OPEN LETTER TO DOCTOR SIMPSON
Dear Dr Simpson,
we are writing to express concern about the involvement of David Coleman in your forthcoming conference Segregation or integration – what’s going on?scheduled for this May.
No doubt you are already aware of some of the controversy surrounding Coleman. However we would like to draw your attention on how Coleman’s problematic views impact upon his proposed lecture ‘Bricks without straw? Estimating the vital rates and future size of ethnic populations‘. In the published abstract we read “Although levels of inter-ethnic union vary greatly between groups at present, it is suggested that in the long run the growth of populations of increasingly complex mixed origin will make the definition and elaboration of ethnic groups as currently understood increasingly meaningless.†We would draw your attention to the article ‘“Replacement Migration†or why everyone’s going to have to live in Korea’ The Galton Institute Newsletter, No. 40 March 2001 (http://www.galtoninstitute.org.uk/Newsletters/GINL0103.pdf), where we read “Europeans think they know who they are and unlike (say) Australians, do not want to become something different.†Coleman goes on to promote encouraging women in Europe to have more children to avoid the alleged “harmful consequences†of more immigration.
In light of Coleman’s involvement with the Galton Institute – as the Eugenics Society likes to style itself nowadays – and Migration Watch, you will understand the concern felt by ourselves and others. It is not so long ago that Karl Pearson and Margaret Moul wrote in their their article “The problem of alien immigration into Great Britain, illustrated by an examination of Russian and Polish Jewish childrenâ€, (Annals of Eugenics (now, Annals of Human Genetics 1,1-128, 1925):
“We hold therefore that the problem of the admission of an alien Jewish population into Great Britain turns essentially on the answer that may be given to the question: Is their average intelligence so markedly superior to that of the native Gentile, that it compensates for their physique and habits certainly not being above (probably a good deal below) the average of those characters here?â€
Although the issue of “population ageing†has replaced that of “intelligence†in the intervening years, the practice of using contemporary issues to mobilise racist opinion remains unaltered. Of course it is important for this practice that this racism is given the veneer of scientific respectability. Coleman’s proposed lecture at your event threatens to do precisely this.
Pearson and Moul also wrote of Jews that “for men with no special ability-above all for such men as religion, social habits, or language keep as a caste apart, there should be no place. They will not be absorbed by, and at the same time strengthen the existing population; they will develop into a parasitic race, a position neither tending to the welfare of their host, nor wholesome for themselvesâ€. Such language speaks for itself. .
Eugenics – whether in its classical formulation presented by Galton, Pearson and Moul or in the contemporary and somewhat disguised formulations offered by Coleman and his colleagues in the Galton Institute and Migration Watch – is a significant movement to promote and sanitise racist views.
It is nearly four years since David Aaronovitch challenged Coleman over the Galton Institute’s links with avowedly racist groups as the Klu Klux Klan (http://www.guardian.co.uk/Columnists/Column/0,,1012515,00.html). As far as I am aware, Coleman has not responded, prefering to gloss over these links and choosing to make patronising remarks about those that criticise him – apparently one of the privileges enjoyed by an Oxford professor.
I urge you to reconsider going ahead with the conference as planned.
April 15th 2007
Voice Solidarity Forum,
Limehouse Town Hall,
London E14 7HA