Professor Arrested in Cambridge

By Jim Williams

Well the race card has been played once again. This time by Henry Louis Gates Jr., a well know Harvard professor. In addition to his Professorship at Harvard, Mr. Gates is also the Director of the W. E. B. Du Bois Institute for African and African American Research and is the Editor-in-Chief of the Oxford African American Studies Center. But neither of these is how I was introduced to him. Before all the media attention due to the Professor’s arrest in Cambridge, I watched the PBS special “African American Lives”, which Professor Gates hosted. This special explores the roots of some famous African Americans. The four part series was especially interesting to me due to the fact that Professor Gates self exploration found that his ancestry and mine had crossed paths. The investigation of his family revealed that they were at one time, during that terrible time of slavery, owned by the (Virginia) VanMetre Family. This is my lineage and therefore I felt an immediate connection to the professor. But as the series went on I became more and more disillusioned with him, due to repeated accusations and comments that could only be interpreted as racist. The first stunning moment is when, through DNA testing, he found that he was 50% white. His comment was that he was “horrified”. Why would anyone be horrified of their roots unless they had a predisposed dislike for a particular heritage; in this case Caucasian decent? This can only be interpreted as an anti-white comment. Secondly, the professor contributed this white heritage to, what he called, “Sneaking and Creeping” by the once slave owners of his family. His accusation was that the VanMetre’s, my family, sexually abused his family. To prove his forgone conclusion, he compared the DNA of a male VanMetre to his DNA. The results showed that he had no VanMetre lineage at all. His response was “I’m surprised”. Surprised, no doubt, because he assumed that sexual abuse was part of every slave / slave owner relationship. This evidence vindicated my family from this horrific accusation. But, Professor Gates never apologized for his slanderous comments or for his pre-judging of my family before actually knowing the facts. I say all this to show that Professor Gates has an obvious predisposition that influenced his behavior during the interaction with the Cambridge police officer. His predisposition is exactly what we as a society have been working to eliminate. The professor’s comment on the PBS special and during the time of his arrest shows a strong dislike for people of white heritage. The time has long passed when these types of comments and behavior should be tolerated. The race card should be thrown, but not by Professor Gates. It goes without saying; all facts should be gathered before passing judgment. To do otherwise would be handling the situation “Stupidly”. Are you listening Mr. President?