NBC News Tonight
Black Athletes - Fact & Fiction
Public Approved
| Name | Value |
|---|---|
| Code | adi-vid-01030 |
| Title | NBC News Tonight |
| Subtitle | Black Athletes - Fact & Fiction |
| Description | Are blacks better athletes than whites? Knowledge is better than ignorance. |
| Subject (keywords) | Performance Analysis ; |
| Duration | 01:37:47 |
| Created on | 1/16/2013 3:40:37 PM |
| Label | Approved |
| Privacy | Public |
| Synopsis |
Black Athletes: Fact and FictionThis video discusses the controversial topic of racial differences in athletic performance, focusing on the dominance of black athletes in American sports. Hosted by Tom Brokaw, the video features interviews with various experts, including Dr. Gideon Ariel, a former Israeli Olympic athlete, and Brooks Johnson, the Stanford University track coach. The video begins with a test set up by Dr. Ariel to evaluate jumping ability among the University of California Irvine basketball team, which showed that black athletes jumped higher than their white counterparts. This led to a discussion on the stereotype of black athletes being naturally gifted and white athletes being hard workers. Brokaw then discusses the potential implications of acknowledging racial differences in athletic performance, arguing that knowledge is better than ignorance. He also mentions that there are physiological differences between races, such as susceptibility to certain diseases. The video also features a debate between Dr. Ariel and Coach Johnson, with the latter arguing against the notion of black athletes having a natural advantage. Johnson suggests that the perceived superiority of black athletes is a result of societal and cultural factors, rather than genetic differences. The video concludes with a discussion on the lack of representation of black individuals in high-prestige positions within sports, reinforcing racial stereotypes. It also touches on the potential genetic advantages black athletes may have, such as less body fat and longer levers, but emphasizes that these advantages are not the sole reason for their success. The video ends with a call for further research and discussion on this complex issue, acknowledging that while there may be some differences between black and white athletes, these differences should be put into an appropriate context. This video transcription discusses the physiological differences between black and white athletes and how these differences may contribute to their performance in various sports. The video explores the theory that black athletes have key biochemical advantages that allow them to excel in sports requiring explosive energy and short bursts of high-intensity activity, such as track and field, football, and basketball. The video also delves into the cultural and social factors that may influence the dominance of black athletes in certain sports. It highlights the story of a young black basketball player from a notorious ghetto in North Philadelphia, who uses basketball as a ticket out of his challenging environment and into college. The transcription further discusses the success of Kenyan runners in long-distance races, attributing their dominance to factors such as altitude, diet, and a tradition of running from a young age. The video concludes by noting the physiological differences between East African and West African runners, suggesting that these differences have evolved over time to suit the specific athletic demands of their environments. Video SynopsisThe video discusses the dominance of black athletes in sports, exploring the reasons behind this phenomenon. It suggests that Kenyans' love for running and their tribal traditions have contributed to their success in athletics. The video also highlights the struggles of black Americans in sports, drawing parallels with their fight for equality and recognition. The video features interviews with various athletes and sports professionals, including Ibrahim Hussein, a Kenyan marathon runner, and Brooks Johnson, a Stanford track coach. They discuss the challenges faced by black athletes and the stereotypes they often encounter. The video also explores the idea of physiological differences between black and white athletes, with some scientists suggesting that black athletes may have a genetic edge. However, this theory is contested by others who argue that these differences are culturally acquired. The video concludes with a discussion on the lack of black executives in sports and the enduring racial prejudices in the industry. Despite the success of black athletes on the field, they often face barriers in advancing to higher positions within sports organizations. The video ends with a call for further discussion and understanding of the issues surrounding black athletes in sports. Video SynopsisThe video features a panel discussion on the topic of black athletes, their performance, and the factors that contribute to their success. The panel includes Dr. Molini, Dr. Bashar, Arthur Ash, Richard Lapchek, Dr. Gideon Ariel, Steve Gibbs, and Dr. Bouchard. The discussion begins with Dr. Molini addressing the development of the black population in the United States and the varying degrees of admixture. He emphasizes the importance of considering both biological and social conditions in understanding athletic performance. Arthur Ash shares his comfort with the conversation and acknowledges the sociological implications of discussing racial superiority in athletics. The conversation then shifts to the treatment of black athletes as gladiators and the impact of racism on their careers. Richard Lapchek, from the Center for the Study of Sport in Society, expresses concern about the denigration of black athletes and the potential for young black children to overemphasize sports at the expense of their education. Dr. Gideon Ariel discusses his study on jumping ability and the role of genetic makeup and specific training in athletic performance. Steve Gibbs, an athlete, questions the objectivity of the scientists, leading to a discussion on the potential racial bias in their tests. Dr. Molini and Dr. Bouchard defend their research, highlighting the need for a biocultural approach to understanding athletic performance. The conversation concludes with a discussion on the impact of cultural and environmental factors on the success of black athletes. Video SynopsisThe video features a discussion on the controversial topic of racial differences in athletic performance. The conversation is led by Edwards, who has studied this issue since his graduate days at Cornell University. He argues that human capability is evenly distributed across all populations and that race itself is a questionable scientific, biological, and genetic validity. He criticizes the flawed nature of studies that suggest a race-linked difference between blacks and whites. Dr. Bershard, another participant in the discussion, agrees with Edwards, stating that there have been no genetic studies comparing black and white gene characteristics affecting performance. He mentions that only 10% of human genetic variation is specific to one human race or group, while 90% is shared by all human individuals. He also points out an intriguing difference in favor of black athletes from West Africa in high-intensity power performance. The discussion also includes the perspectives of Terry Brown, a football player and track athlete at Columbia, who expresses his concern about the undertones of racism in the program. He argues that the program downplays the hard work and effort of African-American athletes by attributing their success to physiological superiority. The video concludes with Edwards expressing his appreciation for the open discussion of such controversial issues, believing that it helps educate people about what's really going on. The host, Tom Broca, hopes that the program will serve as a tribute to the hard work of black athletes in America. |
Audio Transcript
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On after eight this morning the black athlete. His dominance of American sport will be the
focus of an NBC News special tonight. It's called black athletes fact and fiction. Tom
Brokaw is hosting that special. Our blacks, better athletes than whites. This is the
University of California Irvine basketball team and this is Dr. Gideon Ariel, a former
Israeli Olympic athlete. Four NBC Dr. Ariel set up this test to evaluate
jumping ability. He videotaped all 16 players, eight blacks, eight whites. The
dunks were analyzed in his computer lab. The differences between the blacks and
the whites were dramatic. We're talking here about vertical jump and that
represents how much you move your body and you see that in all cases the black
lines will represent the black athletes. We're higher or jumping higher than the
white athletes. Many broadcasters and sports fans of both races talk about
blacks as natural athletes.
Whites are described as hard workers who can't run or jump naturally. When you're
watching television and you see someone described as a great natural athlete.
Yeah, I know exactly what he's talking about. He's black. Why? Because that's the
racist attitude that blacks are natural because they're naturally lazy so anything
they get they don't get from hard work. They get because God just gave them the
right gene pool. What is really being said in a kind of underhanded way is that
blacks are closer to beasts and animals in terms of their genetic and physical
and anatomical makeup than they are to the rest of humanity. And that's where the
indignity comes in. Tom Brokaw, good morning. Good morning. Merely, your
critics are going to say that merely asking this question implies a certain
amount of racism. How do you plead? They're already saying that. I think how we
plead is that knowledge is better than ignorance. And there is a growing body
of information both culturally and biologically that shows that there are
some differences that do exist. And what we try to do is to put that into a
context, into an appropriate perspective tonight. We're trying to lift it out of
the gutter, lift it out of the bar room so that people will know knowledge from
myth. And I think that on balance that we have succeeded at that, although this
is an issue that is still very much in progress, people are still coming to
conclusions about it all.
Father, you had all that some of the scientific evidence may support the
beliefs of some avowed racist. No, not necessarily because there are differences
between us. I mean, for example, blacks are susceptible to sickle cell anemia.
There are some were handles who are lactose intolerant. We know that white
Northern European males, for example, are more susceptible to skin cancer. So there
are some physiological differences that exist. And what we do in this case is to
put it all in the appropriate context of one of the scientists on it calls it a
biocultural phenomenon. And I think that's a good way of putting it because a lot
of it has to do with the closed avenues that are available to blacks. That is,
that sports is one of the few areas in which they really can prevail and
let's bring in Dr. Gideon Ariel, who we met in that clip. He's the man who
compared the strengths and weaknesses of black and white athletes. And Dr. Ariel,
no doubt in your mind. Well, when I'm analyzing outlets and analyzing actually
the false, the laws of motion, how it applied to the human body. In this case,
I'll leave the show that certain outlets can jump, jump, pile or run
faster and with no regards to, to, to aces. But what about the regards to, to
whatever cultural differences might exist? I mean, what would have happened if
you would have taken a number of blacks from various backgrounds? Would you have
seen considerable differences? Number of whites from various backgrounds? Among
them, would you have seen considerable differences? There are ultimate forces
that control a particular event in sport. And any outlet, whether it's a white or
black that can meet this requirement, will win. Of course, we can compare whites to
whites. We, in fact, tried to compare athletes in Israel to athletes in United
States. And in both cases, do we're white? And we found out that the outlets in
Israel couldn't even come close to the American outlets in the United States.
Let me, let's introduce another guess. In, in, in that clip, we also met Brooks
Johnson, who's the Stanford University track coach this morning. He's at our
San Francisco affiliate, KRON TV. Good morning, coach. Good morning. In, in, in
impolite terms, you all think this, you think this is just so much bunk, I guess?
Why? Well, first of all, I'm shocked that getting Ariel, a world-renowned
scientist of Jewish extraction would be an apologist for this kind of a, an
explanation is for this kind of an attitude. Since Hitler probably had his
holy men and scientists making the same kinds of studies to prove that the so-called
Aryan race would superior to the Jews, the Slavs, and any other under mentioned.
That's a tough equation, coach. Sir, I said, that's a tough equation. Well, it
works. And the point is, is that whenever there is this kind of an issue that comes
up, there are people that are going to rush to the forefront to justify and
legitimatize something as heinous and insidious as this stupid myth. Well, coach,
you and I have talked about this as well, and what we're going to show on the
course of this program tonight, and what we can't show on the brief time that we
have here today, is the broad context because there are some scientific studies
now that exist in Canada, for example, on muscle biopsy. There is Dr. Molina, who's
done the anthropological studies, and what we say is, and you have a chance to
say your piece tonight as well, that all that has to be put in the context of what
happens, for example, in terms of inspiration for young black athletes, and
what happens in their homes in terms of role models, and how they have an
opportunity, in fact, they are inspired to develop what physical skills that they
have. We also know that there are genetic differences within whites, that some
white athletes are better in terms of their physical equipment than others,
but that some of those white athletes may bring more dedication to this sport.
Tom, as that applies to this country, that's irrelevant, because basically,
if you're talking about so-called blacks in this country, we're not blacks, we're
Euro-African-American, and as a result, we're not even a race. So, what if, for
example, that Dr. Jay's or Michael Jordan's leaping ability comes from the
white jeans that he has, or the Indian jeans that he has, rather than the black
jeans, wouldn't that be the ultimate paradox in irony? For a matter of fact,
he is, and those who are not Euro-African.
Formulate the laws of motion, even give it a race, or culture, or whatever it is,
I'm a bio-mechanist, I'm analyzing the forces. What we found out that in a
sprint event, in an explosive event, in the recent Olympics, the black athletes
would excel. I mean, that's, sure, these are the facts.
But that's also part of the endorphins.
Dr. Ira, you also know that's also a psychological or a sociological
phenomenon, which you didn't measure. I mean, those physical forces are the
ultimate manifestation of an attitude, an aptitude, that's a quiet socially and
culturally, that they're white athletes with the exact same physical
characteristics, who don't have what I determine, what I call the sprint
syndrome, who don't react as well, or as fast, or as
aggressively. Those are acquired, those are acquired
characteristics. Well, you're quite right in that
regard, Coach, and what we're going to show tonight is that it is
this whole picture that does come together, and there are many
complex parts to it. It is a very complex issue,
but in fact, there are, it now appears, that there are some differences. We're
going to try to put that in some appropriate context.
Coach, I'm going to have to leave something to be done tonight.
Coach Johnson and San Francisco, Dr. Ariel and Tom, thanks very much.
10 o'clock tonight, and then you'll be back at
after local news to talk about it. Talk about it more, and there's a lot to
talk about. Okay, we're back after a break. This is
today on NBC. Of course, in this country, now a
controversial Republican book deal, and $100 million in the
Pennsylvania Lottery. NBC Nightly News with Tom Brokaw.
Good evening. In Moscow, Beijing, and Tokyo tonight,
power plays, challenges, and a resignation have the American diplomatic and
intelligence analyst working overtime. We begin in Moscow tonight,
where Mikhail Gorbachev has strengthened his position
by executing a stunning purge of the Communist Party's powerful central
committee, and he's opened a high-level investigation of poison gas used
against dissidents. NBC's Bob Abernathy is there.
And a report tonight on black athletes fact-infliction.
Why are they dominating major sports? Is black success in sports a two-edged
sword for young blacks?
Tonight at 10, nine central time, NBC News examines a controversial subject.
Black athletes fact-infiction. Why are black males dominating the most
popular sports in America today? Is there a physiological difference between
blacks and whites, however small? And if sport is one of the few
avenues open to blacks today, does that become a kind of trap for black society?
This is an issue that stretches from city playgrounds to
university laboratories.
Philip Crump is the best high school guard in Philadelphia, nicknamed
Sub, quicker than a subway. He practices long and hard,
but Philip also believes he has a natural advantage.
I feel as though that, you know, when I get on the court and I see a white
guy stick me, you know, I think I could take him. That's natural, you know, because
every black guy thinks like that. Basketball is more than a sport,
more than a black and white proposition for Philip.
Basketball, that is a ticket, we need to go to college.
Castleman shoots from outside, and it's good.
Fifty years ago, basketball was the same ticket for poor inner-city
white kids, a way out. What they left behind was an inner city,
more and more black, and a game transformed into a black sport.
Seventy-five percent of the pros are now black. Most came from the ghetto.
This was their way out. They would use their sports skills and their
physical challenge to open doors for them and
allow them to go to a good university where they can
get an education. We're channeling disproportionately high numbers toward
athletic participation. Dr. Harry Edwards is an expert on racism
and sports. We have the cultural reality of the
most positive role models for black kids, being athletes,
and so that is what they aspire to do. And new scientific studies raise the
controversial possibility that genetics also play a role.
Test on children. Try one more time.
Jumping studies on adults and sophisticated muscle
comparisons suggest that blacks indeed have some small
physical edge. I think the jumping is in part,
you might say, Gina, typically or genetically based.
The black youngsters tend to run faster and tend to jump better.
If you happen to have the propensity or the capacity
to excel in terms of the physiological sense, you may have an advantage.
Ironically, black domination on the field has not been rewarded with a
proportionate chair of the front office and coaching positions.
To many blacks, that just reinforces a racial stereotype.
Whites see them as gladiators, performers.
High prestige positions involving authority, decision-making, and so forth
have been virtually areas of white monopoly.
Whites, as a corollary, to this belief in black physical superiority
have come to believe that blacks are intellectually deficient.
The whole idea is to convince black people that there's superior in some areas,
and therefore, by definition, must be inferior in other areas.
Brooks Johnson is head track coach at Stanford.
The fact that a guy is a fantastic cotton picker doesn't mean he's dominating the
plantation, and the fact that he gets extra rewards for being an excellent cotton
picker doesn't mean he's dominating the plantation.
When his days are over, he does not own the 40 acres in a mule.
You're calling Michael Jordan a cotton picker.
In a sense, yes.
It is a complex issue. Philip may have a physical edge, but he's a great player
because of his dedication and hard work. His only role models have been athletes.
It is the world where blacks seem to have an opportunity for great rewards.
It is, however, a world reserved for only a few, and if Philip doesn't make it as a
basketball player, what other opportunities are available?
That's the great dilemma in the black community.
As I'm used to this Tuesday night, I'm Tom Broker.
I'll see you tonight at nine central time, and then again after the local news for a discussion
of black athletes, fact, and fiction.
For the following NBC News Special...
Our blacks are better athletes than whites.
The blacks, physically, in many cases, are made better.
Your black athletes are much more suited to the sporting environment.
When I get in a court and I see a white guy stick me, you know, I think I could take him.
Blacks do dominate the major sports.
Track, black men and women were the big stars and soul.
Three of every four players in pro basketball are black.
There's 63% of the National Football League.
Almost a third of the top stars in baseball.
Blacks hold most of the major titles in boxing.
This is a program about how that happened, how black males especially have made big-time sports
a mostly black world. There are so many theories.
Sportscaster Jimmy the Greek Snyder had his own crude analysis.
The black is a better athlete to begin with, because he's been bred to be that way,
because of his high thighs and big thighs that goes up into his back,
and they can jump higher and run faster.
The next day, he was fired.
Why black athletes are so successful as a complicated and sensitive issue,
many people believe that it's racist to suggest any differences between black and white athletes,
and many blacks are convinced that white people want to believe
that the black athlete is physically superior but intellectually inferior.
And what about a thinking athlete?
Well, we know damn well he's a white person,
because white people have the cerebral capacities that blacks don't possess.
I think it's to the advantage of the black athletes to be proud that God was on their side.
Tonight, we'll introduce you to scientists who believe by and large,
black athletes do have a genetic edge.
We'll find out why basketball has become a black sport.
We'll take you to a country where black athletes say they do have a natural advantage,
and they're proud of it.
We'll hear the concerns of blacks who believe that all of this is just one more manifestation
of racism. We won't be able to answer all of the questions, but by the end of this evening,
we will have a better understanding of the black athlete, fact and fiction.
NBC News presents black athletes fact and fiction.
The 1932 Los Angeles Olympics.
The two black starters, Eddie Tolan and Ralph Metcalf,
one and two in the 100 meters.
It was the first gold medal ever won by a black in the sprints.
The grandeur of the Olympic stadium, the final of the men's 100 meters.
Our law starts his quest for four gold medals.
Now, 50 years later, blacks dominate the sprints.
23 of the top 25 all-time men's 100 meter runners are black.
Carl Lewis.
There is this debate about whether blacks are security or sprinters faster,
whether they can jump higher than whites at the Seoul Olympics.
We all noticed it was an all black 100 meter final.
Do you think that that was just an accident or is there some kind of an advantage?
Generally, the blacks physically in many cases are made better.
I mean, I can look at it and tell that we generally carry less fat.
I mean, the athletic ones. We have longer levers and those are the two things I think
that are the major areas that help us sprint better.
It is a hotly debated issue.
The head track coach at Stanford University, Brooks Johnson.
Coach, this business about, do they have a natural advantage?
Physiologically and atomically, anthropomorphically, no.
None whatsoever.
No.
Are there differences?
Do blacks in running and jumping or whites in swimming and other sports start with a genetic
edge? Robert Malina is an anthropologist and international expert in sports science
from the University of Texas.
But it looks like to me, what you have at birth, on average,
is probably the black infant is somewhat more mature biologically speaking than the white infant.
Black infants tend to also have somewhat advanced skeletal development.
They also tend to be somewhat more neurologically, or what we call neuromuscularly alert.
Scientists have long observed that African children are raised very physically
and therefore develop motor skills early on.
They think there may be parallels in our country where tests show black infants
with a dramatic advantage over whites and coordination.
However, a new study suggests that the edge blacks seem to have may also be genetic.
I'm looking to see if Warren will put his arms out just as he's doing out and hold himself up.
This baby is receiving the Denver developmental screening test.
It measures motor skills.
It's used in more than 35 countries.
Pick it up.
Last year, the test developers compared 1200 black and white children
up to six years of age.
Black required skills earlier than whites in 15 of 30 tests.
Some were even, whites led in only three.
William Prankenberg and Joe Dodd were expecting few if any differences.
They were startled.
So it made me wonder maybe this is a significant kind of a difference between blacks and whites.
The biological factors are major determinants of how the child seems to be developing during
first year or first few months of life, but that with increasing age, the impact of the environment
plays a major role and made to some extent modify how the child's biological development is being
expressed. Black children also perform better than whites as they get older.
In one of many studies, the anthropologist, Dr. Molina, compared whites and blacks
at two Philadelphia schools.
Black children consistently had an edge in the dashes and vertical jump.
But what happens when children's bodies mature when they become adults?
And that's 12.8.
Dr. Molina has done extensive research on body types, including a study of Olympic athletes.
Dr. Molina, are there physiological differences between blacks and whites?
They are differences. Blacks typically have a more dense skeleton,
long arms and relatively longer legs.
Blacks tend to have slender pelvis or hips.
They tend to have proportion less fat on their extremities.
Carl Lewis, Julius Irving, Eric Dickerson. Are there extraordinary athletic abilities
the result of their race or a result of their hard work, their culture?
This, of course, is an explosive question and a lot of people were just as soon avoided.
We invited the director of the U.S. Olympic Committee to appear on this program that he
declined. And yet, any scientists believe that racial differences are legitimate areas for inquiry.
This is an exercise physiology lab at LaValle University in Quebec City, Canada.
Dr. Claude Bouchard has compared muscle biopsies of hundreds of sedentary blacks and whites.
The results are just in and they clearly indicate that the
Caucasian that we tested had a much higher concentration of slow twitch fiber.
The light-colored fibers are slow twitch, which are good for endurance.
The West African had more dark fibers, fast twitch muscles.
Having more of the fast twitch implies that you generally have more of the larger fibers,
more of the fibers which can contract more rapidly and more
explosively with more power in the contraction.
Tests will also run on fat levels and whites and blacks to find out how enzymes work on their
metabolism to create energy bursts. Blacks seem to have much more ability to both to liberate the
energy, free the energy in the blood or to take up the energy circulating from the blood and store it.
And the differences are striking. We're talking about a two-fold, two or three-fold differences.
Dr. Bouchard then tested his theory that blacks had some key biochemical advantages.
The results from this 90-second drill. Blacks show more explosive energy at first.
Whites are less powerful, but they have a lot of endurance.
These characteristics match the pattern of black performance in sports.
In the track and field, we're talking primarily about the short duration, high intensity and
aerobic work. And the same is true in football. In basketball, we're talking about an activity
which is also loaded in terms of anaerobic activity, short burst type of activity.
Slammed on. Let's play ground sports. And now the dominant style in the pros.
Except for a few token leapers like Tom Chambers, now the Phoenix Suns, whites in basketball
don't do this very well. The Atlanta Hawks have two of the best jumpers in basketball,
Spud Web and Dominique Wilkins. When I was growing up, my thing had always been
able to want the dunked the ball. You have a lot of white guys who, I think, basically work on
their jump shot, how on the ball and passing, don't get in really to the dunk thing.
You know, they always say that the white man disease, other black guys jump higher and sound
funny, but I don't know why. Does white man's disease really exist?
This is the University of California Irvine basketball team and this is Dr. Gideon Ariel,
a former Israeli Olympic athlete. He founded the biomechanics division of the U.S. Olympic
Committee. Four NBC, Dr. Ariel, set up this test to evaluate jumping ability.
He videotaped all 16 players, eight blacks, eight whites. The dunks were analyzed in his
computer lab. The differences between the blacks and the whites were dramatic.
We're talking here about vertical jump and that represents how much you move your body
and you see that in all cases, the black lines which represent the black athletes
were higher or jumping higher than the white athletes. The black athletes are able to
explode more efficiently off the ground. Dr. Ariel contends that the ability to jump
is genetic and it's not fundamentally altered by training. He issued this challenge.
If I will take right now 20 black athletes and 20 white athletes and let them jump from this table
into a force platform, it's a plate that has a surface that can measure forces.
And I'll tell you who is black and who is white, just by the reaction force.
So we took him up on that, all 16 players. The results were stored in a computer.
A few weeks later, we gave Dr. Ariel a blind test. We had him randomly put the jumps onto
the computer screen and identified the player's race. Here you see a definite black athletes.
You see that there was a shock absorption here and then there is increasing the force
in the vertical direction after he hit the plate. If we look on this one,
white athlete, no question about it. This athlete is basically collapsing on the force platform.
Dr. Ariel identified all correctly. These and other tests consistently show that blacks
are more explosive runners and jumpers. Scientists are divided over whether that
means that whites are inferior athletes in general. When you look on a white athletes,
they are very good in a power event but different type of power event where you need to move
heavy objects at a slow speed such as in the shot put.
Are there sports which we would predict success for a white more so than for a black on a
purely physical or physiological basis? I don't think there is right now.
The science of sports is very new but the research that we've uncovered, all of it,
suggests that blacks do have some physical advantages. Others contend those differences
are not significant enough to explain black domination of sports. They say it comes from hard work
and social factors. Dr. Harry Edwards is a sociologist specializing in racism and sports at the
University of California. We have racism, discrimination that curtails black access to alternative high
prestige occupations. We're channeling disproportionately high numbers toward athletic participation.
Do you think that there are any physiological differences between blacks and whites?
No differences that make any difference in terms of cultural, athletic, artistic,
intellectual capability and competence. What about the ability to run faster, to jump higher?
Those are essentially culturally linked capabilities. If you have these physiological
advantages, however small or slight they may be, they can make an enormous difference.
At the level of the elite world-class athlete, yes because differences among
athletes that caliber are so small that if you perhaps have an advantage that might be genetically
based, you may have this distinctive advantage that that level might be very very significant.
A fraction of a second is a matter of the difference being the gold medal in fourth place.
Here we go. Next, basketball, talent, a dream and a lot of very hard work.
Philip Crump lives in the most notorious ghetto in North Philadelphia. It's also the home of some
of the best basketball players in the country. For the lucky few, this is where dreams are made.
I don't miss this out. Boy, I'd say me and the pros playing with the Golden State Warriors,
you know, coming home, you know, we live in Jersey or maybe California. Big mansion, you know.
Basically, that's everybody's dream, to get out of projects and make it, you know, big.
His nickname is Sub, quicker than a Subway. He's school yard smart and the best high school
guard in the city. I feel as though that, you know, when I get in a court and I see a white
guy stick me, you know, I think I could take him. That's natural, you know, because every black
guy thinks like that. All right, wait, you take a bite.
All right, you're coming into the arraignment rules and projects that I wouldn't venture
through here at night. This is Philip's neighborhood. Here thoughts turn away from basketball to
survival. This was a crack house and drugs marijuana cocaine.
This crack house is just across the way from where Philip lives with his mother, sister,
and her two kids. Basketball is his ticket out of here. Even the drug dealers respect that.
I want some of it. He got a basketball career. He's smart. He's not done. And he trying to make
something. I know he won't move out of the projects like I do. Philip is out on the court
every weekend at seven in the morning. He became a great basketball player by making it a way of
life, a way out of the projects. Total dedication. The same kind of dedication that paid off for
white players who escaped these same ghettos 50 years ago. Whoever is the dominant ethnic group
at that point in time in the city appears to be the dominant individual in basketball.
That's it. Sunny Hill has run an all-star league in Philadelphia for 25 years. The game of
basketball is not a racist game. It's a city game. If you trace basketball back to the 20s, 30s,
and the 40s, and that's when the Jewish people were very dominant in the inner city and they
dominated basketball. We always thought in Philadelphia that every Jewish boy was born
with a basketball in his hand. Now the spas fight a pass through the solid defense.
Dave DeBrow was a star player on the original Spas, the South Philadelphia Hebrew Association
but Casselman shoots from outside and it's good.
During the 20s and 30s, the spas were the Yankees of Pro Basketball. They won 13 titles in 22 seasons
and they rushed it up the floor and the spas win. It was absolutely a way out of the ghetto. It
was started where a little Jewish boy would never have been able to go to college if it wasn't for
the amount of basketball playing and for the scholarship. Jewish players helped the spas,
the New York Celtics, and the Cleveland Rosenblum's dominate their leagues.
Their major competition, the Harlem Globetrotters, and the New York Renaissance pop-gates team.
As far as the rid of the spas is Philadelphia, the boardwood hotel, packed house, spas,
heady, spark, smooth. You can see a pickle out there on the floor.
Red as us, a boomer ball club, the ball booth, the ball player's booth.
The Wrens are a move-in club, the spas heady. Translation, the Jews got by in strategy,
the blacks and quickness. Those two are stereotypes innocent enough but they can quickly turn racist.
Fifty years ago, sports writers were struggling to explain the Jewish dominance of basketball.
Listen to what the sports writer Paul Gallico wrote. He said,
the reason I suspect that basketball appeals to the Hebrew with his oriental background
is that the game places a premium on an alert, scheming mind, flashy trickiness,
artful dodging, and general sworn alliceness. Now, that's at least as bad as calling a black
a natural athlete.
Over time, the character of the ghettos changed. The Jews moved out enough.
Blacks from the south moved in. The Philadelphia inner city, 10 percent black,
50 years ago, now is all black.
There was a rising young star on the basketball horizon a few years ago in Philadelphia.
He was Will Chamberlain. The black migration transformed the cities and basketball.
Chamberlain and dozens of young blacks went from the Philadelphia streets to college in the pros.
But no one had more impact than a New York kid who came to play for the Philadelphia 76ers.
Julius Irving, Dr. J.
You know, style counts in the in the black community, style counts in the in the in the playgrounds
and certainly being able to blend a very finesseful and graceful act with an act of force and power.
Yeah, it was the ultimate combination.
Irving and the stylish superstars that followed him are heroes to the younger kids.
Most of the stuff used to do is to be like Dr. J.
Phillips started playing basketball when he was eight years old.
The jungle gym was his court. This is our NBA. This is our world right here.
Basketball today is as black in its cultural configuration as the gospel and jazz and other
kinds of cultural expressions in this country that have been tremendously influenced by black
people. Also, you have the cultural reality of the most positive role models for black kids,
being athletes, and so that is what they aspire to do.
Sports heroes take on an even greater importance in families where the father isn't there.
Phillips father is in jail for murder.
I would love to see him make it.
Marvin Crump hopes that basketball will help his son escape the projects.
Constance, uh, dang wars, constance, drugs, he's able to get around it. That's a plus.
A lot of guys he grew up with in that neighborhood has come through here and the blessing is he hasn't
come through here.
Sports has helped put Phillips priorities in order.
They thought they thought they were too good for the common man. I mean, you know, they were
here at Franklin High. Only 15% of the kids go on to college. 70% of the basketball team does,
however. Phillip is an honor roll student.
Nebraska University, West Virginia.
Rhode Island University.
Marquette University.
Dozens of colleges are recruiting him.
Well, I'll listen to your opinion.
Whatever school is going to give you the best education.
Not talking about basketball, but talking about education.
David Spencer is an assistant college coach and recruiter.
Well, I'm here to talk to that University of Hawaii.
How many, am I the first school team?
By and large, the guys that come out of these kind of areas tend to be a little bit hungrier.
Basketball means more to some people in these areas than it would to someone in
suburbia, America, if you will.
He's going to take it out and he'll be in bounds where he normally is.
Now, the most aggressive and intelligent team is going to win this game today.
I think it's us. Let's make sure it's us.
All right. All right.
On three, one, two, three.
Go get it, Sup.
Basketball. Basketball.
When I'm playing, it feels like I'm in a little world of my own.
I'm going down the court, I feel as though that I can't be stopped.
I think I'm Magic Johnson or I'll just say something like that.
I mean, you cannot stop me.
That's the greatest feeling in the world.
The Black student athletes, they seem more intense and more focused on basketball.
They want more out of their lives, and so they're hungry.
Making it is what we always talk about.
That's what we're all striving to make it.
Here we go.
In America, part of making it usually includes a college education.
So, Sub's going to get back.
I really don't have my mind set on playing pro basketball.
You know, I just have a goal to play college basketball and be the best I can be.
Basketball, that is a ticket for me to go to college.
The color of the ghetto may have changed, but the game has not, and for many young men,
basketball is still their best shot in a society where opportunity is half the battle.
Phillip still has not made up his mind about which college he'll be attending this fall.
Black athletes, fact and fiction continues.
Can you, Paul Erring, 20 years old, an Olympic gold medalist training atop the
8000-foot Manningai volcano?
Running was just fun to me. I didn't put much air for it.
It comes naturally.
We need to be able to train it. It just comes naturally.
How much of an athlete's success is determination and how much is physiological?
Most people say, I've fought when I run.
Just make it easy. I've fought grateful.
You saw a human gazelle.
That's the idea.
One of Erring's coaches at the Olympics was John Belzian,
a white Kenyan who has been a national coach for more than 25 years.
We saw somebody who moves so smoothly that he doesn't look as if he's straining at all.
He looks as if it's a complete joy to be running.
Erring had been running competitively for less than three years when he qualified for
the 800-meter final in Seoul. He was an unknown, and for much of the race, he was in the last
place. When he finally made his move, the announcers confused him with his better-known Kenyan teammate.
That's the way Alina will not catch him. That's the difference.
We have blown this call. That is Paul Erring of Kenya. We made the mistake of the Olympic game.
Erring's Olympic victory was the most dramatic in a string of wins by this small
East African country.
I see myself as a part of the tradition here.
Kenya welcomed home seven medal winners in men's running.
That's more than any other country except the United States.
The runners celebrated with a Kenyan drink, cow's blood mixed with milk.
Blacks have long dominated the sprint races, now led by the Kenyans.
Black athletes are dominating the longer races as well. At the Olympics,
Blacks won every men's race except the marathon where they took second and third.
I've always believed in the supremacy of the Black athlete ever since I've been here.
I don't think I would have stayed here as long as I have. If I hadn't seen this vast potential
that exists here, I've been happy to work with it.
Kip Kano is the man who unleashed that potential.
Kano is now a gentleman farmer and a foster father to more than 40 children.
Kano is also the father of running in Kenya.
1968, the Mexico City Olympics, the world's undisputed top-miler, Jim Ryan,
faced the African challenger Kano in the 1500 meters. To sum, this classic matchup had racist
overtones. After all, no American Black had ever competed successfully at this distance,
at this level of competition. Some fans and coaches believe that Blacks didn't have the guts
or the intelligence of the white runners to handle the strategy necessary for the longer distances.
Nobody ever believed that a Black man could run any distance over the 800 meters.
It's another one of those myths that exist about Black people, and Kano destroyed that.
Overnight, Kano shattered a racist myth. He became the most famous African of his time.
Most of the Kenyan, young Kenyans, emitted and named themselves Kip Kano, and even in schools,
whoever won in the competition this is, I'm Kip Kano.
The Kenyans and other East Africans run only the longer races. The shorter races, the sprints,
are dominated by American Blacks who trace their ancestry to West Africa.
So even among Blacks, there are differences from region to region, from culture to culture.
Plainly, there are many factors other than race affecting athletic achievement.
Phillip and Doe is a Kenyan Olympic official.
Stowe, why are runners from Kenya so strong in the long-distance events in your judgment?
There has been several theories or reasons given that they start learning by race,
running or taking care of cows or working long distances. That was true in the runners of just a
year. But today some of these runners are living and training in America. So I presume
one of the reasons which one can give you the quality is that they just work hard at it.
We feel that the running is in our own blood. We feel that we are enjoying it.
I think it is the altitude. I think it is the diet. I think it is the tradition.
Right, so everybody together.
Calm O'Connell is headmaster and track coach at St. Patrick School, which many great Kenyan runners
attended. Listen, you hear the sound of feet coming together. So try to get in harmony with
somebody else. The athletes take running as being natural. They often use that term here
for local athletes. I used to run from home to school and if you are late, they'll punish you.
Abraham Hussein, one of the world's top marathoners, is from the Nandi Hills.
We run early in the morning for two miles and then you run back for lunch and then you run back
again in the afternoon. You see like the kids around here. They walk a little bit and then they
will run. It's a wheel of life down here.
Once that was made the bell ringer for the old school, so it means I had to be there in time.
It's an indirect type of training, which we don't realize but it works later.
Kenyans also believe that their diet contributes to their development as runners. They eat a
starchy cornmeal called ugale. It's carbohydrate rich, a perfect food for endurance.
The East African physique is well-structured for the longer races. Lean, long legs,
shaped by thousands of years of evolution. It is dramatically different than blacked from
West Africa. Look at innocent egg buniki. He's from Nigeria where the elevation is lower
and the diet rich in protein. Egg buniki is broad-shouldered and heavily muscled.
His physique resembles many American blacks such as Calvin Smith who traced their ancestry to
West Africa. So two very different types of black runners have evolved over the years.
The explosive runners such as Smith from West Africa and North America and leaner runners from
East Africa, such as Hussein, who are coming to prominence in the longer races.
Fred Hardy is an American track coach visiting his longtime friend, Kip Cano.
Twice a year, Hardy comes to Kenya to recruit athletes. He says that he can't find in the
United States. World-class distance runners. Who was that bank robber? Will he sudden?
Who asked why I robbed the bank? Is that where the money is?
Hello mama. Good to see you.
I want to have a word with you and mama. I beg Josiah.
You know, I'm hoping that he can come to the University of North Carolina.
We in Kalingin respect somebody with an elder and they will elder. I'm very young.
No, I don't. To us, to us Kalingin is an elderly person. He's given respect and I think he will
be a father of those kids and they accept. Thank you for your son.
If one were to circumscribe a circle of 60 miles, a radius of 60 miles around the town of
Alderett, up in the Great Rift Valley in the Nandi Hills, you would get about 90 percent
of the Kenyan athletes. It's obvious that something special has happened here. It may be
something of a genius. Kenyans have a love of running that distinguishes great athletes,
but the secret of their success is something more and very elusive. A spirit in their souls
linked to the tribal traditions that have shaped a small part of Kenya for so many generations.
You always feel that you should achieve something. Come home with a glory and that is our spirit
and the spirit of the Nandi. There is nothing impossible on that. You can do anything you want
to do it as long as you put concentration. You concentrate very much, okay, and you just believe
I can do it. Your blacks of America have had a similar sort of fight. They've had a struggle.
They've had to emerge. You know, there's this award in Swahili,
with they call Kuphumuliya, and it means to endure.
That special determination was on display at last year's Boston Marathon.
Ibrahim Hussein was one of the leaders. So long as I'll still be there, I'll always remember
what stuff. I was thinking all the time I was running after it. The last mile became a duel
with Juma Ikanga of Tanzania. Looks like Akanga now has made a move and it's the beginning to
spread for the finish line Hussein seems to have fallen back just a bit. As soon as I saw you was
moving and he wasn't moving any farther, I changed him to the 50th gear I think and I passed him.
It's Abraham Hussein who has taken over the lead of the Boston Marathon and it's Abraham Hussein
who has won the York and is about to win Boston. It's a very great feeling and I've always been
very proud of being Kenyan. This year Hussein finished fourth behind a Ethiopian, a Tanzanian,
and an Irishman. Next the cost of being better, racism and sports.
Get on to the lead! Brooks Johnson is on a mission.
I know you're in great shape, you're in great shape, you know what you gotta do.
Get on your lead Carol! The Stanford track coach is determined to find the great white sprinter.
He thinks that whites are just too intimidated to run the speed races.
If you've been brainwashed to think that because I'm black, I'm going to be faster than you,
then that prophecy will be fulfilled. I would like to dispel this myth. I would like to go out and
rub it in some people's noses by finding a white Carl Lewis. You're going to find a white Carl Lewis.
They're all over the place. Well where are they? Well a lot of them are doing other things.
Not many are stealing bases or running with a football, that's for sure.
Blacks not only dominate sports, they've also come to redefine athletic grace and style.
Mike Schmidt, the all-star third baseman for the Phillies. You know out of 24 men on the roster,
we probably have 12 to 13 black athletes and a couple of Latin athletes. So we kid around from
time to time about our heritage and why some of the black players are able to do to run faster,
jump higher, hit maybe hit the ball further than some of the white athletes. You know the black
athlete, you can almost tell in their walk that they're athletes.
It's a common stereotype that blacks have rhythm.
They're naturally graceful. Blacks have little choice but to play that role to get a shot in show
business. And it's open doors and sports as well.
The Harlem Globetrotters gave black stars a chance to play basketball when the pro game was still
all white. But it was vaudeville and it reinforced a common stereotype,
blacks as mere performers for an all-white audience. Dr. Harry Edwards.
Whites have always felt very comfortable with blacks being involved in activities that required
physical exertion. They've always been very comfortable with blacks working in the fields,
whether they were cotton fields or football fields. Many broadcasters and sports fans of both races
talk about blacks as natural athletes. Whites are described as hard workers who can't run or jump
naturally. They have white man's disease. Reverse racism has set in. Black security already
is so accepted that whites are now the butt of jokes. You hear it all the time attract me.
Fall start and I think they'll mark that one up to Mike Cole on the outside.
If I were Mike Cole, I'd jump too. I would have jumped a long time ago.
I'd be running now in the second place to try to get ahead of these guys.
Whites are praised for one aspect of their game. They're intelligence.
On this sequence, I want you to watch Jimmy Paxson, how he reads his defense of man.
It's not how fast you are. It's how smart you are coming off a pick.
Beautiful, very intelligent player. But blacks frequently are described very differently.
Jake Gibbs wanted to get this kid and that little monkey gets close, doesn't he?
What is really being said in a kind of underhanded way is that blacks are closer to beasts and animals
in terms of their genetic and physical and anatomical makeup than they are to the rest of humanity.
And that's where the indignity comes in. When you're watching television and you see someone
described as a great natural athlete. Yeah, I know exactly who he's talking about. He's black.
Why? Because that's the racist attitude that blacks are natural because they're
naturally lazy. So anything they get, they don't get from hard work. They get because
God just gave them the right gene pool. And what about a thinking athlete? Well we know damn well
he's a white person because white people have the cerebral capacities that blacks don't possess.
Blacks, understandably, are concerned that if it's demonstrated there are physiological
differences between blacks and whites, some people will jump to the conclusion that blacks are
intellectually inferior. After all, blacks have had a long, painful experience with outrageous
theories about white intellectual superiority. In the 19th century, so-called craniologists would
measure intelligence by the size of the skull's cavity. It simply reaffirmed their belief that
white European males were intellectually superior. Next on their scale, women and Asians. And at
the bottom of the scale, blacks. Berlin sounds the curtain call for the greatest athletic show on
Earth. The 1936 Olympics. The Nazis had their own race-based theories. They believed in the total
supremacy of the Nordic race. Oh, hell, Jesse Owens who leads the way. And like a streamlined
express, he sets the pace for America's sleep to victory. But Jesse Owens stunned Hitler's
Superman. The girl was curious that he's not exploring people to keep Owens and refused to
present the gold medal to Jesse. Owens went on to win four gold medals, destroying the myth of
Aryan physical superiority. But his dramatic wins raised the question of whether blacks are
physically superior. Blacks quickly emerged as stars as the color barrier began to break down
in sports. Baseball in the 40s, basketball in the 50s. By 1962, when the all-white
Washington Redskins traded for Bobby Mitchell, every team in all the major sports had at least
one black star. But it was harder for blacks to break into the whites-only country club sports.
Arthur Ashe was the only black superstar in tennis. Even with the superiority of black athletes in
so many sports these days, there still remain many sports that are dominated by whites,
like yours, tennis. Do you think that that will remain true? I think that will remain true for
the foreseeable future because the feeling that some white parents in various socioeconomic levels
is still quite strong. For instance, the higher up the socioeconomic ladder, the more parents try
to steer their young daughters into swimming, tennis, and gymnastics. Track and basketball
are seen as a ghetto sport. Arthur Ashe was a role model for young black stars like Zina Garrison.
But others in the all-white sports have had to do it alone. Grant fewer in hockey,
Charles Lakes in gymnastics, swimmer Anthony Nesty, Debbie Thomas in figure skating,
great athletes, slowly destroying racial stereotypes.
And finally put to rest the enduring prejudice that blacks can't cut it at the so-called
thinking positions such as quarterback. Decades of racial prejudice have not stopped
blacks from succeeding at every turn in sports, at least on the field.
Rose in the major sports have come to be manned by members of a dispossessed, deprived, oftentimes
despised racial minority. The people who control those sports are overwhelmingly white. So what we
are seeing is black athletes being reduced to gladiators in the entertainment service
of a predominantly white society. Today black athletes are well paid, but for the most part
when they're playing days or over sports is a dead end. There are hundreds of senior executives
in pro sports, but eight, only eight, are black. Two years ago, Dodger executive Al Campanis offered
his view of why there are so few black executives in baseball. Is there still that much prejudice
in baseball today? No, I don't believe it's prejudice. I truly believe that they may not have some of the
necessities to be, let's say, a field manager or perhaps a general manager.
Campanis was fired. Baseball recently hired Bill White as the president of the National League,
a significant but still a very small step. Our society may be less racist than it was 20 years
ago, but still stereotypes die hard. We have learned tonight that there may be physical differences
between black and white athletes, but we've also learned that blacks dominate in their sports
because they work so hard. They're so dedicated to athletic achievement. The great basketball
player, Elgin Baylor, was once asked jokingly when blacks would allow whites back into the NBA all-star
game, and he answered seriously, when you led us into the banks and boardrooms. Many blacks believe
that they prevail in the athletic arena because that's what's open to them. It's not a matter of
race. Do you think by even raising these questions that it's a racist statement?
It reflects racism, yes. What about the blacks who feel that there is some underpinning? You have to
understand the whole secret of racism and sexism and all these other isms is that the people who
are oppressed end up spouting the party line of the oppressor. The whole idea is to convince
black people that there's superior in some areas and therefore, by definition, must be inferior in
other areas. I know the American system is very sensitive to statements of blacks and white,
but you cannot defy science. I mean, you cannot tell days' night and night is there. I mean,
things are facts. I think it's to the advantage of the black athletes to be proud that God was on
their side. Do you also think that there may be some physiological factor here? My head says,
no. My heart says yes, and I would like to have somebody disprove it to me, but the evidence
surely does suggest that there's some edge that we have that others don't have.
I'm sure all of this has raised many questions, so we'll be back after the local news tonight
to talk with some of the people that you've seen on this program and others about the black
athlete, fact, and friction.
The Tonight Show starring Johnny Carson and late night with David Letterman will be delayed
one half hour due to the following NBC News special.
NBC News presents Black Athletes, Fact and Fiction.
Good evening, everyone. I'm Tom Broca, and welcome now to Black Athletes, Fact and Fiction, part two.
In the course of the next half hour or so, we hope to answer the questions that may be left
over from our one-hour examination of this controversial and yet important issue that
exists in America today, why are black male athletes, especially dominating the most popular
sports that we have. We have a panel of experts with us. We have a studio audience as well. We'll
be meeting them in just a few moments, but first, for those of you who were not with us earlier this
evening, we want to show you a summary. What we are seeing is black athletes being reduced to
gladiates in the entertainment service of a predominantly white society.
Oh hell, Jesse Owens who leads the way, and like a streamlined express, he sets the pace for America's
sleep to victory. In black athletes, Fact and Fiction, we saw how blacks have come to dominate
the major sports in America. The explosive question, why? The blacks physically in many cases are made
better. Coats this business about black athletes. Do they have a natural advantage? Physiologically and
anatomically, answer for monthly, no. But we found that blacks do appear to have a genetic edge. Black
babies are biologically more advanced than whites. Blacks acquire motor skills earlier and studies
show some of the advantages persist into adolescence. Anthropologists have determined that black adults
have relatively longer arms and legs and less fat on their extremities and edge in running.
Comparisons of muscle tissue suggest that whites have more light fibers, good for endurance. Blacks
have more dark, fast twitch muscles. That may help them in quick burst running and jumping.
Finally, we came to see that many people, black and white, think blacks are naturally superior
athletes and why some say that's a racist backhanded compliment. That's the racist attitude that
blacks are natural because they're naturally lazy. So anything they get, they don't get from hard work.
They get because God just gave them the right gene pool. And what about a thinking athlete? Well,
we know damn well he's a white person because white people have the cerebral capacities that
blacks don't possess. I know the American system is very sensitive to statements of
blacks and white, but you cannot defy science. Things affect. I think it's the advantage of the
black athletes to be proud that God was on the side. It is, as I say, an explosive subject.
And here to discuss it with us tonight are some people that you saw in the course of that program
and some others, beginning with Dr. Harry Edwards, who's the well-known sports sociologist from the
University of California, Berkeley author, consultant who majorly baseball onto the San Francisco 49ers.
Arthur Ashe, who hardly requires an introduction. He's one of the premier tennis champions of
America, the author of this free volume study on black athletes called Hard Road to Glory.
Dr. Richard Lapchik is with the Center for the Study of Sport and Society from
Northeastern University and he has studied many of these subjects as well. In Brussels tonight,
two of the scientists who were prominent in our program, Dr. Claude Bouchard,
who is from Laval University in Quebec. He is on your right and Dr. Robert Molina,
who's the University of Texas anthropologist. The purpose here, let me hasten to point out,
is to develop some knowledge, some understanding, to know the facts from the fiction tonight.
We are joined as well in our studio by interested parties from New York area universities and
colleges and from sports participation groups. They'll be with us tonight and I'm sure that they'll
have questions as well. Let me also point out that this program tonight concentrates primarily
on black males who dominate the major sports today. It wasn't a deliberate attempt to somehow
overlook the great achievements of women black or white, but the phenomenon in American sports is
that black males are now dominating the big sports that we're all so familiar with and they're doing
it at a qualitative level never before seen. Let's go to Brussels to begin our discussion
tonight with Dr. Claude Bouchard. Dr. Bouchard, one of the most, I suppose, significant developments
that we saw in the course of the program tonight that you're finding that blacks have more of the
so-called fast twitch muscles, the muscles that are useful in explosive events such as running and
jumping. Let me ask you, can that not be acquired? You were testing primarily adults. Isn't it possible
that those black adults that you were testing acquire those fast twitch muscles in the course of
their youth in West Africa primarily? It is indeed quite possible and as a matter of fact,
the question of the fiber type is only one aspect of the issue. What we have found is more than that,
we have found that the blacks that we have studied who were by the way totally sedentary
had more of the proteins that are associated with the capacity to generate the higher level of
contraction that is required when you perform in high-intensity power performance type of events
and the difference with the whites that we measured, we use French-Canidians as control,
was very striking and of course some of that can be acquired but we measured them in a state where
they were totally sedentary for a long time and they were matched against a comparable
Caucasian group. Dr. Harry Edwards, you can see that there may be some physiological differences
between the races but you contend and I'd like you to address this to Dr. Bouchard if you would
that these are primarily culturally acquired differences. We have a much more basic and fundamental
problem here and that has to do with the whole concept of race itself. We know for example that
the African-American population is a rose generally from an admixture of European-American
Native Aboriginal or Indian stock and African stock. Therefore, the issue emerges how
black does one have to be in order for this thing to make any sense that they're talking about.
It is also the case that if it is indeed something having to do with our African heritage,
then it would appear to me that West Africans would be dominating in all of these various areas
especially in international sports and sprints and so forth rather than African-Americans since we
have been watered down so to speak and you can see this in any general population of blacks.
We approximate every color of the rainbow and we didn't get that way about looking out the
window too much or watching too much TV. So what we have to begin to deal with is the basic
concept of race. How black does one have to be in order to have these fast switch months?
Let's ask that of Dr. Bouchard. What about that Dr. Bouchard?
Well, through the black subjects that we have in our study, we're from West Central Africa.
So they were not comparable to the American blacks that we are talking about, that Dr. Edwards has
been talking about. In that sense, I think we have a better understanding of the racial
differences because as we know in the American black population, there is a fairly large amount
of gene admixture with the Caucasians, with the white.
Then those individuals should be the great basketball players and sprinters and not the
African-American blacks. Is that correct? Well, I'm not looking at that. I'm just saying that there
is a clear biological difference. Well, let me ask you more. You know that more than biology
to make an athlete, of course. Yeah, and that's a very point that you've made as well on the
path. Yeah, that's the point that I have made relative to the fact that most such studies run
into the same problem that this gentleman is having in terms of trying to explain his interpretation
of the data. The reality is that blacks who do achieve outstanding records and performances in
these sports that we're focusing upon are indeed superior athletes and superior physically and
physiologically, but not just to whites, but to other blacks as well. That's how they got to
where they are. You're looking at a very selective population. One more thing though I would like
to pose, given the fact as the philosopher concept that concept without precept is empty,
unless one is prepared to suggest that the anticipation of being outstanding football and
basketball players led to development in the past of these particular characteristics.
What was it about the African-American experience over the last 400 years since we're obviously
not talking about anything that happened in Africa, given that we're an ag mixture and not
pure African? What was it in the African-American experience over the last 400 years that led to
this differential evolution of black Americans as opposed to the general population?
Let's ask that of Dr. Molini of Weekend, who is Dr. Bashar's colleague and who has done
wider studies in that area. Dr. Molini, can you address that if you would?
Well, in terms of the development of the black population in the United States,
sure you're talking over the last three or four hundred years and there have been varying degrees
of admixture. But I think Harry is getting at an interesting point in terms of looking at what
might be the precursors of performance. And I think to approach it in a purely biological way
or to approach it in a purely social way, I think you're missing the point. The key is biology
and social conditions do not exist in isolation. We must approach these together. The two obviously
interact. If you've got the right biological requisites for sport, the right environmental
conditions under which these requisites can be expressed, you have a much better chance of
achieving success. And I believe if we are to look at the issue of race and sport, you must do it
in a biocultural or biocultural context and look at those conditions or you might say determinants
that might bring about the potential for performance to realize this potential if it's there. And
you're talking about relatively small differences. But if we can nurture them with different environmental
conditions and look for the answers in the environmental conditions under which individuals
are reared, how is a youngster socialized into sport? How is a youngster come about with these
particular characteristics that make him or her successful? Let me ask Arthur Ash a question. Are
you comfortable with this conversation so far? Oh yes, very comfortable. Yes. Have your friends
been concerned that just by raising this kind of an issue that it's racist somehow in its overtones?
Oh, it's certainly a sociological red button. No question about that. And people are afraid
that the inference or the causality will be drawn that if blacks are proven to be physically or
genetically superior as athletes, then they will be proven to be mentally or spiritually
deficient somehow. Those two sort of go together and they have for a long time. People have tried
to make this causality and there's no connection. We're going to take a break right now. We want
to come back in just a few moments and talk about the whole subject of racism and whether or not
American black athletes are treated as gladiators and the other issues that come into play in this
important topic of black athletes, fact and fiction. We'll be back in just a moment.
We're back now with many questions of black athletes, fact and fiction tonight. And one of our
guest panelists tonight is Richard Lapchek who is for the Center for the Study of Sport in Society
from Northeastern University. Dr. Lapchek, you have been a student and scholar of these many issues.
Do you think that most whites in America see black athletes merely as performers or as gladiators
in some fashion and is that denigrating in your judgment to them? I think that most whites do see
that and it is definitely denigrating and I think the great danger here is that first of all
a small danger is that young white kids are going to drop out of sports altogether and won't
pursue it but much more importantly so many more black children are going to pursue that
professional dream believing that this genetic makeup if they believe this would lead them to
be pros and in the process lose the chances so many have over the past few generations of getting a
real education by overemphasizing sports and de-emphasizing their educational balance. And as a society
black and white all together fail to deal with this and effectively weigh. One 27% of our division
won basketball players graduate from college. We can say we have a major failure of our higher
educational system. Yes. Another one of the scientists who participated in tonight's program
is Dr. Gideon Ariel who did the jumping study that everyone was watching very carefully. Listen
there's an obvious question here if blacks have superior jumping ability why are the dominant
high jumpers in America today Chinese and Swedish and Soviet citizens? Well of course in a athletic
performance such as Olympic sports you need the specific skill you specific training and many
other components however you need some genetic makeup. Athletes don't make the sport sport actually
make the athletes. Every sport has certain characteristics that they lead if they meet this
characteristics they're going to excel in this sport and like Dr. Edward said there is many many
other factors that affect this kind of thing so if you take a Chinese athlete that you train
him with special equipment and you allow him to optimize his genetic makeup he can break the
world record. On the other hand if you take for example these Germans which will select their
children from two three years old put them in special schools and train them the rest of their
life because this is all their life they have tremendous motivation and still they might lose
the game if they don't have the genetic makeup that other athletes have so it's all basic based
of science. And some of our guests here today have or this evening as well have some questions
for Steve Gibbs who is a an athlete who's here tonight Steve Gibbs where are you? Right here
could we here we'll have a microphone for you right now. You have a question? Definitely my
question is for the scientist I'm just curious as to find out how objective
excuse me how objective can you possibly be since you're obviously out to prove your own
credibility. Well it doesn't make different who will do the test. If I let you do the same test
that I did you will get the same results because I'm dealing with gravity I'm dealing with forces
I'm not cast enough in here I mean anybody can let a person jump on the force platform and find
out what are the forces. Let's ask Dr. Bouchard and Dr. Molino about that Dr. Bouchard what about that?
Well we took a sample of the skeletal muscle and we look at the proteins at the fiber type
and we find that there are differences they are most of the of the blacks are probably comparable
to Caucasians in terms of their skeletal muscle makeup but there is a subgroup of blacks that we
found would definitely add some characteristics in their muscle which are generally associated
with the capacity to succeed in high intensity short duration activities that's it it doesn't
mean that all of them can become athlete but there's probably have an advantage when exposed to
the activities of training and the exercise to perform better. Dr. Molino let me ask you a
question Dr. Molino two questions actually is it possible that your tests are racially
biased as some blacks charged at SAT test are for example and what happens to a young black man
or a young black woman race in an affluent neighborhood who is not much interested for example in
becoming an NBA basketball player. And the studies of motor performance those tests are fairly
objective and used for many many years they're very standardized tests performed under standardized
conditions and in a number of studies in which they're able to control the social class factors
the apparent racial difference is specifically in vertical jumping and in running speed persists
in other words within the same social class even for controlling styles of child rearing
black youngsters still jump better and run faster and the interesting thing to me is
these data begin to begin to appear in literature after Jesse Owen's success in 1936 the first
studies appear about 1938 and since 1938 the results are fairly consistent over time there
been no reversals and if there was no any major trend or shift environmental conditions
you might expect they're reversal but over the last 50 years the data are reasonably consistent
over time specifically for males not so for females. And Harry Edwards I know that you're here.
Yeah this this is I mean I didn't come 3000 miles to sit in engage in sophistry and satire
what what we're looking at here is a situation I have yet to see a study where there was an
adequate control in terms of class factors particularly as it related across so-called
race lines oppression differential motivation differential cultural emphasis you cannot talk
about lower class or underclass whites and the same bag is lower class and underclass blacks
different worlds the second point is that even were you able to distinguish these differences
it doesn't mean that they have anything to do with an outstanding athletic performance for
example this gentleman's jumping test you know to say that you got 16 athletes and you were able
to distinguish the blacks from the whites by the ability to jump once they were basketball players
that's like telling me that my nose has two holes in it I already know that what we're looking at is
the question of why and on top of that if he's if he's inferring that that jumping ability has
something to do with rebounding for example in basketball or jump shooting in basketball that's
nonsense 80% of rebounds are taken below the rim and if you talk to somebody like Bill Russell
who has the greatest career average in terms of rebounding he will tell you that he took from
80 to 85 percent of his rebounds below the rim and has to do with hard work intelligence
and being a student of the game all right doctor I agree with you asking the question why
that's that's the point we need to do we try should find out why do black children in general
perform in certain events better than white children why do blacks perhaps have a better
chance of becoming an athlete we need to look at the why question and that is in I believe the whole
socio-cultural matrix of growing up what the sport mean to a child how do they become socialized
into sport we need to address those in an objective way and to dismiss it simply as being
a social or dismiss it as being racist I think is very myopic we must approach it objectively
that is not that is not what I'm saying what you're essentially doing now is arguing my point
that of course they're physical and physiological differences because we have a disproportionate
number of african-americans in this country with that kind of potential who are channeled
towards sport as a result of a lack of alternative high prestige occupational opportunities
but it is the social environment and the racism and so forth that accounts for that that is what
we have the social environment brings it about that's the key let's look for that what is it in
the social environment we need to address that issue I believe we need a biosocial or biocultural
approach to dismiss dismiss one at the expense of the other is I just think a narrower I would
not suggest I would not suggest that we dismiss one I would suggest that the only difference between
black and white accomplishment in the american society over the course of occupational
over the course of the occupational structure and over the span of each group is racism
and discrimination and a legacy of that are there actually I agree with you there I agree with Dr.
Edwards yes I do there's no question we start screening our athletes much earlier by the time
you're 13 or 14 you are so good you have come through such a tough screening process that everybody
else has encouraged to actually sit down and watch but in the program tonight you said in your
heart you believe one thing yes well in looking for six years at the data going way back to the
early 1800s there were just so many examples of blacks who out of the clear blue sky did awfully
well but my head tells me that hey I really don't believe there is any difference all right Dr.
Labchik we'll be back to you and we'll be back to some questions from the audience right after this
we're back with part two of black athletes fact confession we have been talking about the enormous
impact on the black athlete in this country of cultural and environment and the other opportunities
that are just not available to them and Dr. Richard Labchik is with us as well tonight from the Center
for Study of Sport and Society do you agree that that's 99 percent of the equation I do and I think
it's instructive what Dr. Malita said since 1938 after Jesse Owens Victor we've been trying to
develop scientific studies that prove that their blacks are genetically different than whites I've
never been convinced and I think Harry O'Arthur has been either that we've come up with that
scientific study we've not looked at East German athletes genetically we've not looked at Asian
athletes genetically we've always focused on the black American athlete that I don't think
the question is why have we done that. Go ahead Dr. Malita. I don't think the studies were aimed
to prove most of the studies were no just let's look at no comparisons and the study of human
variability is a fairly straightforward thing and one of the basic comparisons is no between
American black and American white children I don't believe they were designed to prove anything
they're just part of the objective nature of comparison and that results are reasonably
consistent over time and incidentally most of the studies on performance are based on non athletes
these are studies of the general population and of course athletes come from such a small
segment of the general population had there been studies by the way between blacks and
or annals and between blacks and Hispanics or whites and or annals or whites and Hispanics or
has always been primarily a black white equation it's been primarily black white but there are
a number of studies comparing Hispanics mostly Mexican Americans in the southwest and typically
what you see with regard to motor performance Mexican American boys and white boys perform
pretty much the same and in studies that had all three for same social class black boys generally
perform better than white boys and Mexican American boys in these specific tests of running and
jumping that we spoke about earlier but pardon me Dr. Malita isn't that in and of itself a kind
of a racist statement that you've confined it to only the two other groups and they both happen to
be economically deprived minorities in this country but in those early studies they're all
from the same background and the interesting important thing is they're the ones most often
compared all right Ed Baglin is the assistant basketball coach at the Manhattan College
he's here with us today as well yes Dr. Edwards I'd like to know if you've performed any studies
to support your statement that black athletes are superior due to cultural reasons and if so
what have those studies show I have studied this problem since my graduate days at Cornell
University in fact I wrote my dissertation on the myths and realities of American sport and
have looked at and reviewed every piece of information that has come down the pipe for the last 25
years in terms of this situation a fundamental tenant of the social sciences is that human
capability is fairly evenly distributed across all populations and that race itself is a questionable
scientific biological and genetic validity and therefore the owners of proof is on those who
would devise and determine that some scheme that alleges that there is some
race link difference between blacks and whites in fact the one constant thing that I have seen
in the literature and the one constant thing that constantly constantly comes up is the flawed nature
of the studies that have been done including defining who is black is in one block drop of
black blood I'm forced to trace my ancestry back to Africa despite the fact that I have a
perfectly good great great great great uh great irish granddaddy not because that blood and those
genes are not flowing in my veins but because we live in a race a society where if you have one
drop of black blood one thirty second octa room quadrant melado it doesn't matter you're black
and so that's social and political definition flies in the very face of the categorizations
that they're trying to set up when you say this is a black group you're already in trouble
dr bershard you have a response let me just say by the way dr edwards that other scientists have
conducted these studies and we were we had great difficulty in getting any of them to share their
findings with us because we do know that it's a very controversial issue in society today
dr bershard you want to respond to that dr bershard and dr malina were at least uh willing to come
forward dr bershard first of all we must be clear there has been no genetic studies comparing black
and white in terms of their gene characteristics affecting performance the only data that we have
are comparison of two groups one black african group and one white Caucasian group that's it
there's that's not a genetic study secondly when we come when we look at the uh the genetic data though
which have been uh accumulated over the years it's quite clear that indeed like dr edwards said
there is there are not too many differences but between the various races blacks whites uh or
Asians in terms of genetic characteristics it's commonly recognized that at the most 10 percent
of human genetic variation is specific to one human race or group but 90 percent is shared by all
human individuals or all omo sapiens so the probability that the genes are affecting performance
is rather remote it's you know we have only a 10 percent genetic difference among the races
but but in there we cannot eliminate the possibility and in these must skeletal muscle comparison
that we made we find an intriguing difference in favor of the black athletes coming from west
africa that apparently the black individuals coming from west africa for the high intensity
power performance but then that individual might be that black individual might be at a
disadvantage in terms of the endurance performance dr bershard let me ask you a question a lot of
people have asked me quite honestly when i told them that we were doing this program because i
thought there were a lot of half-baked theories out there that we had to deal with as much
fact and knowledge as we possibly could they kept saying to me why would you want to do this
let me ask you a question why would you even be interested in conducting these studies these
comparative studies what what do we gain from that well uh i have always been working under the
hypothesis that knowledge is the greatest safeguard against prejudice hindrance foster
prejudice and if we can understand the biological basis of performance and why some of the bio
bio chemical or molecular characteristics are important in performance and if some of the
the uh human groups of mankind have more of these characteristics and other
then we will understand and knowledge is the important thing here don't forget i'm also
coming from a minority group and every time i open my mouth in america people understand that
i'm from a minority group and have never been against the notion of studying the differences
between the francophone or the anglophone of this continent let me fill up companies in our
audience tonight as well he was the young black a black basketball player that you saw from
philadelphia and somewhere here tonight is terry williams from columbia is he here
where is terry uh terry and philip share something we saw how hard philip works we heard from him
earlier this evening but terry williams has some observations as well you're a what a football
player and a track athlete at columbia yes first of all my name is terry brown to correct you i'm
sorry i get my my researcher didn't help me with that that's quite okay um and i'd just like
to make a comment that as an african-american athlete i am quite disturbed not only by by the
nature of this program but by the hidden undertones that also are quite evident um there's an attempt
to present this program as an informative documentary uh which would both give facts and dispel
miss and fiction about afro-american athletes but uh what i see here is not only uh the undertone
racism but also fear and concern uh historic and blacks have been discriminated against in the
fields of uh athletics academics and economics and now that that we see that blacks have overcome
in the field of athletics in such a dominant force in a dominant way uh that there's a fear
and a concern that that we may also do that in the fields of academics and economics uh the racism
comes into play uh that that that we cannot applaud the afra african-american athlete for his superiority
but we have to uh downplay that superiority and find a reason for it and and make the claim that
that reason is because he is physiologically superior and that it's not because anything that
he's done on his part no hard work involved but it's just that uh god god was on his side i believe
that's what doctor said so um you know it we uh african-american uh athletes get no credit uh where
you this whole program says we're superior but we're not superior because we work at it
we're superior because god did it for well no in fairness uh
in in fairness mr. Brown uh when we showed Philip come for example we showed not just that he was a
a black basketball player who was grown full-blown from his baby's crib we showed how hard in fact
he worked at it we had dr. Edwards on here tonight talking about the importance of hard work and the
environmental factors that go into that the cultural environment the dr. Molina mentions
tonight that there are too few opportunities for blacks in other areas and what we attempted to do
here was to deal with some of the other half-baked theories that exist out there because a good
many people i think do believe that great black athletes just walk onto a floor or onto a football
field or onto a track and set world records just by their natural ability and what we wanted to do
deny was to attempt to sub this in some kind of a a context there were those people who said you
know it's a no-win proposition you're not going to make anybody happy and that may be the case but
the fact of the matter is that the pursuit of knowledge it seems to me is just better we have
my part and part of all the people who work in this program i don't think there's any question
that the great black athletes that we see today or the great white athletes for that matter
get to where they are primarily by working very very hard at their craft that's why some of us
are in television today and not playing basketball as a matter of fact
our clap check uh... what about what mr. Brown had to say here tonight undertones racism throughout
the whole program i think uh the study of the subject not necessarily in this program but the
historical fifty years we've spent trying to seemingly prove that there are the differences
that dr. milliner and dr. buchard might feel uh underlines a racial dimension to the issue and
always has uh we accept black dominance as athletes but we don't accept it in intellectual
matters and the white society is willing now to accept that black dominance on the playing field
but we're not willing to give up control in the classroom in the government in the corporate world
and i think that's the dimension we're really talking about it do we set it back the whole
question of racial understanding in the society racial sensitivity by talking about it in this way
or do we move it forward or is it a wash no i i think we uh illuminate the problem a bit more
than it was and certainly going back to the time when uh charles darwin started his uh studies
resulting in origin of the species and herbert spencer i saw study after study after study after
study which all changed when blacks broke new barriers and each study tried to prove why blacks
were superior in an area where they were not superior before and that the danger is of course
as i said earlier is that whatever results are achieved or or or seen or evidence in the test
that they will try to use those tests to prove that yes we are athletically superior but academically
as mr. brown says inferior and harry edwards well i think that uh all due respect to mickey
mouse and down duck and the soaps and uh football games and super bowls and so forth i think that
this is why television was really created i think that uh uh to the extent that you refuse to deal
with controversial issues in an open society then you push them underground where they take root
and spread faster than ever uh i'm elated that the uh situation is being aired and openly
discussed and uh i would welcome uh anyone uh who holds views opposite to mind most certainly
uh to join me in any kind of a form uh to debate the issues and i think that that's the way we
educate people about what's really going on dr edwards thank you very much harry ash lap check
uh doctor's uh bushard and melina and brussell thank you very much for being with us tonight
dr gittini area especially to our members of our studio audience here many friends and my
colleagues as well wondered why we would raise these issues at all well it seems to me that these
issues are important as dr edwards said to society so that we know each other better so that we see
each other more clearly so that we deal with the facts so far as we are able to determine them
instead of the half-baked theories that exist out there ultimately i hope that this program
will prove to be in fact a kind of a tribute to the place of black athletes in america
tribute to the hard work that they have all put into their great sports and to what they have done
and we have seen some of that here tonight thank you all very much for being with us i'm
tom broca for all of us at nbc news