# Paul Hornung **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [March 31, 2004, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/paul-hornung/237517 "2004-03-31T14:19:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![zamboniracer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/e9a140/32.png) [@zamboniracer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zamboniracer)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2004, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/paul-hornung/237517/41 "2004-03-31T18:53:23Z")
> [@Really Not All That Bright](#): > > I > > Still, Hornung is _wrong_. ND needs to lower its standards to attract _the athlete_. Its white players suck just as badly as its black ones. I agree. Hornung is wrong not for racist reasons, but for football related ones. Notre Dame shouldn’t limit itself to black athletes. Sad to say, but of late the Irish have not had a quarterback of any race, creed, color, religion or national origin who could complete a pass downfield. ---
**Author:** ![IzzyR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/2acd7d/32.png) [@IzzyR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IzzyR)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2004, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/paul-hornung/237517/42 "2004-03-31T18:56:45Z")
> [@jarbaby](#): > > IZZY, I’m not even buying “a disporportionate amount”. Don’t make me sit here and name off people like Priest Holmes, Mike Anderson (a marine) countless other black NFL players who have degrees in Veterinary Medicine, PreMed, Engineering and whathaveyou as compared to White guys like Jeremey Shockey, Brian Urlacher and Brian Griese who are dumb as stumps. No amount of people that you can name off can disprove a disproportionate amount. I think a disproportionate percentage of ultra-orthodox Jews have beards as compared to the rest of the population. Yet there are thousands of instances in which this is reversed. And now for my good and great friend, **Jimmy Chitwood**. OK genius, I’ll hold your hand a bit. Do try to follow along. The jarbaby statement about academic studies referred to “your side”, i.e. my side. This is a reference to statements that I had made in this thread, which were about academic achievement, not intelligence. To which jarbaby said two things. 1. A parenthetical remark that Hornung was unlikely to be aware of any such studies. 2. By implying that black athletes are necessarily dumb, Hornung was being inflammatory. I responded to both of these points, order. To 1) I said that regardless of whether he was aware of any studies, the facts were obvious. To 2) I said that I don’t see that Hornung did in fact make any implication that black athletes were dumb. Really, this should all be readily apparent. In fact, it is readily apparent. (Though maybe not to guys like Jimmy Chitwood.) > [@Really Not All That Bright](#): > > And IzzyR is clearly a dipshit. Just out of the merest curiosity, I wonder if you could point to something I’ve said that you object to. I mean seeing as the rest of your post is along the lines of what I’ve been saying. (Unless you are merely covering for yourself. Hmm…) ---
**Author:** ![Munch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/munch/32/5281_2.png) [@Munch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Munch)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2004, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/paul-hornung/237517/43 "2004-03-31T19:05:06Z")
> [@IzzyR](#): > > 1. I said that I don’t see that Hornung did in fact make any implication that black athletes were dumb. Then please explain the following Hornung quote: > [@](#): > > We can’t stay as strict as we are as far as the academic structure is concerned because we’ve got to get the black athlete. ---
**Author:** ![tiny\_ham](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a183cd/32.png) [@tiny\_ham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tiny_ham)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2004, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/paul-hornung/237517/44 "2004-03-31T19:09:56Z")
> [@IzzyR](#): > > No amount of people that you can name off can disprove a disproportionate amount. I think a disproportionate percentage of ultra-orthodox Jews have beards as compared to the rest of the population. Yet there are thousands of instances in which this is reversed. Wow. So now, being academically inferior is ingrained in the culture, much like the rules of facial hair in the jewish religion? Amazing. > [@Izzy](#): > > To 1) I said that regardless of whether he was aware of any studies, the facts were obvious. Please tell me specifically WHAT is OBVIOUS, without benefit of studies or surveys. OBVIOUS to all of us, including Paul Hornung ---
**Author:** ![IzzyR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/2acd7d/32.png) [@IzzyR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IzzyR)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2004, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/paul-hornung/237517/45 "2004-03-31T19:29:02Z")
[ **Munch** , Here’s what I can’t understand. I have repeatedly in this thread made a distinction between dumb and academic underachiever. In fact the very sentence that you quoted dealt with this distinction. So you are saying my statement (that Hornung said academic achievement, not dumb) are somehow in contradiction with your quote. Could you explain some sort of thought process that led you to this conclusion? > [@jarbabyj](#): > > Wow. So now, being academically inferior is ingrained in the culture, much like the rules of facial hair in the jewish religion? Amazing. Wow indeed. How could you get that out of what I’ve said? Amazing is right. You know I didn’t just toss out an analogy and leave you to figure out what point was being made. I preceded it with a sentence that described the point being made. Did you miss it? Again, my point was not that being academically inferior is ingrained in the culture. It was about the validity of people like yourself using specific instances to try to prove something about the larger group. This is equally invalid whether about something that is ingrained or not. (FWIW, there is in fact a lot of discussion about the influence of black culture in academic underachievement. Apparently in many circles to be academically successful is considered to be “acting white”. But I don’t know how much of an influence this is, and want to stress - before you get any ideas - that my remarks to this point have not been based on this assumption.) > [@](#): > > Please tell me specifically WHAT is OBVIOUS, without benefit of studies or surveys. OBVIOUS to all of us, including Paul Hornung That a disproportionate percentage of black athletes are academic underachievers. Read the thread: IzzyR: “A disproportionate percentage of these athletic stars/academic underachievers are in fact Black”. jarbaby: “Whether or not you have extensive studies on your side (which I doubt Hornung had any idea about)” IzzyR: “I don’t think you need extensive studies - it’s pretty obvious to most people”. The strange thing about it is that this is all so amazingly simple. ---
**Author:** ![Munch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/munch/32/5281_2.png) [@Munch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Munch)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2004, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/paul-hornung/237517/46 "2004-03-31T19:44:55Z")
> [@IzzyR](#): > > Here’s what I can’t understand. I have repeatedly in this thread made a distinction between dumb and academic underachiever. In fact the very sentence that you quoted dealt with this distinction. So you are saying my statement (that Hornung said academic achievement, not dumb) are somehow in contradiction with your quote. Could you explain some sort of thought process that led you to this conclusion? Please bold the portion where Hornung says “academic achievement” or even alludes to it. Hornung is a making a call for the “academic structure” to be lowered to specifically attract black athletes. How is that NOT a gigantic assumption that black athletes are incapable of surviving in that structure, and how is it NOT assuming that black athletes need more help getting in than white athletes? The problem, IzzyR, is that this “disproportionate percentage” you allude to isn’t fact. You have not provided evidence to support it. The evidence you provide supports that black basketball players don’t stay around to graduate. But they don’t suggest that white players do. In fact, there are no numbers to suggest that the word “disproportionate” is accurate at all. And in NO way can it just readily be assumed that African-Americans do leave disproportionately, or perform in the classroom disproportionately. I’d recommend taking a gander at the Affirmative Action thread going on in IMHO right now that has plenty of facts that show AA students perform at a higher level than the average student, which would be contrary to your “obvious” assumption. ---
**Author:** ![Jimmy\_Chitwood](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f475e1/32.png) [@Jimmy\_Chitwood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jimmy_Chitwood)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2004, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/paul-hornung/237517/47 "2004-03-31T19:58:57Z")
**IzzyR,** I’m going to try and keep this civil. Your “review” of the thread: > [@You](#): > > Read the thread: > > IzzyR: “A disproportionate percentage of these athletic stars/academic underachievers are in fact Black”. So far, so good, other than the fact that this thread is about the fact that Paul Hornung said specifically that black athletes can’t keep up academically. The fact that most collegiate stars are black has nothing to do with it, unless you want to pretend that because 95% of collegiate stars are black, and many collegiate stars are bad students, that somehow is a reflection on an entire race. If your claim is that the proportion of black, academically poor star athletes to white, academically poor star athletes is greater than the percentage of black star athletes to white star athletes, I’m gonna need to see some evidence, and that’s not going to be easy to find- I mean, what’s a “star” anyway? > [@](#): > > jarbaby: “Whether or not you have extensive studies on your side (which I doubt Hornung had any idea about)” > > IzzyR: “I don’t think you need extensive studies - it’s pretty obvious to most people”. Magically, the point of what **jarbabyj** was getting at in her post has disappeared. Let’s, for the third time, take a look at the full quote: > [@](#): > > Whether or not you have extensive studies on your side (which I doubt Hornung had any idea about), it is inflammatory and offensive to imply (and yes he did imply) that black athletes are dumber than white. Now we see that Hornung’s _implication that blacks are dumb_ was what **jarbabyj’s** hypothetical studies were concerning, not your claims about percentages. Then you said you don’t need studies, because it is obvious. Anyone above “rhesus”- hopefully you will grant me at least that status- on the comprehension scale would interpret that to mean you were claiming Hornung’s implication was obviously true. It’s got to be one or the other- either Hornung’s statement- that low academic standards are needed specifically to recruit black athletes- was agreeable to you, or it wasn’t. You can’t pretend that he wasn’t claiming blacks were incapable academically as compared to whites. If you agree with that, you are agreeing with a racist sentiment. There is no way to justify that statement without accepting the clear implication that blacks are poor students, i.e. intellectually inferior. > [@](#): > > The strange thing about it is that this is all so amazingly simple Strange and disturbing. ---
**Author:** ![IzzyR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/2acd7d/32.png) [@IzzyR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IzzyR)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2004, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/paul-hornung/237517/48 "2004-03-31T20:03:09Z")
> [@Munch](#): > > Please bold the portion where Hornung says “academic achievement” or even alludes to it. Saying that the standards need to be lower in order to attract the black athlete means the same as saying that black athletes tend to be academic underachievers. Blacks being dumb is one possible REASON that they might be underachievers. But there are other reasons out there (most notably socio-economic), and before you start attributing one reason as being part of someone’s comments you should have a basis for it. You don’t. > [@](#): > > Hornung is a making a call for the “academic structure” to be lowered to specifically attract black athletes. How is that NOT a gigantic assumption that black athletes are incapable of surviving in that structure, and how is it NOT assuming that black athletes need more help getting in than white athletes? He is in fact making both of these assumptions. But this is not necessarily because they are dumber, as above. See also the post above by my worthy admirer Really Not All That Bright. > [@](#): > > The problem, IzzyR, is that this “disproportionate percentage” you allude to isn’t fact. You have not provided evidence to support it. The evidence you provide supports that black basketball players don’t stay around to graduate. But they don’t suggest that white players do. In fact, there are no numbers to suggest that the word “disproportionate” is accurate at all. And in NO way can it just readily be assumed that African-Americans do leave disproportionately, or perform in the classroom disproportionately. Well for starts, try [this](http://www.science.smith.edu/departments/EXER_SCI/Faculty/DS/Gradratem.html) (abstract of a study ): > [@](#): > > The effect of athletic participation on the graduation rate of black male scholarship athletes was examined. Data are reviewed and comparisons made of whites versus blacks at “elite” schools, and at the average Division I institution. The data indicate that while blacks trail whites in graduation rate across institutions and sports, they tend to graduate at higher rate than their black peers at “elite” institutions, and across Division I. Such findings conflict with the common belief that athletic participation has a negative impact on the academic success of black males. Nonetheless, the black-white differences remain problematic. It has become apparent that the issues involved go well beyond athletics, and that sports, once again, appears to highlight and reflect larger societal problems. See also further discussion [here](http://www.umich.edu/~psycours/561/meggyesy.htm). > [@](#): > > I’d recommend taking a gander at the Affirmative Action thread going on in IMHO right now that has plenty of facts that show AA students perform at a higher level than the average student, which would be contrary to your “obvious” assumption. It does not have the slightest connection to my assumption. ---
**Author:** ![IzzyR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/2acd7d/32.png) [@IzzyR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IzzyR)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2004, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/paul-hornung/237517/49 "2004-03-31T20:18:04Z")
> [@Jimmy Chitwood](#): > > IzzyR, I’m going to try and keep this civil. Don’t do me any favors. You came into this thead with a big mouth and a small brain - don’t suddenly try to pretend that you’re the voice of reason here. > [@](#): > > If your claim is that the proportion of black, academically poor star athletes to white, academically poor star athletes is greater than the percentage of black star athletes to white star athletes, I’m gonna need to see some evidence, and that’s not going to be easy to find- I mean, what’s a “star” anyway? Well you can leave out “star” and that is my claim. I agree with you that “star” is difficult to define, for which reason I think you should not have inserted it. See above for some cites. There are undoubtedly many others. > [@](#): > > Now we see that Hornung’s implication that blacks are dumb was what jarbabyj’s hypothetical studies were concerning, not your claims about percentages. As I said before jarbaby referred to my side, a reference to what I was saying. Subsequently she added that Hornung was being inflammatory. Jarbaby is here and can perhaps clarify her remarks if she so chooses. But no matter. If she meant what you said she did a poor job of expressing it. I interpreted it the way I’ve said, and was justified in doing so, and my subsequent comments reflected this interpretation. ---
**Author:** ![Munch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/munch/32/5281_2.png) [@Munch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Munch)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2004, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/paul-hornung/237517/50 "2004-03-31T20:23:22Z")
> [@](#): > > Well for starts, try this (abstract of a study ): Nice. I’d question the validity of a professor’s abstract study that’s in the same pile as [Losing to Girls](http://www.science.smith.edu/departments/EXER_SCI/Faculty/DS/Losing.html), [How to teach people to be intense](http://www.science.smith.edu/departments/EXER_SCI/Faculty/DS/intensity.htm), and my personal favorite: [Golf as psychological therapy](http://www.science.smith.edu/departments/EXER_SCI/Faculty/DS/Sheehan.html). > [@](#): > > See also further discussion here. An article on collegiate sports revenue? If anything, that article supports my side of the argument. > [@](#): > > Saying that the standards need to be lower in order to attract the black athlete means the same as saying that black athletes tend to be academic underachievers. Fine. But ignoring the large percentage of African-American athletes already on the Irish’s roster doesn’t support that. Also ignoring past success with similarly high standards and similiary high numbers of African-American athletes lends further evidence to Hornung being an asswipe. ---
**Author:** ![IzzyR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/2acd7d/32.png) [@IzzyR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IzzyR)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2004, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/paul-hornung/237517/51 "2004-03-31T20:44:06Z")
> [@Munch](#): > > I’d question the validity of a professor’s abstract study that’s in the same pile as Losing to Girls, How to teach people to be intense, and my personal favorite: Golf as psychological therapy. IOW, you don’t accept anything from Smith University because you dislike some of the studies they produce. This is an amazingly powerful technique for ignoring any scientific evidence (much of which is produced by Universities who also produce a lot of fuzzier stuff). > [@](#): > > An article on collegiate sports revenue? If anything, that article supports my side of the argument. You are a bit short on detail here. Perhaps you’ll fill in a bit. For me, what jumped out at me was stuff like the following: > [@](#): > > In the Division I revenue producing sports, football and men’s basketball, 51% of football players graduated and 41% of male basketball players graduated after six years. According to the report, only 33% of Division I black male basketball players graduated in six years, the lowest graduation rate since 1985. (I should note here - just to try and head it off - that the difference between 41% and 33% may seem small, but they are not comparing white players to blacks. They are comparing total (white & black) to black alone. So the white percentage would have to be a lot higher to bring the total to 41%. The exact number would depend on the racial breakdown of Division I teams). And: > [@](#): > > Proposition 48, as an attempt to legitimize the educational mission of the Division I revenue producing college sports programs by establishing minimal academic standards for incoming student athletes, had the unspoken and, some would say, desired effect on black athletes. It was devastating. However Proposition 48 also caused an unintended effect; not only did it negatively impact black athletes as a group, it potentially eliminated superior black athletes who were coveted by the top athletic programs. In response, the NCAA in 1990 instituted Proposition 42 to “loophole” Proposition 48 creating a category of potential scholarship athlete called “partial qualifiers.” However, as Dr. Edwards points out, the net effect of both propositions 48 and 42 “… has been to limit the opportunities-both educational and athletic-that would otherwise be available to black youth.” > [@Munch](#): > > But ignoring the large percentage of African-American athletes already on the Irish’s roster doesn’t support that. I don’t know what you mean with this. Hornung’s problem is that the guys already on the ND roster (African-American or otherwise) are not getting the job done. > [@](#): > > Also ignoring past success with similarly high standards and similarly high numbers of African-American athletes lends further evidence to Hornung being an asswipe. Is this true? I thought the glory years of ND are long in the past. Could you give a cite for this claim? (Even if they’ve had some success in the past with a similar %, I still say - as noted above - that the fact that it is possible to succeed with a handicap does not mean that the handicap does not exist, or that it does not make you less likely to succeed.) ---
**Author:** ![IzzyR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/2acd7d/32.png) [@IzzyR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IzzyR)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2004, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/paul-hornung/237517/52 "2004-03-31T20:54:26Z")
[NCAA Research Report](http://www.ncaa.org/library/research/01Series/report_96-01.pdf) (Tables 4-6) ---
**Author:** ![NicePete](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ee7513/32.png) [@NicePete](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NicePete)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2004, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/paul-hornung/237517/53 "2004-03-31T21:00:47Z")
Leaving aside the racial issues for a moment, I’d just like to point out that Paul Hornung is an idiot for suggesting that the academic standards of a university be lowered to benefit an athletic team. After all, winning football games _is_ the primary mission of a university, right? ---
**Author:** ![Jimmy\_Chitwood](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f475e1/32.png) [@Jimmy\_Chitwood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jimmy_Chitwood)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2004, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/paul-hornung/237517/54 "2004-03-31T21:06:21Z")
> [@IzzyR](#): > > Well you can leave out “star” and that is my claim. I agree with you that “star” is difficult to define, for which reason I think you should not have inserted it. . > [@IzzyR in his first post to this thread](#): > > A disproportionate percentage of these athletic stars/academic underachievers are in fact Black. I didn’t insert anything. Anyway, this isn’t the issue that I was arguing. Your earliest posts, intentionally or not, gave a strong impression that you felt blacks inferior, and I reacted to that. You’ve since claimed that’s not the case, so that’s that as far as I’m concerned, although you’re still an asshole. ---
**Author:** ![Munch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/munch/32/5281_2.png) [@Munch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Munch)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2004, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/paul-hornung/237517/55 "2004-03-31T21:07:19Z")
> [@IzzyR](#): > > IOW, you don’t accept anything from Smith University because you dislike some of the studies they produce. I said nothing of the sort. The articles I linked to were all produced by Donald Siegel, the author you linked to. > [@](#): > > This is an amazingly powerful technique for ignoring any scientific evidence (much of which is produced by Universities who also produce a lot of fuzzier stuff). Say again? > [@](#): > > For me, what jumped out at me was stuff like the following: Fantastic. What jumped out at me were things like this: > [@](#): > > Student athletes’ participation in college revenue producing sports programs, which are dominated by black athletes, continues to reveal a century long pattern of exploitation of student athletes. How would lowering the standards even further reduce that exploitation? > [@](#): > > The plight of the black athlete, in what could by understatement be called a system of athletic exploitation, is a matter of degree compared to white athletes. However it is more severe due to an underlying pattern and consequence of racism in college sports as well as the larger society. Oh my. Tell me again why we should be providing substand educations to black athletes just to improve our athletics. Then tell me why that isn’t an inherently racist sentiment. > [@](#): > > While the NCAA and its Division IA member schools exploit the talents of black athletes and deny these same athletes access to a quality education, they also limit employment opportunities to blacks athletes after their athletic career ends. Hornung’s sentiments are inherently racist because they try to encourage racist behavior. It’s as simple as that. > [@](#): > > Is this true? I thought the glory years of ND are long in the past. Could you give a cite for this claim? 2002: Ranked #1 in the BCS during the Week of October 27 1998: 9-3 1993: 11-3, Ranked #2 at year’s end 1992: 10-1-1 1989: 12-1, Ranked #2 1988: 12-0, #1 Those are the highlights, you’re capable of digging up the rest. (I should note here - just to try and head it off - that the difference between 41% and 33% may seem small, but they are not comparing white players to blacks. They are comparing total (white & black) to black alone. So the white percentage would have to be a lot higher to bring the total to 41%. The exact number would depend on the racial breakdown of Division I teams). And:I don’t know what you mean with this. Hornung’s problem is that the guys already on the ND roster (African-American or otherwise) are not getting the job done.Is this true? I thought the glory years of ND are long in the past. Could you give a cite for this claim? (Even if they’ve had some success in the past with a similar %, I still say - as noted above - that the fact that it is possible to succeed with a handicap does not mean that the handicap does not exist, or that it does not make you less likely to succeed.) [/QUOTE] ---
**Author:** ![IzzyR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/2acd7d/32.png) [@IzzyR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IzzyR)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2004, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/paul-hornung/237517/56 "2004-03-31T21:21:31Z")
**Jimmy Chitwood** Good point here. I meant “stars” in the sense of guys that Hornung is interested in, i.e. guys good enough to make ND succeed on the field. (At that point we had not yet gotten bogged down in arguments over numbers, so an exact definition of “star” was not an issue). Sorry for the confusion. **Munch** , your latest post is just changing the topic. I brought the cite to show that Black athlete graduation rates are lower than white’s. Which is what we were discussing. You ignore this and instead open up a new attack on Hornung, saying that since college athletic programs exploit blacks, anyone calling for more blacks in college sports is a racist. This is almost as silly as anything else that’s been discussed here, but I am loath to address it, seeing how much difficulty people have been having with simple concepts. ---
**Author:** ![Munch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/munch/32/5281_2.png) [@Munch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Munch)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2004, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/paul-hornung/237517/57 "2004-03-31T21:32:47Z")
> [@IzzyR](#): > > **Munch** , your latest post is just changing the topic. I brought the cite to show that Black athlete graduation rates are lower than white’s. Which is what we were discussing. You ignore this and instead open up a new attack on Hornung, saying that since college athletic programs exploit blacks, anyone calling for more blacks in college sports is a racist. What translation service do you use? I’d file a complaint if I were you. And how silly of me to start up a rant against Hornung in a thread I started up to rant against Hornung. What in the world was I thinking? ---
**Author:** ![IzzyR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/2acd7d/32.png) [@IzzyR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IzzyR)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2004, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/paul-hornung/237517/58 "2004-03-31T21:40:15Z")
It’s hard for me to say for sure what you were thinking. But now that you ask, my best guess is that you were thinking this: “hmm… I’m out on a limb here, and my claim that black athletes are not disproportionately likely to be academic underachievers is looking increasingly tenuous in the face of mounting evidence to the contrary. So how do I slip out of this and save face? Hey, why don’t I try changing the topic? That worked a lot of other times…” But again, this is all a guess. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Pashnish\_Ewing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8797f3/32.png) [@Pashnish\_Ewing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pashnish_Ewing)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2004, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/paul-hornung/237517/59 "2004-03-31T22:48:46Z")
> [@Munch](#): > > Then please explain the following Hornung quote: > > > [@](#): > > > > We can’t stay as strict as we are as far as the academic structure is concerned because we’ve got to get the black athlete. I’ll give it a shot. I think Horning used a little culturally insensitive shorthand to get his point across. Here is what I guess would be the longhand version: “We can’t stay as strict as we are as far as the academic structure is concerned because we’ve got to get more of the top 100 high school football recruits to sign with Notre Dame.” As it happens, a majority of those top 100 recruits will be young African-American men (no cites, sorry). I think it’s obvious that Hornung (I always thought it was _Horning_) is not saying ND needs more black female track stars on the football team, he is specifically talking about top football recruits, who have a reputation for not having the academic credentials to meet higher standards than the NCAA minimum. Now, I think Hornungs comments were very insensitive and show that he is out of touch with the way people address these issues today. It also insults those top level athletes that do make excellent grades. But I don’t think you can take his statements as proof that he thinks blacks are not as smart as whites. Although it may proove that he took a few too many shots to the head wearing those flimsy, old-timie leather helmets. Upon preview, I see that **Izzy** has made some similar points, which may or may not help my credibility. Pash ---
**Author:** ![tiny\_ham](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a183cd/32.png) [@tiny\_ham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tiny_ham)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2004, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/paul-hornung/237517/60 "2004-04-01T00:29:56Z")
In the end Izzy, I don’t feel that black athletes are any less underacheiving than ALL athletes (white, hispanic, jewish or whathaveyou) who think they can get through life on their sports talent. Had Hornung said “we need to decrease academic standards to get BETTER ATHLETES” he would have still been an idiot, but not a racist one. Hornung was an ass on several points…one, suggesting a storied academic school lower it’s standards for the sake of football, and THEN in the same breath suggesting that doing so would benefit BLACKS and no one else. And I’d like to see some documentation of being academic as being ‘acting white’. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/paul-hornung/237517.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/paul-hornung/237517.md?page=4)