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The Ascension of Jason Hill
For several years now ARI has been promoting Jason Hill, a Jamaican immigrant, mulatto, homosexual, and professor of philosophy at DePaul University.
Elan Journo writes at ARI’s blog “Voices of Reason” in a post called “How Ayn Rand’s Books Change Lives” (2 May 2014):
“If you haven’t yet read Jason Hill’s article at Salon.com [link to “Jamaican, gay and Ayn Rand made it OK: My amazing ‘Atlas Shrugged’ love story”], head over there now. It’s an engrossing story about how Hill, now a professor at De Paul University, first encountered Ayn Rand’s ideas growing up in Jamaica. A thoughtful young gay man in a society antagonistic to gays, an atheist in a deeply religious culture, Hall found inspiration in Rand’s individualist vision of life and man’s potential. Rand’s ideas armed Hill with, as he puts it, a ‘rational and comprehensive guide to living on earth’. That galvanized him to overcome the obstacles and grinding hardships he faced, to define his own path in life, to find the career he’s passionate about, to pursue his own happiness.”
“As a huge fan of Barack Obama, I was filled with pride at his election. But that pride flowed not from the similarity of our skin tones. Rather it was in the capacity of the people of the United States to move beyond its traditional limitations, to show the world that the U.S. has the ability continually renew itself and fully abide by the fundamental principles of its constitution.
“It was, first and foremost, rational pride I felt in America and in the collective ability of a majority of voters to transcend its own clannish ways in choosing a new leader to take us forward. It is America and the American people that deserve praise for executing this extraordinary historic phenomenon. ...
“It was a collective achievement that proved itself eminently worthy of emulation. Perhaps this realization on the part of the American people has made other noteworthy political firsts possible with minimal fanfare. For example, the recent election of Annise Parker as the first openly gay mayor of Houston ...”
Judging from the above and his other writing, Mr. Hill and ARI would agree that whites who realize they have a common self-interest in ending non-white immigration – and keeping out such as Mr. Hill – are morally depraved.
Mr. Hill’s votng for Obama was part of a pattern. In an interview with Jack Weinstein on 10 August 2014 he said “I voted for Obama, I voted for John Kerry, and I voted for Al Gore, so I’ve always voted for the liberal party.” “Liberal” is an old-fashioned term for leftist.
In his book Becoming a Cosmopolitan (2000) Mr. Hill calls himself a “moral cosmopolitan.” Besides the normalization of “same-sex marriage” one of his goals is to end what he calls purity and privilege. From the book’s Introduction:
“Moral cosmopolitans are out to detribalize the world. Hybridization is a moral goal because it destabilizes zones of purity and privilege.”
“There are those who would say that the United States is not a tribal society. ¶ It is. ¶ So long as heads still turn when a black man walks arm-in-arm with a white woman; [he goes on to list other items in that line I don’t have the stomach to repeat] ... then we are living in a highly tribalistic society.”
I’ve only skimmed the book but one thing is clear: Jason Hill hates a white America and won’t be happy until it is completely destroyed.
Those who object to their destruction get called hard names. Mr. Hill’s more recent book Civil Disobedience and the Politics of Identity (2013), besides promoting homosexuality and the idea of same-sex “marriage,” lectures us on the turning heads:
“Here we begin to see ... the common threads between the assimilaphobe and the xenophobe. A staple value held by both as a prerequisite for the preservation of the culture is the taboo against intermarriage. If ever there was a practice that could ... [in their eyes] destroy the preservationist ethic, dissolve a culture and bring about irreparable loss or painful compromise to the integrity of a culture, it would be the practice of exogamy.”
“Regardless of the sociological explanations for how, such as in the case of blacks affected by racism, this mistrust came about, at the heart of the anti-intermarriage-on-principle phenomenon adopted by the assimilaphobe and the xenophobe lies an antisocial suspicion of the outsider to take care of one in one's basic humanity. This means that the anti-intermarriage convictions of the xenophobe and assimilaphobe are the consequence of a life lived according to a doctrine of
biological collectivism.”
Mr. Hill contributed to the anthology (edited by Tina Fernandes Botts) Philosophy and the Mixed Race Experience, “a collection of essays by mixed race philosophers about the mixed race experience” (2017). His contribution is titled “In Praise of the Virtuous Cosmopolitan.”
He finds Immanuel Kant on the side of open borders in “The Right to Permanent Residency as a Human Right: A Kantian Inquiry,” published in the anthology International Perspectives on Pragmatism (2009). From his website: “In this paper, I defend the rights of refugees and stateless persons to permanent residency from a Kantian perspective.”
Since then he has come out squarely against open borders. It should come as no surprise. Hispanics, asians, and other Third World immigrants are eating the blacks’ affirmative action lunch.
On 15 November 2014 he took part in a panel discussion of the Critical Mixed Race Studies Conference held at Depaul University, organized by one Gino Pellegrini. In a blog entry two days before the conference, headed “An Introduction: Egalitarian, Humanist, and Cosmopolitan Approaches to Mixed Race,” Mr. Pellegrini wrote:
“All three approaches are skeptical of biological race. All see race as an illogical and harmful social construct. To various degrees, all frown on notions of ethnic or racial group pride, and on the politics of conserving the culture and identity of particular ethnic or racial groups. Yet, all view as justifiable the provisional use of racial or ethnic identities and narratives for strategic, political purposes – so as to counteract racist beliefs and practices, and other forms of social injustice that target oppressed groups. Finally, all highlight individual harms, rights, justice, and duties vis-a-vis racialization, the politics of identity, and the history of white supremacy.”
In 2015 Mr. Hill began work on a book about the lives and suicides of two 20th century poets, to be called Goddesses of Death: Anne Sexton, Sylvia Plath and the Moral Meaning of Suicide. [1] In an interview titled “A conversation on suicide with Jason Hill” (Jamaica Observer, 26 April 2015) Mr. Hill said of the two women:
“They offer several insights; some metaphysical and some social. To begin with, suicide is a most radical exercise of freedom because, in choosing your death day, you are irrevocably retracting yourself from the human project, one which is inextricably bound up with the lives of others. ... Plath and Sexton shed light on this tragic phenomenon in our time: They killed themselves for, among other reasons, the fact that it is almost impossible to pursue long-term purpose and meaning in a short-term society, and one cannot today really develop and sustain a life identity and history in a world composed of episodes and fragments.”
Further on in the interview, after speaking of parents harming their children with unwarranted expectations:“I really don’t believe in ultimately blaming capitalism: It is the symptom not the cause of an arrested development in human value systems. We all made capitalism possible by our endless needs and desires and wants. I see capitalism as the genie out of the bottle. But we let it out. We summoned it when we rightly demanded that women be emancipated from the kitchen, that peasants be made wage-independent from the Lord of the manor, and that middle-class people have a birthright to indeterminate wealth acquisition. Suicide does not always come from a place of darkness. Quite the contrary. He/she sees all too clearly the inescapable lifelessness of a dead planet and chooses to ...”
The Spring 2014 edition of ARI’s undergraduate newspaper The Undercurrent echoed Mr. Journo’s praise of Jason Hill’s Salon article with a glowing recommendation: “A Professor’s Tribute to Ayn Rand is a Dramatic Reminder of the Value of Individualism.” Like Mr. Hill, ARI writers know how to put your destruction in terms of reason, morality, and individualism.
A brief note on The Objective Standard’s website dated 4 May 2014 by the magazine’s editor, Craig Biddle, called the article “beautiful” and said “Hopefully we will see more articles accurately depicting Rand’s ideas at Salon in the future.”
Andrew Bernstein has a BlogTalk radio show called “Objectively Speaking.” The show on 21 May 2014 was “How do Ayn Rand's ideas impact one’s life – a discussion with Jason Hill.”
A year and a half later, on 6 November 2015 Yaron Brook posted a link to the Salon article on his Facebook page, which included its side by side photos of Jason Hill and Ayn Rand.
Two days later – 8 November 2015 – Onkar Ghate (ARI), Gregory Salmieri (Anthem Foundation, controlled by ARI), and Jason Hill made up a panel called “General Q&A on Objectivism, the philosophy of Ayn Rand.” This was part of a Leven Foundation Student Conference called “The Morality of Value Creation and Trade” (November 7-8) presented by a branch of ARI called STRIVE – Students for Reason, Individualism, Value pursuit, and Enterprise. (Besides organizing conferences STRIVE publishes the campus newspaper The Undercurrent and sponsors Objectivist campus clubs.)
Jason Hill spoke at the Ayn Rand Society session of the American Philosophical Society’s Eastern Division annual meeting (6-9 January 2016). His talk was “Biological Collectivism and the Politics of Racial Identity.” Joining him were Gregory Salmieri (Anthem Foundation) and James Lennox. At least four of the five ARS steering committee members are associated with ARI.
A blurb by Mr. Hill graces the back cover of Salmieri and Gotthelf’s A Companion to Ayn Rand (2016).
In May 2016 the Supreme Court legalized homosexual “marriage” throughout the U.S. Because of the so-called Civil Rights Act this shoved it down our throats. In the article, “Loveless, Narcissistic Sex Addicts: A Gay Man Critiques His Community” (The Federalist, 16 May 2016) Mr. Hill called the decision “a landmark day in U.S. history.” He goes on to say something like – I found the article unreadable and only glanced at it – there was too much sex in peoples’ lives.
ARI featured Mr. Hill in two panel discussions at the Ayn Rand Student Conference 2016, sponsored by ARI / STRIVE, Nov. 4-6.
ARI’s webpage for the book Failing to Confront Islamic Totalitarianism by Elan Journo and Onkar Ghate quotes Jason Hill praising the book: a “moral tour de force.” Mr. Journo thought Mr. Hill’s endorsement valuable enough to quote again on ARI’s blog “Voices of Reason,” the entry dated 6 December 2016.
On 31 March 2017 ARI published a video recording of Mr. Hill’s first panel discussion at the Ayn Rand Student Conference 2016 mentioned above. On 30 May 2017 ARI published a video recording of the second.
Mr. Brook had Mr. Hill on his Yaron Brook Show podcast of 15 July 2018. Mr. Hill says one reason he likes the so-called Civil Rights Act of 1964 is that
“it went to the point of making private citizens unable to discriminate against blacks.”
“... when I look out at America I see a progressive America that if you are a black man or a black woman we have a progressive environment in which universities will welcome you with open arms.”
“We have progressed beyond a certain pale of racism in this country where [that is, so that] to be black is to command an enormous amount of social power.”
“This is America, where a Third Founding (taking Lincoln’s promise at Gettysburg as the second) was achieved in the Civil Rights Movement and the momentous passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.”
On its website 14 March 2019 The Objective Standard praised the book as well.
In a The Hill editorial of 24 May 2018, “Mr. President, please send the troops to Chicago,” he calls the Posse Comitatus Act “dated” and urges the president to “suspend it” – as was done, he fails to point out, at Waco. We say the hooligans in question are a problem for local government. Let Democrat states stew in the lawlessness that Democrat governments foster. If Posse Comitatus is “suspended” (which means violated at will) the target may begin with antifa but it will soon progress to vaccine resisters and enemies of the state. This is beyond Mr. Hill’s egocentric, forever autobiographical, thinking.
Mr. Hill knows how to get ahead in the intellectual world. 16 April 2019 The Federalist website published his article “The Moral Case For Israel Annexing The West Bank — And Beyond.” He says:
“Jewish exceptionalism and the exceptionalist nature of Jewish civilization require an unconditional space for the continued evolution of their civilization. What’s good for Jewish civilization is good for humanity at large.”
The DePaul University provost and the faculty council president criticized Mr. Hill over The Federalist article. Consequently he sued those two and the university, claiming that he was being discriminated against. One paragraph of his lawsuit, filed 20 April 2020, reads:
“Dr. Hill has been subject to these discriminatory actions on account of his race and sexual orientation, in that he has departed from the opinion defendants have deemed permissible and acceptable for someone of his race and sexual orientation, whom defendants require to espouse prevailing liberal opinion in favor [of] the PLO and against Israel.”
Jamie Glazov interviewed Mr. Hill on 12 August 2019, the show titled “The Jewish People – The Creators of Time.” He put forward “an ethical defense of Zionism.”
27 November 2019 a website called The Jewish News Syndicate published his article “There are no settlers on the West Bank: Only noble and heroic pioneers refounding sacred Israel.” [3]
On 24 September 2019 he accepted the “Education Beacon” award from the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA).
FrontPageMag published his article “America’s Immigration Dilemma: What makes an immigrant culturally qualified to enter the United States?” (18 December 2019) As the subtitle suggests, race is not part of his solution. As he says in the text: “Wherever they come from in the world, those who are admitted into the moral republic of the United States of America, must pass stricter cultural and civic qualifying tests.” [4]
Mr. Hill he spoke at OSI’s TOS-Con 2021, OSI being Carl Barney’s Objective Standard Institute. [5]
4 and 12 February 2020 Yaron Brook was still promoting Mr. Hill, tweeting a link to an excerpt from their interview of 15 July 2018 (see above). And on 24 May 2020 he retweeted someone else’s link to Jason Hill’s essay “Is It Moral to Hold a Racial Identity?: A Cosmopolitan Response.” (His response is: No, it is immoral.)
The people at ARI showcase Jason Hill as an admirer of Ayn Rand, a man whose life she had changed. They’re pushing one nasty piece of work.
1 Since the interview Amy Winehouse has been added so that the forthcoming book’s title is now Goddesses of Death: Amy Winehouse, Sylvia Plath, Anne Sexton and the Moral Meaning of Suicide. According to Mr. Hill’s DePaul webpage, come 2024 he is still working on the book.
2 “Jason Hill’s Ridiculous Lawsuit Against DePaul”
by John Wilson, blog of Academe magazine, 1 May 2020
academeblog.org/2020/05/01/jason-hills-ridiculous-lawsuit-against-depaul
3 The article is as religious as its title suggests. For example:“... the Israeli Jews are not settlers in Judea and Samaria. ... they should be referred to as ‘heroic pioneers’ on refounded land in Holy Israel.”
“You have to expunge from your identity the term ‘settlers’ and see yourselves as ‘noble pioneers’ fulfilling your lost Manifest Destiny.
“In the name of the best within you, do not sully and tarnish it by the prejudicial ways an envious and anti-Jewry world regards you, and wants you to view yourselves.”
“Proclaim proudly that you are noble pioneers and re-founders of the lost treasure troves of Holy Israel. And if you can do this consistently and without compromise to your sworn enemies, then:
“The Glory is Yours.”
Yaron Brook too supports the Israeli settlers. Just as “open borders Brook” has no problem with closed borders Israel, so “atheist Brook” has no problem with Israeli settlers being fervently religious Jews.
4 As for Europe, Mr. Hill says it is a lost cause – which might well be true – and predicts “a wave of ambitious Europeans eager to flee the cultural hell-holes their countries have become.” He neglects to point out that they are hell-holes most Europeans allowed to happen or even fought to make happen. But regardless we should welcome the mass exodus, indeed:“... the United States should actively recruit them. They are the future. Like the Jewish people, they have been the creators of the historical process itself; innovators of the idea that man has a proper end to which he aspires: the fullest development of his capabilities, and the maximization of his highest modes of potentialities.”
Most of the British immigrants I have met have been socialists even though (it was fairly obvious) they had left Britain because of the high taxes that socialism entails. Consider Switzerland, which lets in the French fleeing socialist France. Yet once in Switzerland they tend to vote for socialism there.
So don’t bet on those fleeing Europe or wherever not to vote here for the very policies that ultimately made them want to leave there. Most just won’t make the logical connection. By and large they will vote Democrat, not Republican. Not as much as Third Worlders (about 90%) but all that matters is that more than 50% will.
It might be possible to let in, at a measured rate, Europeans who demonstrably had opposed the policies that led to their country’s downfall. But an immigration moratorium is more politically viable.
5 See OSI vs. ARI.