What man? This man. It’s a lengthy read, and it requires an online subscription to the Times. But it’s free to do and good for you, so go ahead and do that.
And understand this–Roland Fryer is someone with whom you should be familiar. He’s the next academic hot shot Negro, right along the lines of Glenn Loury.
That’s not a good thing.

Lemme begin by noting that I rarely write about professional or academic colleagues. However, this one’s been requested for a while, and these points need to be made.
Fryer’s an interesting character, and I knew that before this piece in the Times. I learned this when I met him around this time last year. I was made aware by folks at Carolina that he would be presenting a paper on “black” names, and I was also made aware of his pedigree. Most notable was that he was the protege of Glenn Loury, the darling of the neocons even after he was hemmed up for smacking his woman around and arrested with blow in his ride.
(It should be noted that Loury has made a a trip back toward the center in recent years, and he has definitely softened his opposition to affirmative action. Why? Word is that he needed to do that to get his job at Harvard back, but that’s another discussion in and of itself.)
So Roland came to Carolina, and time was made for Ashy Larry and I to meet with him before his presentation. After being told that he was Loury’s understudy, I was instantly skeptical. Few will ever question Loury’s mental acumen and talents as an economist, but Glenn did a bit too much to make white folks happy. Chief among those things was his willingness to talk badly about black people. Folks willing to talk badly about black people are in high supply, but few are able to do so without being branded racist. Being branded racist is a bad thing in these times. Being racist really isn’t such a bad thing, though. But what good is having a predisposition against black people if you can’t say anything about it? ‘Tis useless. So, there’s a need for people willing to do so, and folks like Loury and Fryer will always be in demand.
I brought this expectation in the door with me, the expectation that he would say things around me that would offend by black nationalist sensibilities. Instead, he stood before me and explained that he was out to help black people. He told me that the goal of his work was to find ways to improve the standing of blacks in America, and I left that meeting with the belief that I’d misjudged the cat, almost ready to apologize for things he hadn’t heard me say.
I only saw the last part of his presentation. The paper itself was flawed, though a finished version of it was published in the Journal of Political Economy. For you non-economists, that’s a BFD. It’s worth nothing, though, that his co-author on that paper, Steven Levitt, is an editor at the journal. Either way, the paper wasn’t quite rocket science, and it’s more a fodder for dinnertime discussion than substantive academic analysis. He does make some important critiques of the methodology of a similar paper done at Berkeley (most notably that the Berkeley paper didn’t control for addresses of applicants or the class dynamics of names), but this wasn’t gonna shut the world down. Bomani Jones could not have gotten that paper published, nor should Bomani have been able to.
But the part of the presentation that I saw was competent. I came to find later that he made a comedy routine out of these “black” names that he discussed in the paper. Call me what you want, but I find it uncomfortable to hear about someone laughing at those names in front of white folks. Really, that’s laughing at black culture with a group of people that’s likely unable to separate laughing at a name from laughing at a larger group of people. That’s not cool.
But I was told about that part of the program by someone else. The person who told me that, a fellow student, is credible, so I took her word. But had I not, all I would have needed was to go to dinner with Fryer and two professors for it to get solidified.
I saw enough exaggerated chuckling and everything else to make my stomach hurt. I did not see the cat I met one-on-one. I won’t go as far as to evoke the duos Skinnin and Grinnin or Shuckin and Jivin, but I didn’t like what I saw. I worry greatly about anyone whose demeanor changes when white folks come around. Not so much word choice and things like that–most of us code switch, though I resolved long ago to do as little of that as possible–but his vibe. It wasn’t the cool cat that I saw in the department conference room. I saw a cat performing. Here and there, he’d slip back to the cat I met, but it was mostly a performance.
That’s bad news.
And a lot of what I saw in that article was bad news. As Prometheus points out, there were few mentions in this piece to his work. As Spence points out, Fryer isn’t the first cat to come from hard knocks to academic success. Though he didn’t pull the burner on anyone (that I know of), my old man didn’t go from Jack and Jill meetings to get his Ph.D. Most folks have stories, man. His story really isn’t that damn unique. I got folks in my family cookin up stones in the kitchen, and so do you–yes, you. I used to run with cats that have pulled a caper or two. My father isn’t as fucked up as this cat’s appears to be, but yours just might be.
I commend him for handling business in the face of adversity, but that don’t make him much different than most folks I know.
But that’s not the important stuff. I think Fryer may be dangerous. Well, as dangerous as an economist can be…and that’s pretty dangerous. But consider these things.
1. His work comes short of making policy recommendation.
As Ashy Larry just said to me, his work is short of interesting conclusions (an accurate criticism Spence has of Levitt). Because he has no conclusions, he never has anything to offer policy makers as a result of what he writes. So, he’s done a paper on crack and its effects (another joint with flawed methodology). After hearing Levitt present the paper at Dook last year, I didn’t walk away with any idea of how that work should be used to further any change. Sometimes, we just find things in economics to find them, but it’s nice to do something with what’s found. But never does Fryer ever arrive at conclusions that lead to anything else. The problems he investigates then become ad hoc issues that have no solution. If he really wants to help black people advance, one would think he’d have some ideas to offer. The identification of problems simply is not enough.
2. Racism is still a mutha.
Fryer starts with the position that racism is not the root of the problems he addresses, and I can’t ride with that. Sandy said in the Times article that Fryer starts from the position of some group dysfunction, and I agree (as an aside, other black economists had less than positive things to say about Fryer for that piece, but they didn’t get any ink in the piece, as you could see). The paper with which Fryer made his name, one on the bullshit “acting white” hypothesis, is based on the idea that black people have problems with intellectual pursuits. Whatever, man. But by saying that, Fryer puts the persistent disparity between blacks and everyone else totally on the shoulders of black people and ignores racism entirely. He may not say that in closed quarters, but that’s what his work says. When people stop pointing at racism as a chief problem in this world, we’ve got colossal problems. Sorry, but I wasn’t born a fuckup. It’s racism that I overcome every day, not blackness. They roll in tandem, but it’s the racism that makes blackness problematic.
So when Ed Glaeser says it’s “liberating” to work with Fryer because Roland’s blackness is “insulating,” think about what that means. And think about how gladly Fryer shields spades from being called as such.
3. This story is catchy.
Flawed heroes make for the most inspiring stories. So says jimi izrael, and he got it right with that one. It would be easier for Fryer to get a kid to get his shit together than it would for me, an undeniable child of privilege. My high school teacher frequently says I should do motivational speaking, but there’s little in my story a kid from the bottom could take. My father, maybe, but I lived too good to tell kids, “I did it, and so can you.” I’ve been afforded every advantage that one should have in this world. Not making it would have been the anomaly for anyone in my position.
Well, save for all that racism.
But Fryer’s story is inspiring. Almost enough to get a jailbird to start copying the dictionary. However, I’m not comfortable with kids wanting to grow up and be just like him. Just take lessons from the perserverance. But were it not for his inclination to trash Negros, would he have risen that far? Matter of fact, let’s withhold this story until people can fully deal with it. Rated R, baby.
4. He’s 27 years old.
This is just the beginning. Know dat.
Anyone willing to make a living out of talking bad about black folks should be monitored closely, and Roland is one of those guys. He told me that Loury warned him that he needs to be concerned with where people will take what he says, but he says he’s not worried about that. I don’t think that’s true. If you get the opportunity to read any of Fryer’s work, you’ll find that he comes with these ambiguous normative conclusions, the sort that allows him to sell a paper in whatever direction is being bought. The black names paper found that those names do not cause adverse labor market outcomes. The right can say “see, we’re not racist.” But he can tell the left, “it’s not the names, man. It’s something bigger.” And he won’t be lying either way.
His hustle is immaculate. How else do you explain someone ascending from the nondescript economics universe of Penn State to U. Chicago and Harvard? He may have done more in the last three years in terms of upward mobility than any other Penn State Grad ever. Why come? Don’t take long to figure that one out.
Also, why isn’t anyone from Penn State mentioned in this article? Why are no former colleagues or profs interviewed for this piece? Kinda makes ya wonder. Always wonder when huge gaps from someone’s past get omitted from an article with the breadth of this one.
I don’t think Fryer’s an imcompetent economist. He might be as sharp as they come, but I haven’t seen that yet. But in the elitist universe of academia, he has gone from a third tier–correct me if I’m wrong–econ program to Harvard in what amounts to one fell swoop. That’s not a testament to his brilliance; this game is all about those damn rankings, and those on top rarely come down to find talent. He says what people are willing to hear. Just think about what that means.
Sorry for the length of this, but this cat was mentioned to me by a few people after the Times article came out. Many of them were happy to see a brother like this make it, and I’m glad he’s not flippin’ birds. Folks are right in saying that he’s the next black academic star. But that’s not good intrinsically. In fact, this calls into question what the star system is. How does one become a star in academia? What’s it take to get this notoriety?
If it’s talking bad about black folks, I’m cool with obscurity. Fame don’t have a payroll, anyway.
Well, not really.
But remember Roland’s name. We’ll be hearing if for a long time. Whether that’s good or bad remains to be seen, but my money’s on Door Number Two.