, for example, hires people merely based on skill and work-ethic (discounting race)- obviously John will go out of business and Bob's business will be doing fine. The state is the problem here, the Free Market will fix it. Too bad it's too simple of a solution for da guberment.

All these inneficient policies can't exist in a free market, they can only exist in a state to feed itself to make it grow itself. The guberment can print money out of fucking thin air, why the hell not? The overwhelming amount of money that go into these programs invariably ends up fattening the wallets of beurocrats as it filters its way down the political totem pole (see the last chapter). It's a self feeding cycle that produces nothing short of a gravy train. Of course, it's always racism, because if the issue is anything less, these cycles can't perpetuate, and minority leaders can't get all continuous guberment funding that they so greedily desire.

Finally, what Taylor also fails to mention but, implicity nails, is that this whole silly house of cards based upon the most illusory Marxist premise. Within the dank confines of Marxism, there is no individuals. It's a fucking collective philosophy at thats at the fucking root of this shit. Either you're part of the bourgiouse oppressing the proletariat, or you're the proletariat being the oppressees (is that even a words? ha ha). Either your part of the majority enjoying the institutionalized racism at the expense of the minorities, or of course, vice versa. And it's quite diametrically opposed to the truth, we're fucking individuals. Yup.

To quote one of my many heroes, Ludwi Van Mises, "Only the individual thinks. Only the indivual reasons. Only the individual acts." And as Taylor demonstatres throughout his tract, many blacks are unhappy with these poolicies and want to placed in higher positions based on merit alone, not because of some quotas. And these is where Jared makes his most damning point, that at the end of the day, the modern welfare state and Affirmative Action as insulting to Blacks. It's insulting to say they can't achieve anything on their own and that they require the state to baby them along, treating them as less than the autonomous human beings they are.


So sleepy. I'll edit all my spelling mistakes tmrw lol.

[Kelly Korby · Rating 4 out of 5]

Having read many books/articles etc..about this topic this book did not come as a huge surprise to me,but it still manages to find a couple things to really surprise me.
Contrary to what many people say about the book and/or author,I found it to be balanced and objective in its critique of the role civil rights activism and legislation have played in the history of the America and its effects.I was familiar with Jared Taylor's position before reading this,but wasn't truly sure where the argument would be taken.
The biggest surprises were some of the ideas suggested for curing black poverty,lagging education,and lack of ability to catch up to the rest of the U.S.Ranging from paying children to show up for school,paying parents to attend teacher meetings,and eliminating "Eurocentric" history and shifting focus to a more "Afrocentric" view.Fifty years,tons of different ideas,and BILLIONS of dollars later,the situation continues to get worse.
He even surmises that the country may eventually split into different sections along racial lines as blacks feel more empowered and whites more frustrated at always being the villain in these circumstances.As the economy weakens,I believe this to be true as more people strive for less resources.
The problem in my opinion is that the we are treating the symptom and not the problem.We cannot fix a broken home environment or entitlement worldview with government intrusion.Let's just be honest with each other,black and white people see the world differently.They have different priorities,and different ideas about how they want the world to be around them.Black people do not take education as seriously,nor rate it highly for a prority as white people do,so therefore it is only obvious that more will drop out of school.Marriage and the traditional family nucleus are not as highy regarded either,so it's no surprise that the black fatherless rate in America is nearing 80%.
These things are becoming obsolete quickly in America with all races.The younger generations seem to view these ideas as quaint and old-fashioned.White families are breaking up as well,white children are dropping out of school as well,just not in the percentages as alarming as the black population.Of course,one of the contributing problems is perpetual welfare that encourages these conditions,and Mr.Taylor is relentless in his hammering of this issue.
Now naturally,everything I said doesn't apply to 100% of blacks or anyone else for that matter.Very little in existance ever does,but the ratio is WAY TOO HIGH.When 12% of any demographic account for 50%+ of prison occupancy,that is disturbing.When predominately black area such as D.C.or Detroit have 60-80% drop-out rates,that too is disturbing.These things will not change with more 'programs' or money,no matter how well the intentions are.That's where the title of the book comes from.
No politician will ever mention the the solutions listed here in the book,becuase they would be publicly crucified by the media.So I continue to see the problem continuing to grow exponentially until the system as we know know it finally collapses.I personally believe the experiment we know as 'multiculturalism' is going to have to have be dismantled in order to preserve the nation we know and love from devolving into a cess pool of chaos and poverty.
I guess if the original purpose of this movement was to recreate a country where equal outcome was the goal,these misguided people have succeeded,just not quite the way they intended.
OR DID THEY?

[Evan · Rating 2 out of 5]

I am going to fess up, and fess up hard here.

I was once a proto-fascist. In the late '80s and early '90s I avidly listened to right-wing radio: Rush Limbaugh and Barry Farber and Ken Hamblin ("The Black Avenger"). No, I would not say I was a skinhead or a KKK-level dummy and not a far-right-winger, mind you, but a center-rightist looking for a strong Alpha-male leader who would just say no. I suppose it's the same appeal Donald Trump has today for those whose political thinking is not much deeper than something one might find printed on edible ink in a package of Bazooka Bubble gum. I think most American white men go through this phase. Like most Americans in general, we want simple answers to complex questions, so we glom onto people who offer simplistic explanations and simplistic solutions to complex problems. When Ronnie Reagan was running against Jimmy Carter and saying 'Hell no, we ain't gonna give up OUR Panama Canal,' I was all eaten up with pro-colonial Monroe-Doctrine-style, USA-exceptionalist outrage.

And at the time I was certain that I'd been passed over for a newspaper job because the other applicants were black or female. So, it was personal.

For awhile in my young adulthood my political evolution played like a boxing match going on inside me, with conflicting ideas and information sparring and parrying for supremacy. I would listen to right-wing and the few left-wing radio talk shows that existed. I was reading a lot. I was starting my career and working with a diverse group of people. I was getting out in the world. I was not so sheltered in my existence or ideas anymore. I was attaining a more complete picture. I was processing it all, and thinking.

As time went on, I began to more clearly see the world's operating principles -- to see how the privileged rigged the system; how they owned all the media to spread their misinformation and sow confusion and conflict among the citizens to keep them at war with one another to divert attention from the elites who were robbing them blind. I began to see that fomenting racism was part of that grand scheme of control. The Republican "Southern Strategy" that is now biting the party in the ass with Donald Trump's unexpected popularity is one result of this.

During the time of my proto-fascist, "soft racist" phase, I gravitated to this book, Jared Taylor's Paved with Good Intentions because, as I recall, one of the conservative radio shows either pushed it or quoted from it. Or perhaps Mr. Taylor was interviewed about it. I can't quite remember, but in any case it sounded intriguing. It sounded like the kind of book that would support positions I already held. It would, in effect, be preaching to the choir, and that's the kind of book that appeals to the closed-minded. I imagine it's the kind of "foregone-conclusion" book that lines the modest libraries of a typical Fox News watcher, full of vile hate-your-fellow-man screeds by Ann Coulter and Glenn Beck and Bill O'Reilly and Sean Hannity and not much else that would suggest anything charitable, poetic or beautiful in this world.

As I recall the interviews with Taylor, and from reading this book, the author had a wily facility for the clever turn of phrase, the persuasive usage of statistics, a better-than-average talent for prose and articulation. He was a good debater. I remember this being a pretty well-written tract. Check out the guy's credentials. They are sterling. He's from Yale. He has worked in high positions. He is downright respectable. He says and writes these things while wearing nice suits. He makes his points seem reasonable.

The gist of the book was/is that racism no longer existed in America, so Affirmative Action and other "privileges" afforded black Americans were no longer sensible or useful or even right. It was a "reverse-racism" kind of argument.

It doesn't take too many unjust police shootings or unwarranted arrests that we see nightly on the news to realize that -- not only was racism NOT dead in 1992 when this book was written, but that it is very much alive today. I'm not saying this as some kind of guilty white liberal apologetic for his former views. I'm saying it as someone with his eyes wide open looking at what's actually going on.

So, like Hitler's Mein Kampf or Leni Reifenstahl's Triumph of the Will or Sergei Eisenstein's October or D.W. Griffith's Birth of a Nation, I'm giving this a relatively good rating on artistic merit or historical interest -- fully cognizant of its propagandist slant; Taylor's writing and persuasive powers are pretty good.

But, yes, this is something from a shameful past. Anyone potentially has the ability to get beyond the subtle arguments in this white supremacist tome -- to step back and invoke one's critical thinking skills to question and challenge its assumptions and the dubious facts sliced and diced to arrive at them.

I'm glad I read this, if for no other reason than knowing the arguments of your rivals better prepares you to refute them. I consider this book a valuable step toward my sociopolitical maturity. The negative and the positive are the yin and ying of growth. Thus, books like this and the stubbornly hateful agendas that spawn them have their place, in a sense. That is, if they help you in a process of getting beyond hate.

(KevinR@Ky 2016)

[Daniel L. · Rating 1 out of 5]

A Dialog (?) on Race from an Avowed Racist

Judging from the positive reviews "Paved with Good Intentions" has garnered, author Jared Taylor has succeeded in repackaging his racist and white supremacist views in a format more palatable to mainstream readers. Make no mistake; Paved with Good Intentions is social Darwinism (i.e., eugenics) at its worst. Mr. Taylor argues that "welfare mothers" should accept a five-year implantable contraceptive device in return for government assistance. At least that would be easier to promote than "forced abortion" on those whom society deems "less fit."

Who is Jared Taylor? Mr. Taylor, who heads the New Century Foundation and edits American Renaissance, envisions a "clear conception of the United States as a nation ruled by and for whites." American Renaissance has published numerous articles linking IQ and race and using selective breeding to "improve" the genetic stock (i.e., eugenics). Both the notion of race and the link of IQ with race are theories that have no scientific bearing and have been disavowed by most academics. In "Paved with Good Intentions," Mr. Taylor acknowledges Wayne Lutton, who has written articles for the Holocaust-denying Journal of Historical Review and the racist American Mercury.

The only thing more disturbing than Mr. Taylor's disgusting views is that this book has gained acceptance and even respectability among educated, otherwise mainstream Americans.

[Benjamin Hill · Rating 1 out of 5]

Past page 300ish this book devolved into pointless, racist, classist, sexist drivel. He suggests that reproduction is essentially at the heart of most problems and that certain people should not be allowed to reproduce. Unfortunately the author doesn't seem to even make a coherent argument so it's hard to be offended by something that is so nugatory. Nonetheless, I would strongly advise reading this book. Even as a way to see "the other side" it falls short on so many accounts.

[Jake · Rating 5 out of 5]

As relevant today as when it was first written in 1992...actually it's probably more relevant, even if many of the stats & figures are 25 years old. There are some hard truths discussed in this book, and society as a whole would be better off if we could discuss them more openly. If the author believed that 25 years in the future we would be discussing them openly he would have been wrong.

Highly recommended.

[5 pound poi · Rating 5 out of 5]

PwGI is a fact-driven, data-laced exploration of modern (published 1992) race relations in the US between blacks & whites written by a self stylized "White Advocate" or publicly (by the mainstream media) proclaimed "White Supremacist" Jared Taylor.

"Whites are forbidden to think in terms of racial identity unless it is to think of ways to promote the interests of OTHER races. When whites act in their own interests, they are to act strictly as individuals rather than as conscious members of a racial group. Black behavior is the very opposite of this. Blacks are encouraged to identify with their racial "brothers", to promote "black consciousness" and to see themselves as a group defined clearly by race. They need not be concerned with what is fair for whites. They are to work openly for the advancement of their OWN race, and if advancement comes through the exclusion or dispossession of whites, so be it. Blacks, therefore, use racial solidarity as a tool to win advantages for themselves, while whites are to smother their sense of their own racial cohesion. Affirmative action requires that whites go even farther and deliberately sacrifice their own interests to the interests of blacks." pg. 237

The more things change the more they stay the same...

Recommended reading for anyone curious about racial tensions within the US or interested in identity.

Recommended to be avoided by those: easily triggered yet very open-minded of course, fervent believers of the current religion-of-the-day: secular progressivism, loudly opinionated persons that have minimal real life experience; in short: people with cognitive dissonance, heavy bias, etc.

[Doctor Doom · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent, detailed, well-cited, groundbreaking, and courageous.

[Tim · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very well written and well argued book.

I will begin with my criticisms, and then where I think the book succeeded, followed by my take on the negative reviews of this book.

Jared Taylor did a masterful job of taking a touchy topic and mostly succeeding in presenting it in a way that is difficult to attack on its face. That's not to say he didn't make mistakes. Perhaps his mistakes aren't even visible without copious knowledge. For instance, back in 1992 when he authored this book, the Central Park Jogger case was recent. Taylor cites this famous case where a female jogger was raped and beaten to within an inch of her life and subsequently five young men (4 Black, 1 Latino) were convicted of the crime. Taylor discusses how strong the outcry was in the Black community about how weak the evidence was. Taylor's primary rebuttal was there were confessions. He brings this case up later in the book to illustrate and hammer home a different point. I'm sure you're aware that all five of these men have been exonerated and served hard time unjustly. Their false (and perhaps coerced) confessions the only evidence against them.

This is an example of Taylor moving beyond his expertise to make a point - and completely whiffing. Having the benefit of 20 years, I can see his mistake. What else was he arguing beyond his scope of expertise? I'm confident this wasn't his only error; it was just the only one I could find given my familiarity with the subject.

Another negative in the book is his curious need to point out the race of an intellectual he's quoting, at least, whenver they're Black. As a reader I actually appreciated this, even though I knew all the names and knew their race (for instance Shelby Steele, Thomas Sowell, Water E Williams). He mentions their race as a way of saying "hey, it's not just me or a bunch of white guys saying this." I happen to have a lot of respect for Sowell and Williams because they are willing to take the more difficult dissenter route (it's far easier to just go along with what your peers say). The truth is, however, Taylor's black-dropping like that comes off as ignorant stench. It's hardly noteworthy that these individuals go against the grain precisely because they go against the grain.

The book is chalk-full of examples where our current race paradigm has failed all of us. There's just too many to list here. He successfully argues, in a manner of speaking, that it is our thinking about race and, more specifically, race relations that has steered us wrong. Make no mistake, we've steered not only wrong, but in a catastrophic way. Taylor successfully illustrates the hypocrisy, double-standards, and fallacious thinking that has kept us from repairing the lingering harm. He does this without tackling any of the enormous issues that might be outstanding (Bell Curve sort of things) which makes the book all the more impressive.

Further, with twenty years of hindsight, it's easy to see how almost nothing has changed for the better. In fact, social pathology, which Taylor acknowledges were not present prior to WW2, has had yet another generation to fasten and lock into place.

It should be noted that in the mid 90s, Bill Clinton and the Republican Congress did pass welfare reform. I'm sure books like this one (along with Charles Murray) were key drivers in raising popular outcry. I do not know what welfare looks like these days, and therefore cannot comment on how out-of-date Taylor's points are.

When I got this book, I didn't know anything about Jared Taylor. I started reading it when the Ferguson, Missouri riots began as my way of revisiting the race-relation topic. Back in 92 I read authors such as Andrew Hacker (who is briefly derided in the early going of this book). Back in 92, my favorite television station was BET. By the mid 90s, my best friend was an older Black gentleman who suffered quite a bit of discrimination and a fair share of racism. We talked for hours, days even, about race and racism in the United States. I ate it all up. Fast forward to today, and I'm saddened I didn't have the wisdom outlined in this book to spot the BS. There's quite a lot of BS.

Keeping my background in mind, let's address some of the grievances against the book. In the course of reading up on the Ferguson riots, I came across an article by Taylor about the Western World requiring Westerners. This was how I found AmRen a few days ago; had never heard of it prior to that. FWIW, the article was decent and it made me think. I've always thought that the western world requires western thought... not necessarily "westerners." (remember I said he avoided the big issue in the book). It does seem, to me anyway, that Taylor leans towards White Nationalism. If he doesn't, a large bulk of his readership does. That makes me uncomfortable. There is no future where states or our nation is separated by ethnicity. Perhaps this might be one small brick in the wall that eventually brings the country down, but that ship sailed over a century and a half ago. Is this a problem? No. The book is well written as I stated before. What he's up to now, twenty years later, is a different issue all together.

There's a review here on Goodreads that states, "notion of race and the link of IQ with race are theories that have no scientific bearing."

This, sadly, is an outright lie. There is a link (correlation) and the link is well known and acknowledged up and down. The question, or debate if you will, is what causes the link. Is it genetics? Nutrition? A combination of factors? No one knows for sure, though the genetic component cannot be ruled out (and I'm putting that mildly since a lot of IQ is inherited).

From the same review, "The only thing more disturbing than Mr. Taylor's disgusting views is that this book has gained acceptance and even respectability among educated, otherwise mainstream Americans"

I understand where this is coming from, but again this is shooting the messenger instead of dealing with the actual message in this book. In fact, that particular review is against the Goodreads policy as we're supposed to review the books instead of focusing on the author's outside life. I thought including my opinion, on the other hand, might be beneficial to someone curious about picking up the book.

Finally I come to perhaps the biggest "issue" with the book, and that's eugenics. At the end of the book, Taylor expresses the idea to tie welfare with Norplant. I'm a fairly young guy and didn't realize that IUDs were around 20 years ago. A few years ago, when I finally caught up with the times, I thought of this idea on my own. Yes, I sympathize with Taylor's argument. The reason why is because when resources are forcibly confiscated from "society" (you and me) and given to someone else, it stands to reason that perhaps society can ask for something in return; a quid pro quo, if you will. Suppose instead of help with no strings, we require an hour a month of community service. Is that too much to ask? I think such a policy would bring value to the community and to the beneficiary of the welfare.

One of the greatest predictors today (and apparently twenty years ago) whether someone will suffer long-term poverty is early single motherhood. It's an absolute train wreck, destroying the quality of lives for a huge percentage of those that step into the trap. It's extremely ominous. It also puts the child in peril on many fronts, the least of which is academic achievement (something the boffins are still trying to cure). One way to cut this problem tremendously is to prevent it in the first place. That, is within our control. The hypothetical teen-aged mother could control this, but lacks the foresight or ability (or some other unnamed characteristic) to prevent it herself. There's an opportunity here, but neither Taylor nor myself has a solution to prevent the problem in the first place (without instituting some really harsh universal policies that no reasonable population would approve of). What we can do, however, is require an IUD in exchange for financial help from society. This would make it more likely the woman would eventually rise out of her impoverished condition and help insure that her future children aren't brought into the world at a huge disadvantage. This seems like a reasonable proposal. IUDs are temporary contraceptives that require no effort.

Is this proposal eugenic? Sure. It's negative eugenics, but not entirely. A true eugenic policy would seek to never have "inferior" genes replicated (or to significantly reduce the chance of it happening). This was the idea behind the movement and behind sterilizations in the USA and eventually Nazi Germany where the practice was besmirched in the eye of the public.

Taylor doesn't advocate, in this book anyway, "forced" abortions. He advocates for available abortions. Huge difference there. Abortion, as it is today, has a slight eugenic effect. I don't hear the people, other than the right-to-lifers, objecting against abortion because it has this (temporary) effect.

The overwhelming majority of the bulk deals with the discussion on race. Taylor balances the unanswered rhetoric that has been spewing the United States for at least four decades now.

[Cwn_annwn_13 · Rating 3 out of 5]

Taylor does a good job pointing out and documenting things like double standards in the media, movies, etc in how blacks are portrayed in an overly positive light compared to reality. Also how if a violent crime occurs and the victim is black and the perpetrator white it often becomes a a national hysteria, whereas black on white crimes, which are staggeringly more common are buried if not out and out intentionally covered up. He points out all the typical things that these respectable quasi racists talk about, affirmative action, unfair hiring practices, academic/leftist hypocrisy, etc.

Here's where I have a problem with Taylor. He, as is typical of right wingers, both racial, and non racial, big on whining about welfare and social programs. Well I live in a Scandinavian country that puts a lot of money into social programs and I've seen firsthand how they benefit a society if you have a society where the majority isn't complete scum. The biggest thing though is Taylor is completely detached from working class white people. He is Yale educated and grew up going to private schools in Japan and I believe France also. He is totally out of touch with how life is for poor, working and middle class whites. He is more or less trying to sell himself off to upper class whites and conservative Jews. There is no criticism of capitalism in this book and of course he doesn't dare say the "J" word or claim that what is going on is intentional social engineering from the highest levels of society. Its all the just misguided leftists setting government policies and caving in to system controlled black rabblerousers like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton that are the problem in his world. If your not a stiff right winger I would recomend Jim Goads Redneck Manifesto way before anything written by the Jared Taylors or Pat Buchanans of the world.

[Jonathan M · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jared Taylor is a self-described “race realist” and “white advocate,” and the founder of American Renaissance, a monthly magazine he began publishing in 1990. Taylor rejects the widely accepted and uncriticized notion that all white people are inherently ‘racist’ because “[c]harges of racism can be made with the same impunity as were charges of communism at the height of the McCarthy era.”

Taylor debunks such charges with over 1,200 annotations from national newspapers, magazines, and studies, illustrating the opposite: mass discrimination against whites.

For a book published over thirty years ago—much of it using qualitative and quantitative data from the mid-late 80s—Paved with Good Intentions reads as though it were published this year. It describes impoverished neighborhoods, rampant crime, race riots, illiteracy, drug addiction, single, teenage mother households...all beneath the umbrella of Civil Rights. How is it possible for blacks to live worse today than under Jim Crow racism? And why has so little changed?

The answer is in the attitudes of institutions, and the people, both white and black. Blacks receive government favors in the form of programs: racial quotas, welfare programs and affirmative action. The media buries the facts that blacks commit most violent crimes, including violent crimes against whites, due to the infantilizing and institutionalized double standards which exacerbate the moral problems that plague blacks. Furthermore, affirmative action is a discredit to those blacks that can compete, and do so successfully, by awarding them simply because of race. Whites are silent to this unfair treatment; they don’t want to be called racist.

However prosperous the American government, money can never fill the gap that separates the capabilities of the races, and neither can reverse discrimination. Only humility. By acknowledging the truth, however unpleasant, that whites are not inherently racist, and blacks cannot compete with whites without the government imposed double standards, American society can begin to heal.

This summer, the Supreme Court’s conservative majority (which includes Clarence Thomas, a black man) is likely to abolish affirmative action. With institutional meritocracy restored, society will remain largely unchanged; generational moral rot will take generations to repair. Blacks would have to take personal responsibility for their individual actions, a pursuit that will not happen overnight. Things will become worse before they become better. History rhymes; expect riots.

[Bob Bingham · Rating 4 out of 5]

A thirty year old book that is still very much up to date in its analysis of problems with respect to favorable treatment of minorities (especially blacks) at the expense of whites. The very negative reviews this book has received perfectly illustrate what the author (Jared Taylor) states. Instead of dealing honestly with the issues he raises, it is easier to just write him off as a racist. I don't share Taylor's endorsement of Norplant as a solution to the very real problem of teenage pregnancy among the underclass. At best, that is a band-aid approach. Frankly, politicians and their wretched programs are largely to blame (Taylor does a great job of documenting), and it would benefit everyone if the funding and minority set asides were simply cut off totally.

[Spencer Willardson · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a book that I found in a pile of free books at the university. It is really interesting to read it and see that many of its ideas are now playing out in the courts and in the public. The focus on white nationalism is uncomfortable, but the double-standard that is exposed really sets up the discussion about a white backlash.

Ultimately, focusing on what makes us different and having different sets of standards for different racial groups - no matter the group - is divisive. This book illustrates that both in cold logic and in an appeal to to anecdotes that reveal the author's point of view as someone who was at the forefront of the backlash.

[Damned Snake · Rating 4 out of 5]

Book is very apologetic towards american blacks but this approach is good in this type of material, makes it very normie friendly but lacks evolutionary part of black failure as with it affirmative action makes sense, they are biologically disadvantaged and to be equal in white society it's simply obligatory to apply different rules towards them.

[Roger · Rating 5 out of 5]

A thoughtful and humane work

I first read this when it first appeared in 1994. On rereading it holds up well and is even more i.impactful in this era of Marxist DEI race communism. For open minds only.

[Mark]

It is frightening to realize this was published almost 30 years ago.

[Larry · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book confirms what I have been thinking for a long time. There are so many racial problems in America. What started out as affirmative action to fill quotas when two candidates were equally qualified turned into having separate qualifications for whites and non whites for the same positions. In many cases employers were hiring people who were not even close to meeting the job requirements. Not much can be done to rectify this problem. As pointed out in the book, any time a white person speaks out about a person of color, well you know what happens. In case you don’t, they are labeled a racist. You just have to watch the news and hear how often that word is tossed out without merit.

[Ronnie Fairley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Even over 20 years after this book's published date, this book's take on race relations in America is still accurate and relevant today.