Charles Murray

Charles Alan Murray is a crank American political scientist and eugenics promoter with a long association with the conservative, libertarian think tank the American Enterprise Institute. He is best known for co-authoring The Bell Curve with The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life by Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray (1994) Free Press. ISBN 0029146739.
Murray has been described by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a "white nationalist" and "one of the most influential social scientists in America, using racist pseudoscience and misleading statistics to argue that social inequality is caused by the genetic inferiority of the Black and Latino communities, women and the poor."Charles Murray Southern Poverty Law Center
==Murray's career==
===The Peace Corps and counterinsurgency strategies===
After college, Murray joined the stationed in Thailand, and during that time he used Thai prostitutes. He bragged about it to The New York Times, to prove that he was "not against sex" then telling the reporter, "You should have been so lucky."Daring Research or 'Social Science Pornography?' Charles Murray Jason Deparle (October 9, 1994) The New York Times 
In an interview with racist Steve Sailer in 2003, Murray said, "There are aspects of Asian culture as it is lived that I still prefer to Western culture, 30 years after I last lived in Thailand."Q & A with Charles Murray on Human Accomplishment Interview with Steve Sailer (October 16, 2003) iSteve.com (archived) In an interview with Murray said: "Essentially, most of what you read in my books I learned in Thai villages."Conversation with Charles Murray interview by Bill Kristol (2014) Conversations with Bill Kristol (archived)
In 1969 "Murray became an employee of American Institutes for Research (AIR), one of many contract social-science research firms employed by the Pentagon to develop counterinsurgency strategies in Southeast Asia."The White Man, Unburdened Quinn Slobodian, Stuart Schrader (July 2018) The Baffler
===Wingnut welfare===
Murray first caught the attention of the far right through an article he wrote for the Heritage Foundation, attacking the American social safety net.Intellectual Stock Picking James Traub (February 7, 1994) The New Yorker
But in spite of Murray's opposition to welfare, Murray himself has relied on a form of welfare for most of his career, a form known as "wingnut welfare". Economist Paul Krugman characterized it as: "…the lavishly-funded ecosystem of billionaire-financed think tanks, media outlets, and so on (which) provides a comfortable cushion for politicians and pundits who tell such people what they want to hear."Wingnut Welfare and Work Incentives Paul Krugman (April 25, 2015) The New York Times
The easy yet lucrative nature of a wingnut welfare career was noted by writer Adam H. Johnson, who tweeted: "we talk a lot about profitable grifts but imo a far more interesting Q is what is the cushiest grift? (defined as the least work to highest pay ratio). AEI paid Charles Murray $380K in 2017 to, from what I can see, give a few radio interviews, write one testimony & four articles." (and yes all four article were about what happened at Middlebury in March of that year)we talk a lot about profitable grifts… by Adam H. Johnson (January 6, 2020) Twitter (archived from September 29, 2023).
In The Washington Post, in 2015, Tom Medvetz analyzed the benefits of being a creature of the think tank for Murray:
Murray's big career break came in 1982, when Manhattan Institute president William Hammett decided to fund and promote Murray:
===Losing Ground===
In Losing Ground Murray proposed that social safety net programs Aid for Families with Dependent Children, food stamps, Medicare and Medicaid be abolished.The Battle Over 'Losing Ground' Review by Michael Barone (April 3, 1985) The Washington Post 
Murray exchanged letters with Christopher Jencks, over Jencks' review of Losing Ground. Jencks said Murray's use of statistics was misleading:
Considering how important Murray's work is to today's promoters of hereditarianism, it's interesting that Murray did not promote the hereditarian position on Black poverty, in Losing Ground but rather, the "Black culture" argument favored by Daniel Patrick MoynihanDon't Be Like That Kelefa Sanneh (February 2, 2015) The New Yorker:
And then came Linda Gottfredson and Richard Herrnstein and the Pioneer Fund.
===The Bell Curve===
In The Bell Curve, Murray and Herrnstein (Herrnstein died the month that the book was published) would combine the anti-social safety net policies of the Republican Party with the hereditarian claims of Herrnstein and Gottfredson, bolstered by the "science" of E. O. Wilson's partner in racialist theories, J. Philippe Rushton.
====When Murray met Herrnstein====
In 1986, Charles Murray met Linda Gottfredson and her husband Robert Gordon when they asked him to join them for a panel discussion at a meeting of the . Also participating was a racialist and inventor of his own religion, "Beyondism" and Richard Herrnstein who had become famous for his claims that socio-economic hierarchies were the result of innate, genetically-endowed intelligence.See E. O. Wilson#Herrnstein. The panel was scheduled to kick off the "Project for the Study Intelligence and Society" backed by the Pioneer Fund.
(While Gottfredson was at the University of Delaware, she argued that although only racists such as the Pioneer Fund were willing to financially support her work, it did not mean her work was outside of the "mainstream.")Linda Gottfredson (March 29, 1990) University of Delaware Inter-departmental Memorandum
The hereditarian true-believers influenced — or perhaps confirmed — Murray's own views on race, intelligence and socio-economic hierarchies:
The Pioneer Fund would be especially useful to Murray and Herrnstein, "They cite in their book no fewer than thirteen scholars who have benefited from Pioneer Fund grants in the last two decades — the grants total more than $4 million. Many of The Bell Curve's sources who worked for Mankind Quarterly were also granted Pioneer money."The Tainted Sources of 'The Bell Curve' Charles Lane (December 1, 1994) The New York Review of Books
The Bell Curve was controversial when it was published, prompting an editorial from The New York Times:
The popular contemporary view of The Bell Curve was that it was a targeted attack on Black intelligence, as when Al Franken joked at the 1996 White House Correspondents Dinner: 
By the way, also here tonight is Charles Murray who I understand has been hard at work on a sequel to "The Bell Curve" entitled Jazz, the Music Created by Morons.By the way, also here tonight is Charles Murray who I understand has been hard at work on a sequel to The Bell Curve entitled Jazz, the Music Created by Morons. Al Fraken at the 1996 White House Correspondent's Dinner YouTube
====Boosted by Andrew Sullivan====
Over the objection of staffers, Andrew Sullivan, editor at The New Republic decided to print an excerpt of The Bell Curve in the October 31, 1994 issue of the magazine.Race, Genes and I. Q. - An Apologia Charles Murray, Richard Herrnstein (October 31, 1994) The New Republic Sullivan would continue to praise, defend and promote Murray for the next thirty years.A Reader's Guide to Andrew Sullivan's Defense of Race Science Max Read (November 29, 2011) GawkerDenying Genetics Isn’t Shutting Down Racism, It’s Fueling It Andrew Sullivan (Marcy 30, 2018) Intelligencer - New York MagazineCharles Murray On Human Diversity Interview with Charles Murray (May 28, 2021) The Daily Dish
====Gottfredson's mainstream claim====
The public reaction against The Bell Curve was strong enough that Linda Gottfredson published a defense of The Bell Curve in The Wall Street Journal.Mainstream Science on Intelligence: An Editorial With 52 Signatories, History, and Bibliography Linda Gottfredson (December 13, 1994) The Wall Street Journal Gottfredson claimed that The Bell Curve's racialist claims were scientifically "mainstream" but as the Southern Poverty Law Center observed, "The only thing linking many of Gottfredson’s co-signers to the field of IQ research at all was a commitment to the idea of innate racial differences in intelligence."Linda Gottfredson Southern Poverty Law Center
Gottfredson's article would become a kind of founding document for the International Society for Intelligence Research as many of the signers would go on to have roles, including Gottfredson, in that organization. The document is also included on the International Society for Intelligence Research's website under "Resources — Articles about Intelligence." The document is described as "…a classic. It’s one of the best overviews of intelligence, its causes, and its consequences."International Society for Intelligence Research
Murray appeared at the 2009 annual conference of the International Society for Intelligence Research.Charles Murray was interviewed by David Lubinski at the 2009 meeting in Madrid, Spain. (Retrieved November 1, 2023) International Society for Intelligence Research
====The hereditarian political tradition====
In Contemporary Psychology Thomas J. Bouchard, Jr., a Pioneer Fund money recipientIn Genes We Trust: When Science Bows to Racism Barry Mehler (Winter 1997) Reform Judaism frequent attendee of International Society for Intelligence Research events,ISIR 2004 Distinguished Contributor Interview: Thomas Bouchard, Jr. Timothy Bates' YouTube Channel 2010 International Society for Intelligence Research Conference ISIR Lifetime Contribution Award Behavioral Genetics of Intelligence: Its History to the Forefront of Big Data Advances (July 10, 2019) The Inaugural Pre-ISIR Conference Lecture Series and champion of the claims of J. Philippe Rushton quotation from Thomas J. Bouchard, Jr. Race, Evolution, and Behavior: A Life History Perspective Third Edition by J. Philippe Rushton placed The Bell Curve firmly in the hereditarian political tradition: 
====Bell Curve aftermath====
Once the dust of The Bell Curve controversy settled down, and as in the case of Losing Ground, Murray was accused of data misuse:
In its analysis of The Bell Curve, the Brookings Institute stated, "The book’s basic premise–that IQ is becoming the decisive force in determining economic rewards and social position – is demonstrably false."Does The Bell Curve Ring True? A Closer Look at a Grim Portrait of American Society William T. Dickens, Charles L. Schultze, and Thomas J. Kane (June 1, 1995) Brookings
====Barack Obama on The Bell Curve====
Barack Obama, at the time a civil rights attorney, shared his thoughts about The Bell Curve on National Public Radio in 1994:
===Charles Murray predicts===
Hereditarians have been known to predict that their racialist claims will be proven correct, sometime in the future.
In 2005, in response to the Edge "annual question" "WHAT IS YOUR DANGEROUS IDEA?" Pinker wrote: "The year 2005 saw several public appearances of what will I predict will become the dangerous idea of the next decade: that groups of people may differ genetically in their average talents and temperaments." He included a plug for Natural History of Ashkenazi Intelligence: "In June, the Times reported a forthcoming study by physicist Greg Cochran, anthropologist Jason Hardy, and population geneticist Henry Harpending proposing that Ashkenazi Jews have been biologically selected for high intelligence, and that their well-documented genetic diseases are a by-product of this evolutionary history."What is Your Dangerous Idea - Steven Pinker (December 23, 2005) EDGE (retrieved via archive.org October 9, 2023)
In 2009, also in Edge, Jonathan Haidt wrote: 
====Missing heritability====
2009 was the year hereditarians began to come to terms with the realization that genetic studies, which they expected would prove their racialist beliefs, had failed to deliver, a phenomenon called "missing heritability". As Brendan Maher wrote in Nature in November, 2008, "When scientists opened up the human genome, they expected to find the genetic components of common traits and diseases. But they were nowhere to be seen."Personal genomes: the case of the missing heritability Brendan Maher (November 5, 2008) Nature
From a science-based perspective, it has become clear that there is no basis for even the starting proposition of hereditarianism, that there are clearly-defined human races. Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza et al.'s tour de force 1994 book The History and Geography of Human Genes analyzed a massive number of worldwide DNA samples, finding no evidence distinct races, but instead finding gradations (clines) of DNA across the world's populations.The History and Geography of Human Genes by Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza et al. (1994) Princeton University Press. ISBN 0691087504.Toward a new history and geography of human genes informed by ancient DNA by Joseph K. Pickrell & David Reich (2014) Trends Genet. 30(9): 377–389. doi:10.1016/j.tig.2014.07.007.
====Rushton or his critics====
In The Bell Curve, Murray and Herrnstein had defended their use of the studies of J. Philippe Rushton in an appendix, where they claimed that, while Rushton was not a crackpot or a bigot, they didn't know for sure if his speculations about Black people were correct, "We cannot at present say who is more nearly right as a matter of science, Rushton or his critics… we expect that time will tell whether it is right or wrong in fact."The Bell Curve Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray (1994)
However, immediately after The Bell Curve was published, Murray began predicting the eventual vindication of the American hereditarian assumption. As he said to Robert Siegel in October 1994, "I would ask for you to have me back in three or four years, and let's see who is right on this issue."NPR Interview with Charles Murray (10-28-1994) NPR via Prometheism. Murray made similar prediction over the years and was mocked in 2019 on Twitter.
===Human Accomplishment===
Often hereditarians, whether they are political scientists, psychologists or biologists feel the need to explain art and what makes it good.See E. O. Wilson#Implications amok. Murray demonstrated this tendency by publishing Human Accomplishment.Human Accomplishment: The Pursuit of Excellence in the Arts and Sciences, 800 B.C. to 1950 by Charles Murray (2003) HarperCollins. ISBN 006019247X. The book was proclaimed "brilliant" and "audacious" and "a new science of human accomplishment",Human Accomplishment: The Pursuit of Excellence in the Arts and Sciences, 800 B.C. to 1950 About the Book (2003) AEI website but in a 2017 Current Affairs article critiquing the book's methodology, Nathan J. Robinson called it "his little-read 2003 book Human Accomplishment". Robinson continued, "If you want evidence proving Murray a 'pseudoscientist,' it is Human Accomplishment rather than The Bell Curve that you should turn to. In it, he attempts to prove using statistics which cultures are objectively the most 'excellent' and 'accomplished,' demonstrating mathematically the inherent superiority of Western thought throughout the arts and sciences."
===Coming Apart===
Murray's Coming Apart, published in 2012, avoids the issue of race by focusing on the White working class.Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960–2010 by Charles Murray (2012) Crown Forum. ISBN 0307453421. Because Murray is blinded by the hereditarian premise, he does not engage with socio-economic realities that impact the working class. This is evident in The New York Times review of the book, when Nicholas Confessore provided a series of facts in answer to Murray's question about the behaviors of the lower classes:
These economic facts were as available to Murray as to anybody working for The New York Times. But Murray does not want to know these facts: his entire wingnut welfare career is based on telling right-wing plutocrats that socio-economic problems have nothing to do with the self-serving decisions of the plutocracy, but rather the bad choices of the mentally incompetent poor.
===The Curmudgeon’s Guide to Getting Ahead===
In 2014 Murray was promoting himself as a curmudgeon,The Curmudgeon's Guide to Getting Ahead: Dos and Don'ts of Right Behavior, Tough Thinking, Clear Writing, and Living a Good Life by Charles Murray (2014) Currency. ISBN 0804141444. and the American right was happy to accept him as their favorite crusty old right-wing uncle, evident in Forbes' review of his book The Curmudgeon’s Guide to Getting Ahead. Forbes described Murray as a "genius" and the book as "a must-read for all ages." The opening of the review gives a glimpse into Murray's cozy relationship with the libertarian establishment:
===Middlebury College incident===
But in spite of the efforts of Murray and the American right to rehabilitate his image, Murray continued to be associated with the hereditarian claims of The Bell Curve. As a result, he has sometimes received hostile responses whenever he has ventured outside of right-wing safe spaces.Students walk out of Murray talk Georgia Parks (October 29, 2013) Duke ChronicleSpeaking up: Charles Murray talk sparks student, faculty protests Anita Alem (April 9, 2014) The Rice Thresher Students had protested Murray many times in 2016-17.Charles Murray Comes to Campus, Drawing Protest Isaac Lee (November 16, 2016) The PhoenixU. Affiliates silently protest, walk out of Charles Murray lecture Marcia Brown and Christopher Umanzor (December 9, 2016) The Daily PrincetonianControversial author Charles Murray’s visit sparks student protest Timothy Duke (November 2, 2017) The DePaulia 
Murray was invited to give a speech at Middlebury College in 2017 by a student chapter of the American Enterprise Institute. The AEI had been Murray's employer since 1990.How the Middlebury Riot Really Went Down Taylor Gee (May 28, 2017) Politico Students at Middlebury disrupted Murray's speech.Bell Curve author Charles Murray speaks out after speech cut short by protests Danuta Kean (March 6, 2017) The Guardian
As with E. O. Wilson and his "water incident", Murray was happy to use the incident to present himself as a martyr for free speech, publishing an opinion piece in Newsweek, "Charles Murray: My Free Speech Ordeal at Middlebury" about the incident.Charles Murray: My Free Speech Ordeal at Middlebury Charles Murray (March 7, 2017) Newsweek
====Sam Harris====
In his effort to present Charles Murray as a free speech martyr, Sam Harris interviewed Murray on his podcast. Harris was a named (by Bari Weiss) member of the Intellectual Dark Web, a group of people who favor hereditarian explanations for human behaviors — Michael Shermer who believes that Rushton's racialist claims are correct, is another named member. The hereditarian online magazine Quillette was said by Weiss to be the media source most associated with the IDW.Meet the Renegades of the Intellectual Dark Web Bari Weiss (May 8, 2018) The New York Times
The Vox article, "Charles Murray is once again peddling junk science about race and IQ" notes:
The interview demonstrated that both Murray and Harris were devoted to the hereditarian premise, with Harris claiming, "For better or worse, these are all facts… In fact, there is almost nothing in psychological science for which there is more evidence than for these claims."
Harris would later defend The Bell Curve by linking to an article in Quillette,EZRA KLEIN: EDITOR-AT-LARGE Sam Harris (March 27, 2018) Sam Harris' blog written by Ben Winegard and Bo Winegard, the human biodiversity twins.Human Biological and Psychological Diversity Bo Wingegard, Benjamin Winegard and Brian Boutwell (January 17, 2017) Evolutionary Psychological Science
Scott Lemieux shared his response to the incident and to Harris on the blog Lawyers, Guns and Money:
===Retirement===
Officially, Murray retired in 2018, but it was mainly a bureaucratic distinction. His public activities, especially for the hereditarian cause, did not abate. In an interview noting his retirement, with NPR's Michel Martin, Murray denied his influence on the racist right:
Murray appears to be completely oblivious to the significance of his own actions. In 2017, Nathan Robinson addressed Murray's obliviousness in an article "Why Is Charles Murray Odious?": 
===Human Diversity===
Although the AEI publicized Murray's retirement,Charles Murray: Celebrating a New Chapter at AEI Arthur C. Brooks (December 21, 2017) AEI Murray's career activities continued as before — he continued to publish books and make appearances. The major change appears to be that Murray doubled-down on biological determinism.
===="Outrage has been good to Charles Murray"====
In 2020 Murray published a book that recalled the arguments in The Bell Curve. In its review of Human Diversity,Human Diversity: The Biology of Gender, Race, and Class by Charles Murray (2020) Twelve. ISBN 9781538744017. The New York Times wrote:
Psychologist Eric Turkheimer said, "The vast majority of Human Diversity could have been written by Arthur Jensen in 1990."More on Murray: What is Biological Determinism? Eric Turkheimer (January 29, 2020) Eric Turkheimer blog
The title, Human Diversity is very close to "human biodiversity", a pseudoscience founded by racist Steve Sailer. Murray had known Sailer since at least 2003 when he was interviewed by Sailer. By January 2021, Murray was declaring his undying solidarity with Sailer, when Sailer was threatened with having his Twitter account cancelled for making racist claims about Black people.white nationalist fav Charles Murray here just casually asking Twitter to take his account in solidarity with VDARE and Unz Review contributor Steve Sailer @hannahgais (January 30, 2021) Twitter (archived from January 30, 2021).
In its discussion of the book, New Republic said:
===Facing Reality===
A review of Human Diversity said that it was "thick with reassurances to the reader, and caveats that individuals ought to be judged on their own merits." But a month after Murray published his next book, Facing Reality: The Two Truths about Race in America, in June 2021,Facing Reality: Two Truths about Race in America by Charles Murray (2021) Encounter Books. ISBN 1641771976. he demonstrated beyond question that those reassurances and caveats had been absolute, shameless lies. In July Murray was on Twitter, advocating race-based employment discrimination. Being Black, in Murray's worldview absolutely trumps being an individual who "ought to be judged on their own merits."
Theodore R. Johnson, in his review in The Washington Post, wrote:
After facing the indisputable reality of Charles Murray's extreme racism, the mainstream media gave this book far less attention than Murray's previous books. Steve Sailer complained about thatHow Many Reviews Has Charles Murray's "Facing Reality" Received in Its First Month of Publication? Steve Sailer (July 17, 2021) Unz Review and Razib Khan moaned, "I am one of the few people willing to write about" the book.Charles Murray’s ‘Facing Reality’—A Review Razib Khan (July 29, 2021) Quillette. In the review, Khan mentioned he was Murray's friend.
Facing Reality was simply the same old rehashing of the American hereditarian assumption, which has been around since before J. Philippe Rushton tried to codify it as "science".
==Murray's political and moral agendas==
===Libertarianism===
====It usually begins with Ayn Rand====
In 1971, Jerome Tuccille published a "satirical memoir" called It Usually Begins with Ayn Rand in which he noted how influential Rand was in gaining converts to Libertarianism.It Usually Begins with Ayn Rand by Jerome Tuccille (1971) Stein and Day. ISBN 0812814029. Charles Murray is a good example. Writing in The Federalist, Murray admits that Ayn Rand was a big influence on his early years, and shares his love of Rand's novels, like Atlas Shrugged and its fantasy of blue collar workers who don't even want to strike because owners pay them high wages out of the goodness of their hearts. Although even Murray has to admit (thanks to reading two excellent Rand biographies published in 2012, and ) that Rand was a self-deluded, drugged-up, hypocritical crackpot.How Ayn Rand Captured The Magic Of American Life Charles Murray (October 16, 2014) The Federalist
====A Personal Interpretation====
Murray is a devout libertarian. In 1997 he published What It Means to Be a Libertarian A Personal Interpretation, called a "manifesto" in The New York Times review.Leave It to the Elks James P. Pinkerton (January 19, 1997) The New York Times - Books
The hereditarianism of The Bell Curve is the perfect tool for the political goals of libertarianism. Libertarianism says public funds should not be used to help the poor, and hereditarianism says why: because the poor are too stupid to be helped.
=====Universal basic income=====
Towards the end of his official career, Murray found a new tactic to try to destroy the American social safety net: universal basic income:
In calling out single women — presumably he means single mothers — Murray demonstrates that he hasn't forgotten a major purpose in shredding the social safety net: telling those women they "did wrong", as described in the next section.
===Welfare mothers vs. prostitutes===
A month after The Bell Curve was published, The New York Times published a profile of Murray that was revealing of Murray's character and his moral compass:
Like many right-wing hypocrites, while Murray would be happy to deny any aid to a young unwed mother, because she "did wrong" in having sex outside of marriage, Murray is unashamed of his own non-marital sex. Rather, he brags about it: 
No doubt it never crossed Murray's mind that the "courtesans" he had used might become pregnant, and what that would mean to their lives. But perhaps this is another example of Murray's obliviousness. Murray is not against sex — and not against non-marital sex — for himself, and presumably not against it for the men of his class who can afford easily-discarded sexual liaisons.
Another interpretation is that Murray is so devoted to the principles of libertarianism that he believes single mothers who receive welfare, and therefore cause a financial burden to taxpayers, would be more moral if they instead avoided hunger for themselves and their children by resorting to the free enterprise of prostitution.
Murray is somewhat conflicted about prostitution. While he appears to believe it's a positive good in the 1994 New York Times article, in 1987 he used prostitution as an example of the "broken windows" theory.Bench Ansfield, How a 50-year-old study was misconstrued to create destructive broken-windows policing. Archived from The Washington Post, 27 December 2019. He can be seen in a video on YouTube, during an interview, posted by the right-wing libertarian organization "Free to Choose" saying: 
===The orphanage solution===
Charles Murray hates the welfare system, as he told David Brinkley on ABC's This Week and his solution to the destruction of the safety net for struggling parents was orphanages, "I want to get rid of the whole welfare system, period, lock, stock and barrel — if you don't have any more welfare, you enlist a lot more people in the community to help take care of the children that are born. And the final thing that you can do, if all else fails, is orphanages." His influence on the Republican Party was apparent when House Speaker Newt Gingrich suggested that poor children should be put in orphanages.Orphanages Are No Solution New York Times Editorial Board (December 12, 1994) The New York Times
Right-wing pundit Glenn Loury testified to Murray's influence, "You cannot understand the changes in American welfare policy that began in the '90s if you don’t read Losing Ground."In Defense of Charles Murray Glenn Loury (March 29, 2022) Glenn Loury Substack
===White trash vs. crossburners===
The New York Times article was also revealing of Murray's hereditarian views:
The New York Times article quotes Murray referring to himself as a "bright kid." It also notes that as a teenager, Murray burned a cross:
This calls into question Murray's self-assessment as a "bright" kid. How many high school seniors from the white trash class, a group that Murray considers his intellectual inferiors, would be so "oblivious"?
It seems more likely that rather than obliviousness, Murray lied. 
Murray lived in Newton, Iowa, just 35 miles east of Des Moines, the capital of Iowa. The Des Moines Tribune ran multiple stories about cross-burning prior to the fall of 1960, including one in Henderson, North Carolina in February,A Protest Walk by Negroes (February 27, 1960) Des Moines Tribune. Retrieved September 18, 2023 Albuquerque, New Mexico in March,Shun Negro Students at Little Rock (March 24, 1960) Des Moines Tribune. Retrieved September 18, 2023 and Jacksonville, Florida in August.Jacksonville Violence Renewed: Bombs, Cross-Burning, Death Des Moines Tribune. (August 30, 1960). Newspapers.com. Retrieved September 18, 2023 
It was national news when the KKK burned a cross in front of the house of Martin Luther King, Jr. on April 27, 1960.Martin Luther King, removes a KKK cross burned on lawn of his home, as his son Martin stands next to him, Atlanta, Georgia. April 27, 1960 Bridgeman Images
====A cross-burning in Iowa City====
 Closer to home, the Tribune carried several stories about a cross-burning at the State University of Iowa, which is 83 miles east of Newton.
On April 29, 1960:
The next day the newspaper reported that eight students had been suspended. Dean of Students M. L. Hunt said university officials believed it was "merely a prank".Suspend Eight in 'Cross' Case (April 30, 1960) Des Moines Tribune Retrieved September 18, 2023 On May 2 it was reported that "The eight State University of Iowa students who were suspended Saturday in connection with a cross-burning incident, were back in their classes Monday pending an appeal of their suspension."8 Students Plan Appeal (May 2, 1960) The Des Moines Tribune Retrieved September 18, 2023 The next day it was reported that the students, all members of the Beta Theta Pi fraternity, had been reinstated at the request of the committee on student discipline.Reinstate 8 Until Action on Appeal (May 3, 1960) The Des Moines Tribune Retrieved September 18, 2023)
It would be remarkable if Murray, a high school senior planning to attend college, was unaware of the significance and the gravity of cross-burning.
==Continuing decline into racism==
After Murray retired from AEI, his devotion to hereditarian politics and his association with racialists and racists became apparent through his social media activities.
Journalist Elle Reeve has noted that The Bell Curve and Murray have frequently been cited as the thing that radicalized members of the alt-right into racism.Black Pill: How I Witnessed the Darkest Corners of the Internet Come to Life, Poison Society, and Capture American Politics by Elle Reeve (2024) ISBN 1982198893.
===Steve Sailer===
Charles Murray frequently defended, promoted and admired Steve Sailer via tweet.
File:Steve+chuck.png|A political scientist and a marketing guy share their thoughts on genomics
File:Sailer-murray.png|Conversation with Sailer, Murray and Richard Spencer
File:Murray+sailer.png|Murray celebrates Sailer's Twitter reinstatement
File:Sailer-murray-parsi.png|Murray and Sailer rank races - but how could "Western thought" be superiorA Cultural Scorecard Says West Is Ahead Emily Eakin (October 25, 2003) The New York Times if it wasn't created by the smartest race?
File:truststeve.png|Murray trusts Steve Sailer
File:Chucklovessteve.png|Murray admires marketing guy and professional racist Steve Sailer
In 2022 a right-wing media outlet, Ricochet, associated with the right-wing blog Powerline, platformed a conversation between Sailer and Murray. The conversation was published in two parts, and was hosted by Steven F. Hayward, a right-wing serial recipient of wingnut welfare. Hayward claims Murray and Sailer had never metA Conversation with Charles Murray and Steve Sailer, Pt. 1 Steven F. Hayward (January 23, 2022) Ricochet , either unaware of the 2003 interview, or not counting the interview as a meeting.
===Emil Kirkegaard===
Murray is an ally of Emil Kirkegaard, and has promoted him and retweeted him several timesWhat I love about the article is that Gilman quotes… Charles Murray retweets Emil Kirkegaard (November 20, 2018) Twitter (archived from October 1, 2023).The Emil Kirkegaard article I linked to… by Charles Murray (July 9, 2023) Twitter (archived from October 1, 2023).Murray retweeting Emil Kirkegaard Charles Murray (August 28, 2023) Twitter (archived from October 1, 2023).Murray retweeting Emil Kirkegaard and Razib Khan (September 10, 2023) Twitter (archived from October 1, 2023). and funded Kirkegaard and Bo Winegard.
===Bo Winegard and Aporia===
Murray participated in a conversation with hereditarian Helmuth Nyborg a Danish admirer of RushtonIntroduction to the memorial issue for J. Philippe Rushton Helmuth Nyborg (2013) Elsevier, in which they complained that non-white immigrants to the United States and Denmark weren't assimilating American or Danish culture quickly enough.Intelligence: Past, Present and Future | Charles Murray and Helmuth Nyborg (January 28, 2023) YouTube The discussion was hosted by the racist pseudoscience online magazine Aporia which employs Bo Winegard as Executive Editor and Noah Carl as editor.About Aporia. It is Aporia's ambition to "widen the Overton window"Aporia - About Aporia which is race pseudoscience-speak for "mainstream race pseudoscience beliefs."
===Richard Hanania===
Murray is a great admirer of right-wing, racist extremist Richard Hanania not only retweeting him, His description of interactions with liberals re group differences… by Charles Murray (September 19, 2023) Twitter (archived from October 1, 2023). but praising his book "The Origins of Woke" effusively: 
===Hidden Figures===
During his retirement, Charles Murray decided to launch a new project: tear down Hidden Figures, the book written by about the contributions of Black women to the NASA space program, focusing on three mathematicians, and Hidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Mathematicians Who Helped Win the Space Race by Margot Lee Shetterly (2016) William Morrow. ISBN 006236359X.
Murray published a PDF that implied that Johnson was a liar and/or delusional despite NASA's official biography of her confirming the details of her work at NASA.Katherine Johnson Biography by Sarah A. Loff (Nov 22, 2016) NASA. Murray had two collaborators, Harold Beck and Kenneth A. Young, former NASA employees.The Portrayal of Early Manned Spaceflight in Hidden Figures: A Critique by Harold Beck, Kenneth Young, and Charles Murray (2023).
Young got the project started, suspecting a conspiracy involving "journalists, politically correct politicians and bureaucratic activists."
Young often uses exclamation points and all caps in his accusations. He implied Johnson was a liar, while ranting about the :
While Young believed the alleged misattribution was due to Johnson lying, combined with a conspiracy, and possibly intra-organizational rivalry between the Houston and Langley (Virginia) NASA offices, Murray believed that the most plausible reason for the alleged misattribution was because Johnson was delusional:
 
====Ken Young and his good friends====
There isn't much information available about Ken Young online. He gave an interview in 2001 for the NASA Johnson Space Center Oral History Project to Kevin Rusnak and mentions both Beck and Murray, and calls them each his "good friend."[https://historycollection.jsc.nasa.gov/JSCHistoryPortal/history/oral_histories/YoungKA/YoungKA_6-13-01.htm Kenneth A. Young
Interviewed by Kevin Rusnak] (13 June 2001) NASA Johnson Space Center Oral History Project: Edited Oral History Transcript Ten years before the interview, Young had wanted Murray to write an exposé on the :
Young couldn't convince Murray to write an exposé about Space Station Freedom because, Murray said, he was "not into writing exposés." Apparently Murray changed his mind for Hidden Figures.
====Why Charles Murray is odious====
In spite of Young's request to publicize his claims, Murray refused to take him up on his project until he received pushback to his racist trolling on Twitter:
Murray saw a tweet about a Popular Mechanics article about two Black teenaged girls who were said to have "proven the Pythagorean theorem with trigonometry"Teens Have Proven the Pythagorean Theorem With Trigonometry. That Should Be Impossible. Two high schoolers just did what mathematicians have never been able to do. by Darren Orf (Mar 31, 2023) Popular Mechanics. and his response was to go onto Twitter and express doubt that they were correct, predict their failure would be covered up by Popular Mechanics and compare them, insultingly, to the women portrayed in Hidden Figures. 
Providing an excellent answer to Nathan J. Robinson's question: "Why is Charles Murray odious?"
Far from a failure covered up by Popular Mechanics, Calcea Johnson and Ne’Kiya Jackson were in the news a year later, because per the Guardian "Teens who discovered new way to prove Pythagoras’s theorem uncover even more proofs."Teens who discovered new way to prove Pythagoras’s theorem uncover even more proofs by Ramon Antonio Vargas (May 6, 2024) The Guardian
===="Never heard of Katherine Johnson or her calculations"====
In Murray's paper, Ken Young claimed people who should have heard of Katherine Johnson had not.
This echoes the opening of Margot Shetterly's epilogue to Hidden Figures:
One possible answer could be that women's STEM work has always been overlooked, or their contributions denied creditWhy the ‘Mother of the Atomic Bomb’ Never Won a Nobel Prize Katrina Miller (October 2, 2023) The New York Times even into the second decade of the twenty-first century:
Considering that Hidden Figures is about the careers of Black women in the southern United States, working in the middle decades of the twentieth century, before the civil rights movement achieved the end of segregation and many other forms of legal discrimination, it seems probable that women like Katherine Johnson received less credit than they deserved.
====Apollo: The Race to the Moon====
In his NASA interview, Young mentioned the book Murray wrote with his wife Catherine Bly Cox, no longer in print, called Apollo: The Race to the Moon.Apollo: The Race to the Moon by Charles Murray & Catherine Bly Cox (1989) Simon & Schuster. ISBN 0671611011. The book received praise for its accuracy, with the exception of a review by astronaut who noted:
Had he wished, Collins could have speculated on why Murray and Cox portrayed the Kennedy decade at variance from Collins' own experience. Perhaps, as a right-wing pundit, Murray was disinclined to give Kennedy credit. But unlike Murray in 2023, Collins didn't have an agenda, and generously adds that the portrayal was not accurate "for me, at least."
====Not-so-hidden motivations====
Like Murray, Ken Young appeared to have an agenda. He quoted from Hidden Figures, "At the Cape, a behind-the-scenes camera captured extensive footage of the astronaut as he walked through each station of the trip he had already taken hundreds of times in NASA simulators. (217)" to which Young responded, "Perhaps 'dozens,' not 'hundreds.' More hyperbole!"
The point of Murray's document is to argue that Katherine Johnson's calculations were not as important to the project of manned space flight as the book Hidden Figures claims. A possible exaggeration about walks in NASA simulators — this objection is dependent on Young's memory of and knowledge of all possible trips — has no bearing on the document's point — but it does show that Young is on a mission. And leaving in that kind of nit-picking reflects on Murray, who edited the document.
It's certainly possible that there are inaccuracies in Hidden Figures: disagreements on recollections of long-past events are not uncommon, as shown by E. O. Wilson's "water incident". And Murray's own book was disputed by an expert eyewitness. Tom Wolfe's well-known book on the space program was lauded for its accuracy, but some took issue with its portrayal of astronaut Gus Grissom.Author says 'Right Stuff' is wrong about Gus Grissom Scott L. Miley (January 10, 2013) CNHI News Service
Although Murray's document mentions Johnson's age several times, it doesn't reveal the ages of Young and Beck, who were near contemporaries of Johnson, who died at age 101 in 2020. They were likely to be at least in their mid-80s. And in spite of Murray's frequent claim of "falsifiability," much of Murray's argument depends on the memories of Young and Beck. 
It's also possible that Beck and Young were motivated by resentment. Johnson achieved fame at least as much for her identity as her career accomplishments. As a Black woman during the age of Jim Crow, she had to surmount incredible obstacles to achieve a career at NASA and her story is truly inspirational. Meanwhile history is unlikely to remember either Young or Beck, except for a couple of interviews by NASA,NASA Johnson Space Center Oral History Project Edited Oral History Transcript Harold D. Beck Interviewed by Rebecca Wright (December 9, 2004) and their association with Charles Murray.
As for Murray's possible motivation, to borrow a phrase from Charles Murray's document, "I have a theory of the case. I emphasize that it is speculative; no more than my attempt to devise a plausible explanation that is consistent with the known facts": Charles Murray's career is staked on the mental inferiority of Black people, so much so that who was equally qualified for a position as a hypothetical white one. And he admitted that he decided to publish the critique of Hidden Figures out of revenge for the negative reaction he received when he cast doubt on an accomplishment of two Black teenagers. Murray is on a mission to show that any accomplishment by Black people, especially Black women, must be considered doubtful.
For the legacy of Charles Murray to succeed, Black people must fail.
==Why take Charles Murray seriously?==
Nathan J. Robinson said it well:
==See also==
*Peter Thiel — Right-wing billionaire who Murray teamed up with in 2011 to argue that "too many kids go to college";Elizabeth Weingarten (October 11, 2011). "Too Many American Kids Go To College". Slate. more recent reporting suggests Thiel-backed academic network(s) may host/promote Murray and his work.Nafeez Ahmed (December 10, 2021). "Peter Thiel's Free Speech for Race Science Crusade at Cambridge University Revealed". Byline Times.
==External links==
* How The Bell Curve Naturalized Inequality - Charles C. Roseman (August 14, 2023) Jacobin
* Bubble - Lance Mannion (January 27, 2012) Lance Mannion blog
* Charles Murray on Allegations of Racism - Charles Murray (March 17, 2014) American Enterprise Institute
* That Old-Time Whistle - Paul Krugman (March 16, 2014) The New York Times
==Notes==
==References==
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