Steve Sailer
Encyclopedia
Steven Ernest Sailer is an American
journalist
and movie critic for The American Conservative
, a blogger
, a VDARE.com
columnist, and a former correspondent for UPI
. He writes about race relations, gender issues, politics, immigration, IQ, genetics
, movies, and sports.
. He majored in economics, history, and management at Rice University
(BA, 1980). He earned an MBA from UCLA in 1982 with two concentrations: Finance and Marketing. In 1982 he moved from Los Angeles to Chicago, and from then until 1985 he managed BehaviorScan test markets for Information Resources Inc. He became a full-time journalist in 2000 and left Chicago for California.
In a 2006 National Observer
column, Paul Gottfried
(who also writes for VDARE.com) reported that Sailer operates a computer business in California, commenting that "given the politically incorrect
topic that he addresses and the precariousness of his journalistic career, this advocate of immigration restriction is indeed wise to have other sources of income."
(and has since published in it).
In August 1999, he debated Steve Levitt
at Slate.com, calling into question Levitt's hypothesis, which would appear in the 2005 book Freakonomics
, that legalized abortion in America reduced crime
.
Sailer, along with Charles Murray
and John McGinnis
, was described as an "evolutionary conservative" in a 1999 National Review
cover story by John O'Sullivan
. Sailer's work frequently appears at Taki's Magazine and Alternative Right
, while Sailer's analyses have been cited by newspapers such as The Washington Times
, The New York Times
, the San Francisco Chronicle
and The Times
of London. He has been featured as a guest on The Political Cesspool
.
Sailer's January 2003 article "Cousin Marriage Conundrum", published in The American Conservative, argued that nationbuilding in Iraq would likely fail because of the high degree of consanguinity
among Iraqis due to the common practice of cousin marriage
. This article has been republished in The Best American Science and Nature Writing 2004, and in One World, Many Cultures.
After the 2004 US election
, Sailer discovered a very strong correlation between voting patterns and fertility rates. He described the fertility link in an article in The American Conservative
: "Among the 50 states plus Washington, D.C., white total fertility correlates at a remarkably strong 0.86 level with Bush’s percentage of the 2004 vote. (In 2000, the correlation was 0.85.)" Writing in the New York Times, pundit David Brooks
referred to this article as showing the "surprising political correlations" of what he dubbed "natalism". Sailer later discovered a slightly stronger correlation between marriage rates and voting, and dubbed his theory of modern American voting as "Affordable Family Formation": "a state’s voting proclivities are now dominated by the relative presence or absence of affordable family formation." The correlation between home prices, marriage rates, and voting was verified by George Hawley at the University of Houston, using county-level data for the 2000 election.
In 2008, Sailer published his only book, America's Half-Blood Prince, an analysis of Barack Obama
based on his memoir Dreams From My Father
.
Sailer is the founder of an online discussion forum called Human Biodiversity Discussion Group, whose members he has described as "top scientists and public intellectuals".
, and that Ashkenazi Jews
and Northeast Asia
ns have higher IQs than whites. He says that prosperity helped blacks close the IQ gap. He suggests that a problem with mass immigration of non-white Mestizo
Mexicans into America is that native-born whites in the US will become a master caste
to a non-white servant caste. He also considers that "for at least some purposes – race actually is a highly useful and reasonable classification," such as providing a very rough rule-of-thumb for the fact that various population groups may inherit differences in body chemistry that affect how the body uses certain pharmaceutical products, for "finessing" Affirmative Action when that's economically convenient, and for political gerrymandering
. Sailer has also argued that Hispanic immigration is "recreating the racial hierarchy of Mexico" in California:
Rodolfo Acuña
, a Chicano
studies professor, regards Sailer's statements on this subject as providing "a pretext and a negative justification for discriminating against US Latinos in the context of US history." Acuña claimed that listing Latinos as non-white gives Sailer and others "the opportunity to divide Latinos into races, thus weakening the group by setting up a scenario where lighter-skinned Mexicans are accepted as Latinos or Hispanics and darker-skinned Latinos are relegated to an underclass." Sailer considers Hispanic
a non-racial characterization, identifying non-Hispanic White
Americans as second-class citizens
because of affirmative action
, which he claims has caused and will cause more and more "anti-white pogroms".
During the United States presidential election, 2004
, Sailer estimated that based on the intelligence tests from military records of candidates George W. Bush
and John Kerry
, Bush probably had a higher IQ
by about 4 IQ points. In a report on the findings for The New York Times
, journalist John Tierney
called Sailer "a veteran student of presidential IQ's", and cited the judgement of Professor Linda Gottfredson
, an IQ expert at the University of Delaware
, that Sailer's study was a "creditable analysis".
Sailer's article on Hurricane Katrina
was followed by accusations of racism from left-wing organizations Media Matters for America
and the Southern Poverty Law Center
. In reference to the New Orleans slogan "let the good times roll", Sailer commented:
Conservative columnist John Podhoretz
, responded in the National Review Online blog by calling Sailer's statement "shockingly racist and paternalistic
" as well as "disgusting".
Sailer describes his personal ideology as "Citizenism", which he explains as:
He views this as an antithesis of racism, and he argues that African-Americans, Jewish-Americans, European-Americans, and other groups can rally behind this. He has also stated that "White Nationalism
is worse than a crime, it's a mistake" and argued that the ideology, if widely adopted, would actually hurt American whites rather than help them.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
journalist
Journalist
A journalist collects and distributes news and other information. A journalist's work is referred to as journalism.A reporter is a type of journalist who researchs, writes, and reports on information to be presented in mass media, including print media , electronic media , and digital media A...
and movie critic for The American Conservative
The American Conservative
The American Conservative is a monthly U.S. opinion magazine published by Ron Unz. Its first editor was Scott McConnell, his successors being Kara Hopkins and the present incumbent, Daniel McCarthy....
, a blogger
Blog
A blog is a type of website or part of a website supposed to be updated with new content from time to time. Blogs are usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in...
, a VDARE.com
VDARE
VDARE.com, or VDARE, is a website that advocates reduced immigration, especially illegal immigration, into the United States. Former Forbes editor Peter Brimelow supports the site through his VDARE Foundation, also known as Lexington Research Institute Limited...
columnist, and a former correspondent for UPI
United Press International
United Press International is a once-major international news agency, whose newswires, photo, news film and audio services provided news material to thousands of newspapers, magazines and radio and television stations for most of the twentieth century...
. He writes about race relations, gender issues, politics, immigration, IQ, genetics
Genetics
Genetics , a discipline of biology, is the science of genes, heredity, and variation in living organisms....
, movies, and sports.
Personal life
Sailer grew up in Studio City, Los Angeles. As a child, Sailer appeared alongside four other grade school students on the "Kids Say the Darndest Things" segment of Art Linkletter's House PartyArt Linkletter's House Party
House Party is an American radio daytime variety/talk show that aired on CBS Radio and on ABC Radio from January 15, 1945 to October 13, 1967...
. He majored in economics, history, and management at Rice University
Rice University
William Marsh Rice University, commonly referred to as Rice University or Rice, is a private research university located on a heavily wooded campus in Houston, Texas, United States...
(BA, 1980). He earned an MBA from UCLA in 1982 with two concentrations: Finance and Marketing. In 1982 he moved from Los Angeles to Chicago, and from then until 1985 he managed BehaviorScan test markets for Information Resources Inc. He became a full-time journalist in 2000 and left Chicago for California.
In a 2006 National Observer
National Observer (Australia)
The National Observer is a quarterly current-affairs and politics magazine in Australia...
column, Paul Gottfried
Paul Gottfried
Paul Edward Gottfried is Horace Raffensperger Professor of Humanities at Elizabethtown College in Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania, and a Guggenheim recipient...
(who also writes for VDARE.com) reported that Sailer operates a computer business in California, commenting that "given the politically incorrect
Politically incorrect
The phrase "politically incorrect" may refer to:* Someone or something which does not meet a standard of political correctness* Politically Incorrect, a late-night U.S. political talk show* Politically Incorrect, a German political blog...
topic that he addresses and the precariousness of his journalistic career, this advocate of immigration restriction is indeed wise to have other sources of income."
Writing career
From 1994 to 1998, Sailer worked as a columnist for the conservative magazine National ReviewNational Review
National Review is a biweekly magazine founded by the late author William F. Buckley, Jr., in 1955 and based in New York City. It describes itself as "America's most widely read and influential magazine and web site for conservative news, commentary, and opinion."Although the print version of the...
(and has since published in it).
In August 1999, he debated Steve Levitt
Steven Levitt
Steven David "Steve" Levitt is an American economist known for his work in the field of crime, in particular on the link between legalized abortion and crime rates. Winner of the 2004 John Bates Clark Medal, he is currently the William B...
at Slate.com, calling into question Levitt's hypothesis, which would appear in the 2005 book Freakonomics
Freakonomics
Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything is a 2005 non-fiction book by University of Chicago economist Steven Levitt and New York Times journalist Stephen J. Dubner. The book has been described as melding pop culture with economics, but has also been described as...
, that legalized abortion in America reduced crime
Legalized abortion and crime effect
The effect of legalized abortion on crime is the theory that legal abortion reduces crime. Proponents of the theory generally argue that since unwanted children are more likely to become criminals and that an inverse correlation is observed between the availability of abortion and subsequent crime...
.
Sailer, along with Charles Murray
Charles Murray (author)
Charles Alan Murray is an American libertarian political scientist, author, columnist, and pundit working as a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank in Washington, DC...
and John McGinnis
John McGinnis
John Oldham McGinnis is a professor at Northwestern University School of Law and author of over 90 academic and popular articles and essays. His popular writings have been published in The Wall Street Journal, National Review, and Policy Review....
, was described as an "evolutionary conservative" in a 1999 National Review
National Review
National Review is a biweekly magazine founded by the late author William F. Buckley, Jr., in 1955 and based in New York City. It describes itself as "America's most widely read and influential magazine and web site for conservative news, commentary, and opinion."Although the print version of the...
cover story by John O'Sullivan
John O'Sullivan (columnist)
John O'Sullivan CBE is a leading British conservative political commentator and journalist and currently Vice President and executive editor of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty....
. Sailer's work frequently appears at Taki's Magazine and Alternative Right
Alternative Right
Alternative Right, or AlternativeRight.com, is a paleoconservative website which presents itself as "an online magazine of radical traditionalism," and "an attempt to forge a new, independent intellectual Right." The website is often referred to as "AltRight." Alternative Right was founded by...
, while Sailer's analyses have been cited by newspapers such as The Washington Times
The Washington Times
The Washington Times is a daily broadsheet newspaper published in Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States. It was founded in 1982 by Unification Church founder Sun Myung Moon, and until 2010 was owned by News World Communications, an international media conglomerate associated with the...
, The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
, the San Francisco Chronicle
San Francisco Chronicle
thumb|right|upright|The Chronicle Building following the [[1906 San Francisco earthquake|1906 earthquake]] and fireThe San Francisco Chronicle is a newspaper serving primarily the San Francisco Bay Area of the U.S. state of California, but distributed throughout Northern and Central California,...
and The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
of London. He has been featured as a guest on The Political Cesspool
The Political Cesspool
The Political Cesspool is a weekly talk radio show founded by James Edwards, and syndicated by Liberty News Radio Network and Accent Radio Network in the United States...
.
Sailer's January 2003 article "Cousin Marriage Conundrum", published in The American Conservative, argued that nationbuilding in Iraq would likely fail because of the high degree of consanguinity
Consanguinity
Consanguinity refers to the property of being from the same kinship as another person. In that respect, consanguinity is the quality of being descended from the same ancestor as another person...
among Iraqis due to the common practice of cousin marriage
Cousin marriage
Cousin marriage is marriage between two cousins. In various jurisdictions and cultures, such marriages range from being considered ideal and actively encouraged, to being uncommon but still legal, to being seen as incest and legally prohibited....
. This article has been republished in The Best American Science and Nature Writing 2004, and in One World, Many Cultures.
After the 2004 US election
United States presidential election, 2004
The United States presidential election of 2004 was the United States' 55th quadrennial presidential election. It was held on Tuesday, November 2, 2004. Republican Party candidate and incumbent President George W. Bush defeated Democratic Party candidate John Kerry, the then-junior U.S. Senator...
, Sailer discovered a very strong correlation between voting patterns and fertility rates. He described the fertility link in an article in The American Conservative
The American Conservative
The American Conservative is a monthly U.S. opinion magazine published by Ron Unz. Its first editor was Scott McConnell, his successors being Kara Hopkins and the present incumbent, Daniel McCarthy....
: "Among the 50 states plus Washington, D.C., white total fertility correlates at a remarkably strong 0.86 level with Bush’s percentage of the 2004 vote. (In 2000, the correlation was 0.85.)" Writing in the New York Times, pundit David Brooks
David Brooks (journalist)
David Brooks is a Canadian-born political and cultural commentator who considers himself a moderate and writes for the New York Times...
referred to this article as showing the "surprising political correlations" of what he dubbed "natalism". Sailer later discovered a slightly stronger correlation between marriage rates and voting, and dubbed his theory of modern American voting as "Affordable Family Formation": "a state’s voting proclivities are now dominated by the relative presence or absence of affordable family formation." The correlation between home prices, marriage rates, and voting was verified by George Hawley at the University of Houston, using county-level data for the 2000 election.
In 2008, Sailer published his only book, America's Half-Blood Prince, an analysis of Barack Obama
Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II is the 44th and current President of the United States. He is the first African American to hold the office. Obama previously served as a United States Senator from Illinois, from January 2005 until he resigned following his victory in the 2008 presidential election.Born in...
based on his memoir Dreams From My Father
Dreams from My Father
Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance is a memoir by United States President Barack Obama. It was first published in July 1995 as he was preparing to launch his political career, five years after being elected the first African-American president of the Harvard Law Review in...
.
Sailer is the founder of an online discussion forum called Human Biodiversity Discussion Group, whose members he has described as "top scientists and public intellectuals".
Views and criticism
Sailer cites studies that say, on average, blacks and Mexicans in America have lower IQs than whitesRace and intelligence
The connection between race and intelligence has been a subject of debate in both popular science and academic research since the inception of intelligence testing in the early 20th century...
, and that Ashkenazi Jews
Ashkenazi Jews
Ashkenazi Jews, also known as Ashkenazic Jews or Ashkenazim , are the Jews descended from the medieval Jewish communities along the Rhine in Germany from Alsace in the south to the Rhineland in the north. Ashkenaz is the medieval Hebrew name for this region and thus for Germany...
and Northeast Asia
Northeast Asia
Northeast Asia and Northeastern Asia refers to the northeastern subregion of Asia. Though the precise definition of Northeast Asia changes according to context, it always includes Japan and the Korean Peninsula, and is sometimes used to refer to these two regions exclusively.-Definitions:The...
ns have higher IQs than whites. He says that prosperity helped blacks close the IQ gap. He suggests that a problem with mass immigration of non-white Mestizo
Mestizo
Mestizo is a term traditionally used in Latin America, Philippines and Spain for people of mixed European and Native American heritage or descent...
Mexicans into America is that native-born whites in the US will become a master caste
Caste
Caste is an elaborate and complex social system that combines elements of endogamy, occupation, culture, social class, tribal affiliation and political power. It should not be confused with race or social class, e.g. members of different castes in one society may belong to the same race, as in India...
to a non-white servant caste. He also considers that "for at least some purposes – race actually is a highly useful and reasonable classification," such as providing a very rough rule-of-thumb for the fact that various population groups may inherit differences in body chemistry that affect how the body uses certain pharmaceutical products, for "finessing" Affirmative Action when that's economically convenient, and for political gerrymandering
Gerrymandering
In the process of setting electoral districts, gerrymandering is a practice that attempts to establish a political advantage for a particular party or group by manipulating geographic boundaries to create partisan, incumbent-protected districts...
. Sailer has also argued that Hispanic immigration is "recreating the racial hierarchy of Mexico" in California:
Rodolfo Acuña
Rodolfo Acuña
Rodolfo Francisco Acuña, Ph.D., is an historian, professor emeritus, and one of various scholars of Chicano studies, which he teaches at California State University, Northridge. He is the author of Occupied America: A History of Chicanos, which approaches the history of the Southwestern United...
, a Chicano
Chicano
The terms "Chicano" and "Chicana" are used in reference to U.S. citizens of Mexican descent. However, those terms have a wide range of meanings in various parts of the world. The term began to be widely used during the Chicano Movement, mainly among Mexican Americans, especially in the movement's...
studies professor, regards Sailer's statements on this subject as providing "a pretext and a negative justification for discriminating against US Latinos in the context of US history." Acuña claimed that listing Latinos as non-white gives Sailer and others "the opportunity to divide Latinos into races, thus weakening the group by setting up a scenario where lighter-skinned Mexicans are accepted as Latinos or Hispanics and darker-skinned Latinos are relegated to an underclass." Sailer considers Hispanic
Hispanic
Hispanic is a term that originally denoted a relationship to Hispania, which is to say the Iberian Peninsula: Andorra, Gibraltar, Portugal and Spain. During the Modern Era, Hispanic sometimes takes on a more limited meaning, particularly in the United States, where the term means a person of ...
a non-racial characterization, identifying non-Hispanic White
Non-Hispanic Whites
Non-Hispanic Whites or White, Not Hispanic or Latino are people in the United States, as defined by the Census Bureau, who are of the White race and are not of Hispanic or Latino origin/ethnicity. Hence the designation is exclusive in the sense that it defines who is not included as opposed to who is...
Americans as second-class citizens
Second-class citizen
Second-class citizen is an informal term used to describe a person who is systematically discriminated against within a state or other political jurisdiction, despite their nominal status as a citizen or legal resident there...
because of affirmative action
Affirmative action
Affirmative action refers to policies that take factors including "race, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation or national origin" into consideration in order to benefit an underrepresented group, usually as a means to counter the effects of a history of discrimination.-Origins:The term...
, which he claims has caused and will cause more and more "anti-white pogroms".
During the United States presidential election, 2004
United States presidential election, 2004
The United States presidential election of 2004 was the United States' 55th quadrennial presidential election. It was held on Tuesday, November 2, 2004. Republican Party candidate and incumbent President George W. Bush defeated Democratic Party candidate John Kerry, the then-junior U.S. Senator...
, Sailer estimated that based on the intelligence tests from military records of candidates George W. Bush
George W. Bush
George Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....
and John Kerry
John Kerry
John Forbes Kerry is the senior United States Senator from Massachusetts, the 10th most senior U.S. Senator and chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He was the presidential nominee of the Democratic Party in the 2004 presidential election, but lost to former President George W...
, Bush probably had a higher IQ
Intelligence quotient
An intelligence quotient, or IQ, is a score derived from one of several different standardized tests designed to assess intelligence. When modern IQ tests are constructed, the mean score within an age group is set to 100 and the standard deviation to 15...
by about 4 IQ points. In a report on the findings for The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
, journalist John Tierney
John Tierney (journalist)
John Marion Tierney is a journalist and author who has worked for the New York Times since 1990.-Career and background:...
called Sailer "a veteran student of presidential IQ's", and cited the judgement of Professor Linda Gottfredson
Linda Gottfredson
Linda Susanne Gottfredson is a professor of educational psychology at the University of Delaware and co-director of the Delaware-Johns Hopkins Project for the Study of Intelligence and Society. Gottfredson's work has been influential in shaping U.S...
, an IQ expert at the University of Delaware
University of Delaware
The university is organized into seven colleges:* College of Agriculture and Natural Resources* College of Arts and Sciences* Alfred Lerner College of Business and Economics* College of Earth, Ocean and Environment* College of Education and Human Development...
, that Sailer's study was a "creditable analysis".
Sailer's article on Hurricane Katrina
Hurricane Katrina
Hurricane Katrina of the 2005 Atlantic hurricane season was a powerful Atlantic hurricane. It is the costliest natural disaster, as well as one of the five deadliest hurricanes, in the history of the United States. Among recorded Atlantic hurricanes, it was the sixth strongest overall...
was followed by accusations of racism from left-wing organizations Media Matters for America
Media Matters for America
Media Matters for America is a politically progressive media watchdog group which says it is "dedicated to comprehensively monitoring, analyzing, and correcting conservative misinformation in the U.S. media." Set up as a 501 non-profit organization, MMfA was founded in 2004 by journalist and...
and the Southern Poverty Law Center
Southern Poverty Law Center
The Southern Poverty Law Center is an American nonprofit civil rights organization noted for its legal victories against white supremacist groups; legal representation for victims of hate groups; monitoring of alleged hate groups, militias and extremist organizations; and educational programs that...
. In reference to the New Orleans slogan "let the good times roll", Sailer commented:
Conservative columnist John Podhoretz
John Podhoretz
John Podhoretz is an American neoconservative columnist for the New York Post, the editor of Commentary magazine, the author of several books on politics, and a former presidential speechwriter.-Life and career:...
, responded in the National Review Online blog by calling Sailer's statement "shockingly racist and paternalistic
Paternalism
Paternalism refers to attitudes or states of affairs that exemplify a traditional relationship between father and child. Two conditions of paternalism are usually identified: interference with liberty and a beneficent intention towards those whose liberty is interfered with...
" as well as "disgusting".
Sailer describes his personal ideology as "Citizenism", which he explains as:
He views this as an antithesis of racism, and he argues that African-Americans, Jewish-Americans, European-Americans, and other groups can rally behind this. He has also stated that "White Nationalism
White nationalism
White nationalism is a political ideology which advocates a racial definition of national identity for white people. White separatism and white supremacism are subgroups within white nationalism. The former seek a separate white nation state, while the latter add ideas from social Darwinism and...
is worse than a crime, it's a mistake" and argued that the ideology, if widely adopted, would actually hurt American whites rather than help them.