Kevin MacDonald (evolutionary psychologist)

Kevin B. MacDonald, (born January 24, 1944) is a professor of psychology at California State University, Long Beach, best known for his use of evolutionary psychology to inform his study of Judaism as being what he claims is a "group evolutionary strategy". MacDonald's most controversial claim is his assertion that a suite of traits which he attributes to Jews, including higher-than-average verbal intelligence and ethnocentricism, have been eugenically derived throughout history to enhance the ability of Jews to out-compete non-Jews for resources while undermining the power and self-confidence of the white majorities in Europe and America. Despite having in the past made comments which have been interpreted by some as racist, such as calling for the establishment and defense of a European "ethnostate" in America and Europe in a speech while accepting an award from the white nationalist periodical The Occidental Quarterly, MacDonald tries to distance himself from extremist organisations.

Early years

MacDonald was born in Oshkosh, Wisconsin and raised in a traditionalist Roman Catholic family. His father was a policeman and his mother was a secretary. He went to parochial schools and played basketball in high school. He entered the University of Wisconsin-Madison and became an activist in the anti-war movement from about 1965 to 1975. During this period, he perceived the East Coast Jewish origins of the majority of the movement there (Culture of Critique, p 104), which motivated his interest in Jewish intellectual movements.

MacDonald became a philosophy major and lost his radicalism. He embarked on a career as a Jazz pianist, but by the late 1970s had abandoned it in favour of academia. While in graduate school, he became attracted to E.O. Wilson's theory of sociobiology. He has two adult children from his first marriage.

Professional background

MacDonald is the author of seven books on evolutionary psychology and child development and is the author or editor of over thirty academic articles in refereed journals. He received his B.A. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1966, and M.S. in biology from the University of Connecticut in 1976. He earned a Ph.D. in 1981 (Biobehavioral Sciences) from the University of Connecticut where he studied under Professor Benson E. Ginsburg, one of the founders and leaders of modern behavior genetics, as his advisor. His thesis was on the behavioral development of wolves and resulted in two publications: MacDonald, K. B., and Ginsburg, B. E. (1981). "Induction of normal behavior in wolves with restricted rearing." Behavioral and Neural Biology, 33, 133-162; MacDonald, K. B. (1983). "Development and stability of personality characteristics in prepubertal wolves." Journal of Comparative Psychology, 97, 99-106, 1983.

He completed a post-doctoral fellowship with Ross Parke at the psychology department of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1983. His work there concerned rough and tumble play in children (he had two small boys at home at the time as well) and resulted in three publications:

• MacDonald, K. B., & Parke, R. D. (1984). "Bridging the gap: Parent-child play interactions and peer interactive competence." Child Development, 55, 1265-1277;
• MacDonald, K. B., & Parke, R. D. (1986). "Parent-child physical play: The effects of sex and age of children and parents." Sex Roles, 15, 367-378, 1986;
• MacDonald, K. B. (1987). "Parent-child physical play with rejected, neglected and popular boys." Developmental Psychology, 23, 705-711.

He served as Secretary-Archivist of the Human Behavior and Evolution Society and was elected as a member of the executive board from 1995 to 2001. He was an editor of Population and Environment and is an associate editor of the journal Sexuality & Culture. He serves on the Advisory Board of The Occidental Quarterly, a journal that has been described by Max Blumenthal, writing on the website of The American Prospect magazine, as “the premier voice of the white-nationalist movement” and makes occasional contributions to VDARE.com, an immigration reductionist webzine. Peter Brimelow of VDARE denies it being a white nationalist webzine, but acknowledges having white nationalist writers amongst its contributors; he does not list MacDonald as one of these.

He has been with the Department of Psychology at California State University-Long Beach since 1985 and as a full professor since 1995.

Theory of Judaism as a "Group Evolutionary Strategy"

For the main article, see The Culture of Critique series.

MacDonald is best known for his trilogy that analyzes Judaism and Jewish culture from the perspective of evolutionary psychology, comprising A People That Shall Dwell Alone (1994), Separation and Its Discontents (1998), and The Culture of Critique (1998). He proposes that Judaism is a group evolutionary strategy to enhance the ability of Jews to out-compete non-Jews for resources. Using the term Jewish ethnocentrism, he argues that Judaism fosters in Jews a series of marked genetic traits, including above-average verbal intelligence and a strong tendency toward collectivist behavior.

Jewish organizations and immigration policies

Extreme right-wing groups and some members of the immigration reductionism movement have long argued that there has been a significant or central Jewish role in facilitating mass immigration into the United States and other western nations. MacDonald echoed their claims, arguing that "the organized Jewish community" has been the single most important and powerful group in favor of unrestricted immigration to the United States, and that the community has been acting in its "own perceived collective interests," regardless of whether these are in conflict with the interests of other Americans.

MacDonald's main thesis centers on the period preceding the all-important 1965 Immigration Act when strict, country-of-origin based quotas existed, mostly favoring immigration from Europe. According to MacDonald, while most of the ethnic communities in that period were somewhat active in trying to affect the increase of immigration quotas from their own countries of origin (i.e. the Irish for immigration from Ireland, Greeks for immigration from Greece etc.), only the Jewish community activists were requesting (and ultimately obtained in 1965) the dismantling of country-of-origin quotas and an increase in immigration across the board. This policy shift benefited primarily non-European immigration and had a profound impact on the U.S. demographics in the following decades. He also contrasts U.S. immigration policy with the more restrictive immigration policies of Israel.

He cites Leonard S. Glickman of the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society as stating to an on-line Jewish journal that "The more diverse American society is the safer [Jews] are." MacDonald expresses his opinions on immigration on the VDARE website:

Why members of the Jewish community, which over so many centuries demonstrated such determination to preserve its distinctiveness, should have been so demonstrably active in preventing the preservation of the nation in which they find themselves, is an interesting question... Much of the effort was done more or less surreptitiously so as not to fan the flames of anti-Jewish sentiment.

MacDonald also points out that even the Jewish activist Stephen Steinlight, who argues against mass immigration, does so on explicitly ethnocentric grounds: "Our present privilege, success, and power do not inure us from the effect of historical processes, and history has not come to an end, even in America."

Conservative columnist and mathematics writer John Derbyshire criticizes this thesis in his review of The Culture of Critique in The American Conservative. He cites MacDonald's statement that it is in “the ethnic interests of white Americans to develop an ethnically and culturally homogeneous society.” and states:

And on the point of Israel having something very much like the old American dispensation, I am unimpressed by MacDonald’s oft-repeated argument—it is a favorite with both Israelophobes and anti-Semites—that it is hypocritical for Jews to promote multiculturalism in the U.S. while wishing to maintain Jewish ethnic dominance in Israel. Unless you think that ethnic dominance, under appropriate restraining laws, is immoral per se—and I don’t, and Kevin MacDonald plainly doesn’t either—it can be the foundation of a stable and successful nation. A nation that can establish it and maintain it would be wise to do so. The USA was not able to maintain it because too many Americans—far more than three percent—came to think it violated Constitutional principles.

In his reply to the review, MacDonald noted that Derbyshire explicitly acknowledged the fact that careers could be ended or severely harmed by criticism of the role of the Jewish community in American public life, and suggested that Derbyshire himself was frightened of running foul of "the Jew thing". He further claimed that Derbyshire

lives in a sort of childlike world in which Jewish interests are legitimate and where Jewish attempts to pursue their interests, though they may occasionally be irritating, are not really a cause for concern, much less malice.

Race, culture, and intelligence

See also Race and intelligence.

Like some of his fellow contributors to Vdare, MacDonald questions claims that racial differences are unimportant or illusory and that racial and cultural assimilation will be an easy process. He points to the phenomenon of popular scientists such as Stephen Jay Gould, Richard Lewontin, Leon Kamin, Steven Rose, and Jared Diamond, who were all born to Jewish parents, and who have been leading proponents of the view that there is no biological basis for race, and that variance between races in mean IQ is caused by environmental rather than hereditary factors.

Neoconservatism

MacDonald published a three articles in The Occidental Quarterly, a journal of opinion for self-described "white nationalists," on the alleged similarities between neoconservatism and several other possibly Jewish-dominated influential intellectual and political movements. He argues that "[t]aken as a whole, neoconservatism is an excellent illustration of the key traits behind the success of Jewish activism: ethnocentrism, intelligence and wealth, psychological intensity, and aggressiveness." His general conclusions are that neoconservatism fits into a general pattern of twentieth-century Jewish intellectual and political activism. Since Leo Strauss, a philosophy professor, taught several of the putative founders of the neoconservatism, MacDonald concludes he is a central figure in the neo-conservative movement and sees him as "the quintessential rabbinical guru with devoted disciples".

MacDonald contends that, like Freudian psychoanalysis and Marxism, neoconservatism uses arguments that appeal to non-Jews, rather than appealing explicitly to Jewish interests. MacDonald argues that non-Jewish neo-conservatives like Jeane Kirkpatrick and Donald Rumsfeld are examples of an ability to recruit prominent non-Jews while nevertheless preserving a Jewish core and an intense commitment to Jewish interests: "it makes excellent psychological sense to have the spokespeople for any movement resemble the people they are trying to convince." He considers it significant that neoconservatism's commitment to mass immigration is uncharacteristic of past conservative thought and is identical to liberal Jewish opinion.

Criticism

Some response to MacDonald's Criticism may be found below in the section MacDonald and Other Scholars Address his Critics

Academic criticism

Although he acknowledges not having read any of MacDonald's books at the time of issuing his Slate Magazine attack against MacDonald, in a letter to that magazine, Harvard University psychology professor Steven Pinker maintained that MacDonald's theses were unable to pass the threshold of attention-worthiness and/or peer-approval:

MacDonald's ideas, as presented in summaries that would serve as a basis for further examination, do not pass that threshold, for many reasons:

1. By stating that Jews promulgate scientific hypotheses because they are Jewish, he is engaging in ad hominem argumentation that is outside the bounds of normal scientific discourse and an obvious waste of time to engage. MacDonald has already announced that I will reject his ideas because I am Jewish, so what's the point of replying to them?

2. MacDonald's main axioms - group selection of behavioral adaptations, and behaviorally relevant genetic cohesiveness of ethnic groups -- are opposed by powerful bodies of data and theory, which Tooby, Cosmides, and many other evolutionary psychologists have written about in detail. Of course any assumption can be questioned, but there are no signs that MacDonald has taken on the burden of proof of showing that the majority view is wrong.

3. MacDonald's various theses, even if worthy of scientifically debate individually, collectively add up to a consistently invidious portrayal of Jews, couched in value-laden, disparaging language. It is impossible to avoid the impression that this is not an ordinary scientific hypothesis.

4. The argument, as presented in the summaries, fail two basic tests of scientific credibility: a control group (in this case, other minority ethnic groups), and a comparison with alternative hypotheses (such as Thomas Sowell's convincing analysis of "middlemen minorities" such as the Jews, presented in his magisterial study of migration, race, conquest, and culture).

Reviewing MacDonald’s A People That Shall Dwell Alone: Judaism as a Group Evolutionary Strategy in The Jewish Quarterly Review, Sander Gilman, professor of the Liberal Arts and Medicine at the University of Illinois in Chicago describes MacDonalds arguments about a Jewish group evolutionary strategy as “bizarre.” According to Gilman, “MacDonald recasts all of the hoary old myths about Jewish psychological difference and its presumed link to Jewish superior intelligence in contemporary sociobiological garb.” Gilman also charges that “MacDonald manipulates his sources rather shamelessly,” including Gilman’s own work. Gilman concludes that MacDonald’s book “is the most recent chapter in the continued myth-building concerning Jewish superior intelligence and achievement. It is, like the numerous earlier works, of interest in how positive images turn into the means by which Jewish difference is stressed and Jewish acculturation is shown to be pathological.

Reviewing Macdonald’s A People That Shall Dwell Alone in the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, Eugen Schoenfeld, Professor Emeritus of Sociology at Georgia State University, noted that "the book is controversial, not only because of its theoretical approach, but also, and perhaps primarily, because of sloppy scholarship." Schoenfeld writes that Macdonald "selects historical incidents that can be used to support his thesis and conveniently omits others that challenge his thesis." Schoenfeld points to what he sees as Macdonald’s “unfamiliarity with both the sociological frame of reference and historical knowledge,” and as an example, notes that Macdonald’s comparison of Jewish collectivism during the biblical period with eighteenth- and nineteenth-century English individualism “indicates a total ignorance of the impact of industrialization on Western societies.

Reviewing Macdonald’s Separation and Its Discontents in the American Jewish Society Review in 2000, Zev Garber, Professor of Jewish Studies at Los Angeles Valley College, writes that MacDonald works from the assumption that the dual Torah is the blueprint of the eventual Jewish dominion over the world.” and that he sees contemporary anti-Semitism, the Holocaust and attacks against Israel as “provoked by Jews themselves. In this scenario, Jews imagine themselves as innocent victims of hatred and violence." Garber concludes that Macdonald’s "rambling who-is-who-isn’t roundup of Jews responsible for the “Jewish Problem” borders on the irrational and is conducive to misrepresentation.”

John Tooby, the founder of MacDonald's field (evolutionary psychology), criticized MacDonald in an article for Salon.com in 2000. He wrote, ""MacDonald's ideas — not just on Jews — violate fundamental principles of the field."

MacDonald has replied to Tooby, Pinker, Schatz, and Lieberman on his website. In May, 2006, MacDonald responded in FrontPage Magazine to charges of anti-Semitism made by FrontPage Magazine editor Jacob Laksin.

MacDonald's theses include Freudian psychoanalysis as a Jewish tactic. Dan Kriegman, founder of the Psychoanalytic Couple and Family Institute of New England produced a 50-page analysis criticizing MacDonald's work as "pseudo-scientific theorizing." He wrote that MacDonald "believes his own nonsense." Kriegman remarked in an email, "MacDonald is not the first person to avoid the narcissistic injury of having his ideas rejected by concluding that there was a conspiracy against him rather than becoming aware of the substandard nature [as evidenced in his trilogy] of his thinking."

A History Professor at MacDonald's university, Don Schwarz called MacDonald's claims about Jewish history "unsupportable." Philosophy Professor Warren Weinstein said that MacDonald's work was not science at all, but "something else, masquerading as science." "It is in the great tradition of Nazi and Stalinist science which clearly and scientifically proved that their respective insanities were objectively true and defensible," he added.

Academic Jaff Schatz has accused MacDonald of misrepresenting and misusing his work.

John Hartung, the associate editor of the Journal of Neurosurgical Anesthesiology and an associate professor of anesthesiology at the State University of New York said that MacDonald's The Culture of Critique was "quite disturbing, seriously misinformed about evolutionary genetics, and suffering from a huge blind spot about the nature of Christianity."

Praise from white supremacists and neo-nazis

A 2006 article in The Nation magazine reports that Macdonald's 2004 Understanding Jewish Influence: A Study in Ethnic Activism "has turned MacDonald into a celebrity within white nationalist and neo-Nazi circles." Writing in the Journal of Church and State, Professor George Michael noted that MacDonald's work "has been well received by those in the racialist right, as it amounts to a theoretically sophisticated justification for anti-Semitism," and that on the far right MacDonald "has attained a near reverential status and is generally considered beyond reproach".

A colleague of MacDonald's, Martin Fiebert criticized MacDonald for being cited by white supremacist, anti-semitic, and neo-nazi organizations. The Southern Poverty Law Center criticized MacDonald for holding panels and working with Virginia Abernethy, a self-described "white separatist" and member of the white supremacist organization Council of Conservative Citizens which describes blacks as "a retrograde species of humanity" among other things. The SPLC also criticized MacDonald for publishing in, and receiving a 10,000 dollar grant from, the white nationalist publication The Occidental Quarterly. In October 2004, he accepted the Jack London Literary Prize from The Occidental Quarterly, using the award ceremony as an occasion to argue for the need for a "white ethnostate" to maintain high racial birthrates. In his acceptance speech, he stated, "The best way to preserve ethnic interests is to defend an ethnostate — a nation that is explicitly intended to preserve the ethnic interests of its citizens." According to MacDonald, one of the functions of such a state would be to exclude non-European immigrants who are attracted to the state by its wealth and prosperity. At the conclusion of his speech, he remarked, "The alternative faced by Europeans throughout the Western world is to place themselves in a position of enormous vulnerability in which their destinies will be determined by other peoples, many of whom hold deep historically conditioned hatreds toward them. Europeans’ promotion of their own displacement is the ultimate foolishness — an historical mistake of catastrophic proportions."

MacDonald testified in defense of convicted holocaust denier David Irving, where he alleged that the suppression of Irving's work was "an example of Jewish tactics for combating anti-Semitism." MacDonald said he was an "agnostic" in regards to the Holocaust. MacDonald's testimony caused a backlash among his colleagues.

MacDonald has an extensive following among white supremacists and neo-Nazis. Neo-nazi and former KKK leader, David Duke praises MacDonald's work in his autobiography, where Duke explains how he came to be an anti-Semite. Neo-Nazi Victor Gerhard wrote in a 2003 E-mail exchange that MaDonald's The Culture of Critique "is completely true; that to rail against blacks and Hispanics without mentioning Jews is like complaining about the symptoms and not the disease." When MacDonald won his award from the Occidental Quarterly, the ceremony was attended by David Duke; Don Black, the founder of white supremacist site Stormfront; Jamie Kelso, a senior moderator at Stormfront; and the head of the neo-Nazi National Vanguard, Kevin Alfred Strom. In 2005, Kelso told the Occidental Report that he was meeting up with MacDonald to conduct business. MacDonald is also featured in the Stormfront member Brian Jost's anti-immigrant film "The Line in the Sand", where he blamed Jews for destroying the European domination of America through their liberal pro-immigration views.

Heidi Beirich of the Southern Poverty Law Center told the Los Angeles Times, "Not since Hitler's 'Mein Kampf' have anti-Semites had such a comprehensive reference guide to what's 'wrong with Jews.' His work is widely advertised and touted on white supremacist websites and sold by neo-Nazi outfits like National Vanguard Books, which considers them 'the most important books of the last 100 years.' "

CSULB comments

MacDonald has been highly critical of the SPLC 'campaign against' him, including the November 2006 visit to his university's campus by the SPLC's Bierich. Shortly after the visit, the University issued a statement supporting MacDonald's academic freedom. Bierich acknowledges that the University supports MacDonald "unequivically". In reply to Bierich, University spokeswoman Toni Beron replied, "The university will support MacDonald's academic freedom and freedom of speech." MacDonald has offered on his website the statement, "This website contains frank discussion of ethnic issues, including ethnic interests and ethnic competition. In all cases I have done my best to be objective and to base my analyses on solid evidence. I want to make it clear that nothing on this website should be interpreted to suggest that I condone white racial superiority, genocide, Nazism, or Holocaust denial. I advocate none of these and strongly dissociate myself and my work from groups that do. Nor should my opinions be used to support discrimination against Jews or any other group.". In addition, the Psychology Department on December 4th, and 6th, issued three statements; a Statement on Academic Freedom and Responsibility in Research,a Statement on Diversity, and a Statement on Misuse of Psychologists' Work.

Toni Beron, a spokeswoman for CSULB, said that at least two classes a year taught by all professors — including MacDonald — have student evaluations, and that some of the questions on those evaluations are open-ended, allowing students to raise any issue. “Nothing has come through” to suggest bias in class, she said. “We don’t see it.”

American Association of University Professors

After being prompted about investigating MacDonald's University coursework, Jonathan Knight, who handles academic freedom issues for the American Association of University Professors replied,“I don’t see a basis for an investigation” into what goes on in his courses.

Responses to MacDonald's critics

Overall

MacDonald articulates his situation regarding his work on Jewish social strategies,

Of course, I could be wrong. Demonstrating this would require logical argument and reinterpretation of the extensive factual evidence I have assembled. I have yet to see any critic of my work able to show that I was wrong about the theory or in my handling of the evidence. But in principle it might be possible. However, my critics, exemplified by the SPLC, have generally been unwilling to attempt this. Instead, their line has been that the subject is taboo and discussing it should be forbidden. Needless to say, this is not the intellectual tradition out of which the Enlightenment and the Scientific Revolution came.

Southern Poverty Law Center

MacDonald says on his website that he has been the target of a campaign against him by the Southern Poverty Law Center, and others. MacDonald holds, among other complaints, that the SPLC's publicity on MacDonald such as "The Thirteen Scariest People in America" and "Promoting Hate--California Professor is Font of Anti-Semitism," contain severe misrepresentations and distortions of his work. Heidi Bierich, the author of the reports, had traveled to California State University–Long Beach to interview students, faculty, and administrators about Macdonald.

Among the claims Macdonald takes issue with is Beirich's claim in her report for the SPLC that he "suggest[s] that colleges restrict Jewish admission and Jews be heavily taxed 'to counter the Jewish advantage in the possession of wealth.'" In his rebuttal, Macdonald reproduces the full passage as follows:

Moreover, achieving parity between Jews and other ethnic groups would entail a high level of discrimination against individual Jews for admission to universities or access to employment opportunities and even entail a large taxation on Jews to counter the Jewish advantage in the possession of wealth, since at present Jews are vastly overrepresented among the wealthy and the successful in the United States.

Macdonald insists that he was simply discussing a hypothetical ethnic spoils system. He writes, "There is a big difference between advocating something and discussing this as a grim likelihood. I am discussing the possible consequences of a hypothetical ethnicity-based spoils system."

Beirich also claimed that Macdonald ""blames the deaths of "millions of people" on "the failure of Jewish assimilation into European societies."" In his rebuttal, Macdonald notes he is contending that inter-group competition is at the root of anti-Semitism and bloody conflicts between Jews and non-Jews throughout history:

I think that my critics essentially want me to assert that Jewish behavior is utterly irrelevant to anti-Semitism, and I cannot accept that point of view. I am hardly alone in supposing that Jewish behavior-very often Jewish success-must be taken into account in any adequate theory of anti-Semitism.

MacDonald summarized the prospect of a fair representation by the SPLC's Bierich: "Given Ms Beirich's poor record in accurately portraying my writings, I had no confidence that she would conduct and report on an interview with me in a non-biased way. Nevertheless, I offered to be interviewed by her if she would answer my concerns about her previous writing about me. She has not responded to this offer." Macdonald specifically names six points/complaints he demands Bierich addresses before he offers her an interview, in a series of emails between himself and her, published on his website.

CSULB dissociates from MacDonald's views

In late 2007 the Cal State Long Beach Psychology Department began the process of formally dissociating itself from MacDonald's views on Judaism, race, and the propagandistic use of his work by neo-Nazi and white supremacist groups. The department's move to dissociate followed a discussion of Macdonald's December forum presentation at meeting of the department's advisory committee that concerned his ethics and methodologies. Late in 2006, a report issued by the SPLC after an on-campus investigation labeled his work anti-Semitic and neo-Nazi propaganda, and described increasing concern about Macdonald's views by CSULB faculty members (see above).In an e-mail sent to the college's Daily Forty-Niner newspaper, MacDonald noted that he had already pledged not to teach about race differences in intelligence as a requirement for teaching his psychology class, and expressed that he was "not happy" about the dissociation. The newspaper also reported that the in the e-mail, Macdonald confirmed that his books contained what the paper described as "his claims that the Jewish race was having a negative effect on Western civilization."

Pinker, Slate article

MacDonald has published on his website a highly critical response to Steven Pinker's Slate article on him, objecting to and addressing among other things:

1) Pinker said that "the Human Behavior and Evolution Society has never 'welcomed' MacDonald's ideas" and that MacDonald's theories "have never been published by the HBES's official peer-reviewed journal". However MacDonald was published by the HBES journal before it changed its name in 1997. MacDonald's first book was also favorably reviewed by that journal. In addition, MacDonald notes, he discussed his Jewish life history data in Human Nature [1997], which is a semi-official journal of the Human Behavior and Evolution Society. MacDonald notes several other professional journals in which his work has been published.

2) Pinker's accusation of an ad hominem attack on all Jews by MacDonald. MacDonald gave an explanation of why such an attack did not occur, in addition to immediately dismissing Pinker's accusation as "ridiculous".

3) Pinker's accusation that MacDonald's theses have been "an invidious portrayal of Jews, couched in value-laden, disparaging language". MacDonald offers a denial of this assertion, and a challenge to Pinker to show this.

4) Pinker said that MacDonald's theses "fail two basic tests of scientific credibility": a control group, and a comparison with alternative hypotheses. MacDonald replied:

"The concept of a control group does not apply to group evolutionary strategies because they are open-ended and therefore able to creatively meet environmental demands. However, I have compared a number of group strategies in the Diaspora Peoples preface to the paperback edition of A People That Shall Dwell Alone. For example, I contrast the relatively aggressive behavior of Jews in America with the relatively passive behavior of the Overseas Chinese. Such differences are doubtless a complex result of preexisting psychological traits interacting with the environmental context. The importance of the environmental context is illustrated by the differing reactions to Jews by, for example, Europeans and Muslim society. This issue is discussed in Separation and Its Discontents."

5) The point that Pinker did not read any of MacDonald's books before publicly criticizing MacDonald's theories.

MacDonald and Steve Sailer address Tooby

John Tooby said "the fact that MacDonald disagrees with evolutionary psychology's claims and principles does not necessarily make him wrong. It just makes him not an evolutionary psychologist." MacDonald responded,

Tooby states that I am not an evolutionary psychologist and that I am a fringe scientist. These are very troubling statements highly reminiscent of typical behavior in political organizations, not scientific ones.

MacDonald articulates his differences with Tooby:

To some extent, our disagreements are purely intellectual and have to do with the nature of psychology and how evolutionary theory informs the study of psychology. I have long been a critic of evolutionary psychology as conceptualized by Cosmides and Tooby....My view is also highly compatible with a large number of other psychologists (David Geary, Keith Stanovich) and paleontologists (Steven Mithen, Richard Potts).

Steve Sailer, a blogger and moderator of the Human Biodiversity email discussion list, stated on the list that "it looks like Tooby has rendered Evolutionary Psychology's claim to be a legitimate branch of science kaput. Tooby appears to believe that it is his personal intellectual property. If so, he should not have given it the generic scientific name "evolutionary psychology", but instead should have given it a personal or ideologically-descriptive name like "Toobyism" or "Politically Correct Darwinism."

Frank Salter addresses Tooby and Pinker

In his review of The Culture of Critique in the Human Ethology Bulletin, Frank Salter, a political ethologist and at the time a researcher at the Max Planck Institute for Behavioral Physiology, whose work has also received praise in white nationalist circles, commented on Tooby and Pinker as follows:

On a personal note, it is overdue that John Tooby and Steven Pinker applied their professional skills seriously to critique MacDonald's work in the appropriate scientific forums. This now seems obligatory as a matter of professional duty given the severity of their attack on a colleague who has refrained from ad hominems throughout this sorry event. Still, it is now too late to reverse the harm done to both MacDonald's and probably HBES's reputation by what can only be judged reckless, unscholarly, and plain uncivil slurs. For these they should apologize.

Miscellaneous

MacDonald has noted that his biography on Wikipedia as well as an article on his books, the Culture of Critique series, contain "negative assertions". Aside from Jews, MacDonald has also worked on other ethnic groups living in diaspora, such as, Overseas Chinese people and Assyrians. He began his career in evolutionary psychology by studying Wolves.

Books and monographs

Main article: The Culture of Critique series

• Professional Résumé — Kevin B. MacDonald
• MacDonald, K. B. Understanding Jewish Influence: A Study in Ethnic Activism, with an Introduction by Samuel Francis, (Occidental Quarterly November, 2004) ISBN 1-59368-017-1 Introduction online
• Burgess, R. L. & MacDonald, K. B. (Eds.) Evolutionary Perspectives on Human Development, 2nd ed., (Sage 2004) ISBN 0-7619-2790-5
• MacDonald, K. B. The Culture of Critique: An Evolutionary Analysis of Jewish Involvement in Twentieth-Century Intellectual and Political Movements, (Praeger 1998) ISBN 0-275-96113-3 (Preface online)
• MacDonald, K. B. Separation and Its Discontents Toward an Evolutionary Theory of Anti-Semitism, (Praeger 1998) ISBN 0-275-94870-6
• MacDonald, K. B. A People That Shall Dwell Alone: Judaism As a Group Evolutionary Strategy, With Diaspora Peoples, (Praeger 1994) ISBN 0-595-22838-0
• MacDonald, K. B. (Ed.), Parent-child Play: Descriptions and Implications,. (State University of New York Press 1993)
• MacDonald, K. B. (Ed.) Sociobiological Perspectives on Human Development, (Springer-Verlag 1988)
• MacDonald, K. B. Social and Personality Development: An Evolutionary Synthesis (Plenum 1988)

External links

MacDonald's website

• Official website; see also [2]
  • Summaries and Reviews of MacDonald's books as collected by Kevin MacDonald
  • MacDonald's reasons for testifying for David Irving as given by Kevin MacDonald
  • MacDonald replies to Lieberman, December 13, 2003 on Evolutionary Psychology email list and to Jaff Schatz, h-antisemitism, Dec. 10, 1999
  • Replies to Tooby and Pinker
  • Newspaper article on MacDonald and Irving, and MacDonald and Evolutionary Psychology
  • Jewish Involvement in Shaping American Immigration Policy, 1881-1965: A Historical Review

Criticisms of MacDonald's work

• Slate:"Evolutionary Psychology's Anti-Semite"
• Open letter by Judith Shulevitz to John Tooby about MacDonald
• David Lieberman: Scholarship as an Exercise in Rhetorical Strategy: A Case Study of Kevin MacDonald's Research Techniques. Part 1 of 3.
• David Lieberman: Scholarship as an Exercise in Rhetorical Strategy: A Case Study of Kevin MacDonald's Research Techniques. Part 2 of 3.
• David Lieberman: Scholarship as an Exercise in Rhetorical Strategy: A Case Study of Kevin MacDonald's Research Techniques. Part 3 of 3.

Online dialogue on MacDonald's work

• Dialogue on MacDonald's work at online magazine Jewcy

Irving libel case

• MacDonald's testimony in Irving libel case

Google/Yahoo Video/YouTube

• Dr. Kevin MacDonald Speaks with Hesham Tillawi about Jews
• Dr. Kevin MacDonald Discusses U.S. Immigration
• Deciphering Jewish Intellectual Movements

See also

• Israel lobby in the United States
• New antisemitism