Don McNay
“Never understood that ain’t no good, you shouldn’t let other people get your kicks for you.”
— Bob Dylan
Author Malcolm Gladwell’s career path reminds me of 1970s rock star Peter Frampton.
In 1976, Peter Frampton released “Frampton Comes Alive.” Critically acclaimed, it was one of the biggest selling live albums of all time.
He followed up with “I’m In You,” a lesser effort. He then flamed out with the movie, “Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.”
Gladwell’s first book was “The Tipping Point,” a critically acclaimed best seller. The second, “Blink,” was a lesser effort.
His latest book, “Outliers,” is Gladwell’s “Sergeant Pepper.” A total embarrassment. Frampton was embarrassing because he made bad choices and took bad drugs.
Gladwell’s book is embarrassing because it is inane and plays on stereotypes.
I’m not sure what the point “Outliers” is supposed to be making. He talks about hockey players, birth years and other random topics. He sucks up to some New York lawyers, including his agent.
I don’t mind pointlessness or shout outs to his buddies. Lot of authors write pointless books and butter-up their friends.
What I mind is his prejudice and hatred against the people of Appalachia.
Gladwell devotes an entire chapter of the book to Harlan, Ky. A place I am pretty familiar with. I’ve been there countless times and my daughters were born in an adjoining county.
Nothing suggests that Gladwell has been near Harlan, but it doesn’t stop him from being an expert anyway.
Although “Outliers” is subtitled, “The Story of Success,” Gladwell thinks the people in Harlan are a bunch of losers. He calls it “a remote and strange place” and tells the story of a 1930s fight between the Turner family and the Howard family. He spends the rest of the chapter promoting a theory that people in Appalachia are more prone to violence than people in the North because of their “Scotch-Irish heritage.”
Gladwell doesn’t let facts get in the way of his theory. Thus, he doesn’t cite any crime statistics at all.
I can see why. According to the Crime in Kentucky report issued by the Kentucky State Police, there was only one murder in Harlan County in 2007.
If the Howards and the Turners are still feuding, one of them is not shooting back.
There were 12 Harlan County robberies and 53 assaults. That number might rise to 54 if Gladwell ever sets foot there.
If someone in Harlan takes a swing at him, Gladwell is getting off easy. New York City had 494 murders that same year. Imagine if Gladwell attributed those killings to the ethnic heritage of the murderers. His publisher (Little, Brown and Co.) would have mobs in front of their building.
Gladwell slopped the chapter together without a lot of research. As noted, he skipped statistics and personal interviews. He leans heavily on a book written in 1962 and an article written in 1949. He throws in a couple of studies and books from 1980s and 1990s.
Thus, a chapter in his 21st century “story of success” does not have a single piece of research done in the 21st century.
Lack of research doesn’t stop him from pushing his prejudices anyway. He plays on stereotype as many people’s view of Appalachia comes from television comedies such as “The Beverly Hillbillies.”
“The Beverly Hillbillies” was the second-most outrageous caricature to come out of the 1960s. Its impossible to be worse than “Hogan Heroes,” which turned Nazis into a bunch of stumbling, funny men.
Something else was going on the 1960s. The civil rights movement. The decade started with segregated restaurants and rest rooms and ended with the assassination of Martin Luther King. Lots of good was done during that time period. It was a major step in a journey that led up to the first African-American being elected president of the United States.
When Barack Obama is sworn in as president on Jan. 20, it should be the day that Americans stop making bigoted generalizations about people that they know little or nothing about. It’s time to stop perpetrating stereotypes about race, religion, heritage, nationality, disabilities and sexual preference.
Its time to stop demeaning the people of Appalachia, too.
Appalachian crusaders such as Gurney Norman have made tremendous strides in keeping “The New Beverly Hillbillies” television show off the air and the “Kentucky Cycle” out of theaters. I hope Gurney and his crew take up the cause of keeping “Outliers” out of bookstores and libraries. Perpetuating myths about Appalachia has to stop.
Even if those myths come from high-powered business authors who promise to share “the story of success.”
Like Peter Frampton, Gladwell is coasting on the success of his previous work. It’s not a bad money-making strategy. The book is on the best-seller list.
I would like to see Gladwell test his theory about Southerners being more prone to violence than Northerners. A good way to do it would be for Gladwell walk the streets at midnight in urban areas that have the same economic and unemployment challenges that Harlan does.
If he survives, I invite Mr. Gladwell to come to Harlan, do some readings of his book and have a heaping helping of their hospitality.
Hillbilly that is. Set a spell. Take your shoes off. You all come back now, you hear.
Don McNay is the founder of McNay Settlement Group in Richmond, Ky. You can read his award-winning, syndicated financial column at www.donmcnay.com or write to him at don@donmcnay.com. McNay is the author of “Son of a Son of a Gambler” and “The Unbridled World of Ernie Fletcher.” He is also proud to have been named a Kentucky colonel and an honorary Duke of Hazard.
