The New Republic and the Beltway Media’s Race Problem
But Hughes’ predecessor, Marty Peretz, did much worse. In the years of Peretz’s ownership, from 1974 to 2007 and then partially until 2012, the sewing machine fortune heir gave himself the title of editor-in-chief and regular space in the magazine and on its website, which he frequently used to issue rants that were breathtaking in their overt racism. The columns typically came during periods of turmoil for the minorities he targeted: often blacks and Latinos, later focusing especially on Muslims and Arabs.
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And no one resigned — including me, while I was an intern at the magazine for four months. Though I was unpaid, I eagerly accepted the resume-boosting prestige that came from working there. And, like the rest of the staff, I did it knowing it meant turning a blind eye to Peretz’s frequent screeds on the magazine’s website, fully aware that they were not just the crazy rants of an old racist but were in fact palpably damaging to the minority families who had to live in a society that was that much more intolerant because Peretz enjoyed a platform that legitimized his views.
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I personally heard and saw a number of today’s resigning editors deride and privately object to Peretz’s racism, sometimes quite forcefully. But, to my knowledge, not one of them, including senior editors who could find a new job with ease and contributing editors who drew no salary at all, thought it was as resignation-worthy when Peretz repeatedly wrote that Arabs have lower “standards of civilization,” that blacks have an inferior “culture,” that Latinos are lazy.
And yet, on the day when Hughes fired two well-off white men from the publication, two men whose talent and prestige will see them through to a new position, a half-dozen or so contributing editors who saw fit to retain their titles through years of Peretz’s racism immediately resigned their positions.
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