Third Section of Dying In The City Of Blues

In the last portion of Keith Wailoo’s book Dying In The City Of Blues, sickle cell anemia is taken and used throughout society for different political gains. In hopes of illigitamizing radical parties claims that the government is committing black genocide, president Nixon enacts the Sickle Cell Anemia Control Act. This act supplied millions of dollars in funds for sickle cell anemia research in hopes of finding a cure for the condition. The act, to me, was seen as both a political strategy for Nixon to gain the African American vote and a humanitarian gain in hopes of supplying care for those with this condition. It also presented the opportunity for the health community to find “evidence” to support the idea that the African American community was inferior. This is done with the immense knowledge discovered on the disease due to the funds the act provides.

One case in which professionals had “research” to back up the claim of African American inferiority is seen in the William Shockley and Arthur Jensen’s work. These two men claimed that the lower IQ scores they had found within their study of African Americans had proven that the community had hereditary lower intelligence: “Shockley and Jensen argued that no amount of money or social engineering could change the racial differences in IQ and social achievement, which they believed were created by nature and sustained through inheritance” (Wailoo 186). Since these researchers had found “proof” that African Americans were inherently inferior, the sickle cell condition was also seen as sign of inferiority (Wailoo 186). The ability of the condition to be inherited within the African American community allowed for society to stamp them as biologically different and inferior to white Americans.

Alongside Shockley and Jensen, researcher Linus Pauling had also expressed the inferiority of African Americans. Pauling did this through his support of preventing sickle cell carriers from childbearing. Pauling had stated that those with the sickle cell anemia should have a tattoo of a  “symbol showing possession of the sickle-cell gene” (Wailoo 186). This “tattoo” given to sickle cell carriers would single African Americans out in society and present a physical way in which they can be stamped as outcasts. I found this method to be absolutely appalling and demanding. Pauling’s method reinforced that this racist ideology of African American inferiority was out in society and continued to affect the medical field. It showed that american culture, despite advances towards equality, was still heavily influenced by racist ideologies.