A Failure of Intellectual Nerve By James Reed
I am not surprised. According to Retraction Watch, “Elsevier Journal to Retract 2012 Paper widely Derided as Racist”:
the following article has been pulled: J. Philippe Rushton and D. I. Templer, “Do Pigmentation and Melanocortin System Modulate Aggression and Sexuality in Humans as they do in Other Animals?” Personality and Individual Differences, vol. 53, 2012, pp. 4-8.
Why is the paper now censored? The abstract tells us all: “We review studies that have found darker pigmented individuals average higher amounts of aggression and sexual activity than lighter pigmented individuals. We hypothesize that similar relationships between pigmentation, aggression, and sexuality occur in humans.”
The Rushton/Templer paper first reviewed non-human animal studies that indicated that darker pigmented animals had higher than average levels of aggression and sexual activity than lighter pigmented animals. The comprehensive literature review indicates that right throughout the animal kingdom, this relationship is found. As humans are animals, it is a reasonable hypothesis to investigate whether or not this holds for humans too. Yes, but today, not politically correct.
The available literature indicates, that authors argue, that both within human populations and between populations, darker pigmented individual have higher than average levels of aggression and sexual activity and lower IQs. They examined crime statistics, rates of murder, rape and serious assault, psychopathology in childhood and adolescence, sexual activity, and rates of sexually transmitted diseases. All of these areas are confirmed by the pigmentation hypothesis.
Naturally a paper like that cannot be left to survive, even though by some fluke it was published in the first place. Hence the need for independent journals, all on-line, and freely accessible to the general public, not shut behind pay walls. And, in such journals, scholars can pull no punches, and hit harder, so to speak.
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