Should-Read: Jelani Cobb: @jelani9 on Twitter: "I was frankly embarrassed by @CornelWest’s threadbare commentary...
...It’s one thing to challenge and interrogate. Quite another to cloak petty rivalry as disinterested analysis. Neoliberal?... This points to a broader concern I might as well air. One of the more fascinating things I’ve observed as @tanehisicoates has become more prominent is the unifying contempt of a striking array of black intellectuals.... People as intellectually diverse as John McWhorter and Glenn Loury are mad at the same dude as @CornelWest and Adolph Reed. I can’t tell you how many times black academics have tried to turn me against my friend on the low. One who sniffed indignantly to me “He hasn’t written anything that’s not on my syllabus.” Then you should’ve sent your syllabus to @TheAtlantic. But underlying all this is another dynamic. Plain classical elitism.... Straight up: many people hate the fact that the person being hailed as possibly the sharpest black intellectual writing about race is an HBCU dropout. They prefer their self-made intellectuals to be of the deceased variety
Frankly I preferred not to say any of this. @tanehisicoates is a grown man. He can fight his own battles. But it’s a little tiresome to see and hear the hypocritical bullshit of academics who would prefer the community not be defended if doing so means accolades for someone else...
