Black Klansman: Race, Hate, and the Undercover Investigation of a Lifetime

by Ron Stallworth

Duke’s assessment of blacks’ use of language was interesting in that he was only partially right. Some blacks from the South do, in fact, pronounce the word “are” in the manner in which he described. An example was my late mother-in-law. She was born and bred in Alabama, a graduate of Alabama State University with a master’s degree in business, and was a retired head of the Business Department at a Colorado Springs high school. She was active in her A.M.E. (African Methodist Episcopal) church and black community affairs, yet throughout my thirty-year experience with her she pronounced the word “are” exactly as described by David Duke. The racial fallacy in his argument is that this pronunciation is not unique to blacks. Many people from the South, whites included, employ this speech pattern. In other words, it has nothing to do with pure Aryan white racial intelligence superiority as stated by the Grand Wizard, but rather is more of a regional reflection of a cultural linguistic upbringing. In other words, his logic was extremely flawed and unsubstantiated by facts. Another significant factor about this particular conversation was Duke’s freewheeling use of the pejorative “nigger.” He was publicizing himself at the time and being reported by the media as being the “new face of the modern Klan.” He was not the stereotypical, uneducated, potbellied, tobacco-chewing/spitting, beer-guzzling Klansman of movie lore. David Duke was respectable-looking, always appearing in public ...