Debates about the biological existence or race are popular here at the moment, but thats not what this thread is about.(At least this first post isn't, and I hope the thread doesn't become about it)
I'm interested, instead, at considering questions like these:

What is racism?

Can one believe in biological races in humans and not be a racist?

Can one not believe in biological races in humans and still be a racist?

Is racism ever justified, and if not, why does it exist?


Here are my answers:
I consider racism to be pre-judging people based on their race, and making generalizations about the inherent value or lack thereof of certain races.
For example, if upon meeting someone of a certain race one makes assumptions about them based on their race("Bob is an Arab, therefore Bob hates Jews), that would be racism. On the other hand, racial generalizations that are not about inherent value("most black people are poorly educated") are not racist.

It should be clear from my definition of racism that the answer is yes to the second two questions. In the first case, one can certainly believe that humans are divided into distinct biological races, but not believe that any of these races are any better or worse than another. In the second case, it is completely possible for one to believe that although there are no biological races, certain races have negative cultural practices that are so ingrained in all of them, that it is safe to assume that they are shared by every member of that race.(Dan is a Jew, all Jews are raised to kill Christian babies, therefore Dan kills Christian babies)

I do not believe that racism, as I have described it, is ever justified. Even if one were to believe that race exists scientifically and that certain races are inherently better equiped than other races, such differences would be so overshadowed by socio-economic circumstances that they would not be relevant in looking at the world. For example, a common argument that proponents of racism present is the fact that blacks consistently score worse on educational tests than whites, and that this shows their intellectual inferiority. Even if race is a factor in these test scores, there is no way to conduct such tests with specimens from equivalent socio-economic backgrounds, and this makes any difference in the scores that race might have played negligible in comparison to that played by background, and impossible to distinguish from it.

Although racism has likely has its origins in a natural fear of the unfamiliar, differing levels of technology, and cultural and language barriers, these things can hardly be the cause of it today as globalization has lead to people of different races speaking all different languages, living at the same level of technological advancement, and living in the same cultures.
Today, racism is perpetuated by differences in socio-economic status, and intentional scapegoating. For example, if you ask a white person from an all white community if they'd be more afraid meeting a black person on the street than a white person, they'd likely say they'd be more afraid of the black person, but in their minds eyes, what they'd likely have pictured is a white person dressed as they are, and a stereotype of a black person. In truth, I'd imagine rather few people would be at all scared of either a white guy or a black guy in a tuxedo, and many would be scared of either a white guy or a black guy dressed as and carrying themselves like a gang-member. However, as black people, having only recently been granted human rights(in the US anyway) are far more likely to be dressed as gangsters than white people Without putting much thought into it, people may conclude that they do not like black people because they do not like black gangsters, when in fact, what they dislike is gangsters.

Such misconceptions would eventually cease to exist in modern society where it not for the fact that they are cultivated by the ruling class to keep the lower classes divided. Race provides a necessary scapegoat for problems that are inherent in a class society. For example, if factories are being moved to Mexico to increase the wealth of the ruling class leading to high unemployment in the US, it would be dangerous to present this directly to those suffering from it. If people were made explicitly aware of the fact that there are no jobs because US companies are building things in other countries to circumvent US labor laws, people would demand that the situation be rectified. Instead, the situation could be blamed on illegal immigrants willing to work for cheap, and instead of making it illegal for US corporations to move their factories overseas, stricter immigration laws would be passed. When the problem doesn't go away, it could be portrayed as the stricter laws not working. In the same way, if crime rates increase in an area as a result of joblesness, blaming it on unemployment would be dangerous, so instead it can be attributed to changes in the areas racial demographics, implying that certain races are bringing crime to the area because they are inherently criminal.

At its core, racism is a kind of tribalism. Protect your own, be suspicious of others, use primitive cues to determine if a person is part of your tribe. I think it is natural to be racist, and many cultures in the world are. It is easy to fear people with strange looks, behaviours and languages. We are comfortable and safe amongst those who look and do as we do. This is where the power of the human mind must come in; the ability to override instinctive impulses; a sign of intelligence.

Racism is behaving in a biased manner toward someone due to differences for which they are not responsible, such as color of skin, or location of birth. I also believe that racism is also the willful continuance of a behavior which a racial group (or culture) finds insulting, antagonistic, or hurtful.

Personally, I dislike people for their actions or choices, not something that is always up to chance.

:m: Peace.

Personally, I dislike people for their actions or choices, (goofyfish)

do you not factor in circumstance and motivation when making judgements?
i understand that ideally, the individual is solely responsible for his or her actions. yet, in practice i think society concedes that this is not always the case. for instance, in a court of law, we have such phrases as...mitigating circumstances, crime of passion, diminshed capacity etc.

jps

Such misconceptions would eventually cease to exist in modern society where it not for the fact that they are cultivated by the ruling class to keep the lower classes divided.

there is the occasional political opportunism and demagoguery. could there be an active collusion? a master plan on the part of the "ruling classes?"

For example, if factories are being moved to Mexico to increase the wealth of the ruling class leading to high unemployment in the US, it would be dangerous to present this directly to those suffering from it. If people were made explicitly aware of the fact that there are no jobs because US companies are building things in other countries to circumvent US labor laws, people would demand that the situation be rectified.

i think most were aware of nafta. (http://www-tech.mit.edu/V113/N58/nafta.58w.html) however i doubt if the more obscure trade agreements surface sufficiently enough to attract public interest

A Mexican student in one of my classes made fun of me for being Lilly white and having a Spanish last name. I think he thought I must have a Mexican person in my family, and was giving me an endearing ribbing about my apparent whiteness. I told him "There is an entire nation full of Spanish speaking white people" and that sort of made it awkward. I think I messed up.

This happens to my family a lot, living in the southwest. People ask “What kind of Rodriguez are you?!” My fathers version of the rebuttal to this question involves reminding people about just who conquered and ruled all the Mexicans for hundreds of years. I consider this a little less PC than my reaction was… but then again, speaking in racist or ethnocentric terms, aren’t Spaniards supposed to have a lot of fiery Spanish pride?

That’s my story about racism.

To understand racism we must look into our own prehistory. We are social apes like chimpanzees and gorillas. In fact the entire primate order has many social species of monkeys. They all behave in a manner that we call "racist" when humans do it.

Social primates (like all social mammals such as elephants and dogs) are comfortable relating to a "pack" or a "tribe." Basically, a pack is a group of related individuals of a size that can feed comfortably within the geographical area that it can command. For hunters like wolves that need a huge turf, that might be only a dozen. For large fearless ungulates that can digest the ubiquitous cellulose like bison, that might be a couple thousand. But for apes, it seems to be somewhere between fifty and a hundred.

Now remember that we are apes, and it's only been a few million years since our evolutionary line diverged from the chimpanzees. Fossils and other anthropological records indicate that our ancestors lived much like the chimps, in packs or "tribes" of about the same size. But eventually we adapted to a more carnivorous diet and learned to hunt, and that changed things.

Our hunting tools allowed us to live efficiently in larger tribes, well over a hundred.

Throughout this time period, which brings us up to the Neanderthals, we had an instinct to match our lifestyle: any humans who showed up in our hunting area that were not of our tribe were outsiders. They were competitors for our food supply.

If times were good, like all pack animals we would tolerate a little hanky-panky. Some cross-breeding is very healthy for the tribal gene pool, so that's a very handy instinct to have. A little inter-tribal competition during the summer months when food is abundant makes life interesting, and advances the survival of the entire species by letting all tribes share each other's discoveries.

But when times were tough, outsiders were the enemy and had to be driven off, or even killed if it came to it. The survival of "our tribe" was paramount.

Lots of really important stuff has happened since then. Dogs and humans noticed how well their hunting methods complemented each other and formed the Earth's first multi-species community. This allowed the size of a tribe to increase to several hundred humans, and goddess knows how many canines. People figured out that plants grow from seeds and learned how to plant their own crops instead of roaming the continent gathering them. Having the dogs live among them gave them the idea that they might be able to do the same thing with the goats and pigs that kept hanging around looking for garbage to eat. Soon humans found that they didn't have to wander around looking for food any more. They could grow enough plants and raise enough game animals to stay well-fed in one spot. Soon somebody got the bright idea of building a home that was a little sturdier than a collapsible tent. Human settlements started getting really large. Eventually people coming over from other tribes were viewed as traders, not competitors, and it became normal not to kill strangers. Finally division of labor was discovered, cities were built, and the rest is history.

Very recent history. That's an important point. All of this sociological development happened in something like a hundred thousand years. Does anybody think that our brains could evolve new synapses to keep up with the dizzying rate of change in the outside world that we ourselves were responsible for? No way!!! Inside our skulls, we're still Neanderthals. Look around you. What is the largest human settlement that still functions happily as a tribe? A very small city, somewhere between ten and twenty thousand people. Visit one if you don't live in one and you'll probably find people who don't lock their doors, who don't think twice about disciplining or helping raise other people's children, who pitch in and help anyone who is in any kind of trouble, and who give true meaning to the word "community."

You know something? We should be proud of that. In about a hundred thousand years we really have advanced from a species that only felt comfortable surrounded by a few dozen people that we knew personally and were related to by blood, to feeling comfortable among a huge throng of people, many of whom we barely know and are not even blood relatives. In evolutionary terms, that's amazing progress. Our dogs haven't done that well, even though they have twenty generations to our one and should be able to evolve much faster. When humans hit hard times and let their dogs fend for themselves, they form packs that are only modestly larger than the packs of their ancestral wolves, maybe twenty or thirty.

So we're stuck with these instincts that tell us anybody from outside our tribe is a competitor for scarce resources who must be driven off or even killed if necessary. We can't help it! Our brains are hard-wired that way.

Yet we live in "communities" of hundreds of thousands, and we are expected to treat people who live on the other side of the planet that we don't even know, people who are sheer abstractions to us, as members of our own tribe. We don't get to kill them if it looks like they're competing for the same resources. We actually have to make nice with them.

What a quandary! If you were an evil-minded player of a game like Sims, could you possibly come up with a more cursed environment, a more difficult world to succeed in, for your simulated people to live in than the one we've created for ourselves?

So yes, we have racism in us, it's just left over from our ancestors. We've managed to overcome it to a huge extent. We have a long way to go, yes. But we have proven that human willpower can triumph over human instinct.

Way to go, people! I say, three cheers for Homo sapiens!

(And, if you've read my other threads, you know that I give dogs a lot of credit for this as well. We learned 12,000 years ago how to love a "person" of a totally different species. I believe that if it weren't for that gift from Canis familiaris, we might never have been able to learn how to love a person of the same species who merely speaks a different language, has a different color skin, or calls god by a different name.)

At its core, racism is a kind of tribalism. Protect your own, be suspicious of others, use primitive cues to determine if a person is part of your tribe. I think it is natural to be racist, and many cultures in the world are. It is easy to fear people with strange looks, behaviours and languages. We are comfortable and safe amongst those who look and do as we do. This is where the power of the human mind must come in; the ability to override instinctive impulses; a sign of intelligence.
I don't believe that the fact that people fear those with strange looks behaviours and and languages means that people are naturally racist. If one grew up in a multi-racial community, as is increasingly common today, one would not find other races' appearances, cultures, and languages would to be strange
do you not factor in circumstance and motivation when making judgements?
i understand that ideally, the individual is solely responsible for his or her actions. yet, in practice i think society concedes that this is not always the case. for instance, in a court of law, we have such phrases as...mitigating circumstances, crime of passion, diminshed capacity etc.
This illustrates how, in my opinion, it becomes possible for one to be racist who does not believe in the inherent inferiority of other races or even in biological race at all. If an entire race(at least in one's mind) follows a certain cultural practice that one finds offensive, then a person might well dislike that entire race.
there is the occasional political opportunism and demagoguery. could there be an active collusion? a master plan on the part of the "ruling classes?"
I doubt there's any organized conspiracy, but I have no doubt at all that in political meetings in closed rooms the powers that be do to decide from time to time to actively blame certain races for problems that they themselves are creating.

i think most were aware of nafta. however i doubt if the more obscure trade agreements surface sufficiently enough to attract public interest They were aware of its existance but not of what it actually meant. People knew that NAFTA meant more "free trade" and everybody loves freedom right? and they also knew that their leaders were saying it would be good for the economy. Thats good too right? This is what the media(which is really an extension of corporate public relations on issues like this) told people.
It was certainly never explained as an agreement to make it possible for US corporations to shop around for the country with the most lenient labor and environmental laws, produce their products there, and ship them back here without having to pay any tariff on them.

Fraggle Rocker,
I agree with much of your historical argument, but it seems to me to be more of an explanation for nationalism than racism, as a tribe or community could be made up of multiple races. In addittion, tribes or communities of the same race would be as much at odds with each other as those from other races.

Drastically constricted, one must ask how old the concept of different human races became popularily accepted. One must separate tribal, cultural and even nationalistic pride when talking about identifying with separate races. The notion that a Nordic, a Greek, a Spaniard, would identify and be identified by the abstract Caucasian or White is relatively new. It is not as significant as others viewing most if not all dark skinned peoples as one kind. It is however significant that dark skined Africans identify themselves as black. I think racism as a widespread modern idelogy has its foundations in the transatlantic slave trade. The justifications, guilt, propaganda, etc spurned and spread images of Blacks as inferior. In the abuse of Darwin's theories, people found the perfect structure to create hierachies to separate the races. In the advent of nationalistic pride, these further identifications became strengthened and applied to other peoples.
Perhaps I shall expand at a later time...

. I think racism as a widespread modern idelogy has its foundations in the transatlantic slave trade....
This is likely true, for the most part, regarding white supremacism, and to some extent all racism in the US, but how could it account for racism in other cultures that had no part in the slave trade?

This is likely true, for the most part, regarding white supremacism, and to some extent all racism in the US, but how could it account for racism in other cultures that had no part in the slave trade?
It started the culture of racism. As I mentioned, the notion geenralized humans races is relatively new, and furthermore, the attribution of different mental and physical capacities to specific races that started in Europe with the strict stratification of the peoples of earth started with the concept of the negro at the bottom of the hierachy... Inasmuch as it was based upon Europe's success was it based on European perception of the outside world in relation to themselves. No where was this perception more stronger than in comparisons to the negro, who was being legally enslaved.

Racism is ignorance.
Certain people wish to separate one race with another.
Each of us has qualities that match other qualities of others, and differ from even yet others.
Therefore, it would be impossible to find a basis for the qualities of separation.

The only way these seperatist racist eletist nimrods would get it through their head that there is no difference between races except for the fact they were born under a certain category, would be if everybody interbreeded together so that we would all look the same.
That way even somebody really dumb wouldn't try and act like there is a difference between one person and the other.

Look at Asiatic racism if you think that Europeans are the ones who originated racism and they have had it for far longer than they have had contact with Europe. Ask a Hindu pariah about racism. Most people have some preconceptions about races. It is always dangerous to stand out because when times get lean it is always the pink monkey that gets eaten.

I was under the impression that organized slave trading has been a part of the world economy for about the last 7,000 years. It would surprise me to see confirmation that racism based on skin color only became a significant factor in that tradecraft within the last 300 years. A link to some scientific explanation of this would much appreciated.

Now that right there: "asiatic racism", illustrates the flaw in your argument. Certainly the Japanese, Koreans, Chinese, Mongols have been fighting and hating each other for a long fucking time. In other areas, the definitions are even less broad and the hatred exists...

Racism is very much broader. Asians are a group. Africans and the africa diaspora become Black, Europeans are grouped, Indians..... Do you see the difference or not? The Mandinka and the Yuroba never thought themselves alike, neither did the Korean and the Japanese, and yet, as races, these entities are grouped together... Racism follows with the definitions of races...

The few Koreans that I have known have made it very clear that they do not believe that they are the same race as the Japanese. For specific groups that hate each other look at the Yankees versus the Rebs. My 70 year old grandmother would have shot someone for calling her a Yankee and that is not even a racial slur. You can always find something to hate about any other group if you look hard enough.

Racism is not discrimination or generalisation (though they can be by-products of it). Racism is the belief that a race is "better" or "more civilised" than another. And quite honestly i reckon some are.

I disagree that some races are better or worse than all the other. (Except Yankees). I do believe that there are some cultures that are better than others. Those that support personal responsibility are better than those which deny individuals the power to change.

I don't believe that the fact that people fear those with strange looks behaviours and and languages means that people are naturally racist. If one grew up in a multi-racial community, as is increasingly common today, one would not find other races' appearances, cultures, and languages would to be strangeTo a certain extent, "specieism," which is a more general term for demographic discrimination, is something that people learn. Yet to a certain extent it is also instinctive. Sexism, for example, seems to be prevalent in all cultures. In Israel, where gender equality is practically dogmatic, male soldiers often need to be relieved of duty when they see a female comrade blown to bloody bits, whereas if it happens to a male soldier they keep right on fighting with renewed determination. They don't mind making their women do all the housework and raise the kids, but as cockeyed compensation they don't want to allow them to be battlefield casualties.

Specieism is common enough in the animal kingdom. In South America many conure species (small parrots very similar and closely related to mini-macaws; you Brits and Aussies confuse us all by insisting that they're "parakeets") are on the endangered list and it's not easy for them to find mates. Yet they will avoid interbreeding with another species almost to the point of preferring extinction. When they finally do interbreed and produce fertile, hybrid offspring, the hybrids are invariably uniquely colored and patterned since conures are one of the most colorful families of parrots. The hybrids continue the tradition, preferring to mate only with other hybrids of the same genetic mixture and appearance, rather than other hybrids or the ancestral species. There's no reason to dismiss racism as a totally learned behavior when it has a well established hereditary vector.This illustrates how, in my opinion, it becomes possible for one to be racist who does not believe in the inherent inferiority of other races or even in biological race at all. If an entire race (at least in one's mind) follows a certain cultural practice that one finds offensive, then a person might well dislike that entire race. That's a good reason for using the more general term specieism. The learned part of "racism" is, as you say, often not about race or only incidentally about it. Poorly educated Westerners believe that all Muslims are Arabs (when in fact something like 90 percent of them are not). So anti-Arabism easily morphs into anti-Islamism, and America's huge and heretofore peacefully integrated population of Somali immigrants is suddenly blamed for 9/11.I doubt there's any organized conspiracy, but I have no doubt at all that in political meetings in closed rooms the powers that be do to decide from time to time to actively blame certain races for problems that they themselves are creating.Well duh. It's their mission to lay off blame on someone else. Why not pander to an easily aroused emotion?Fraggle Rocker, I agree with much of your historical argument, but it seems to me to be more of an explanation for nationalism than racism, as a tribe or community could be made up of multiple races. In addition, tribes or communities of the same race would be as much at odds with each other as those from other races.History shows us that nationalism as a form of specieism is often difficult to distinguish from racism. Look at the fierce battles among the various states of ancient Greece and ancient China. The Scandinavians, who are so closely related that they can just barely understand each other's languages, have fought among themselves in historical times. How about the American Civil War? The differences between Northerners and Southerners (even the role of slavery) were purely of economic origin, yet many historians consider it the bloodiest conflict ever to occur within a single Christian nation.

I'm going to agree with the above post and say that what we call "Racism" would be more aptly called "cultural prejudice". It seems to me that, with few exceptions, prejudice and discrimination in our society are based on patterns of behavior, not on race. Example: The guy, white or black, wearing "street" clothing, blasting rap music and talking slang laced with profanities is far more likely to experience discrimination by the guy, white or black, who wears starch-white collared shirts and listens Paul Simon through headphones, and vice versa. Neither pattern of behavior is specifically racial, but discrimination against these cultural patterns is often mistaken for racial discrimination even among the people doing the discriminating.

That said, prejudices are in some cases useful, although like anything, it's a problem when taken to the extreme. For example, a prejudice against people carrying assault rifles is probably justified, simply because a person with an assault rifle in any ordinary situation likely intends to kill somebody. I think true prejudice against race independent of behavior patterns is never a good thing, but prejudice against behavior patterns does have a place in society.

Fraggle Rocker:

To a certain extent, "specieism," which is a more general term for demographic discrimination, is something that people learn. Yet to a certain extent it is also instinctive. Sexism, for example, seems to be prevalent in all cultures. In Israel, where gender equality is practically dogmatic, male soldiers often need to be relieved of duty when they see a female comrade blown to bloody bits, whereas if it happens to a male soldier they keep right on fighting with renewed determination. They don't mind making their women do all the housework and raise the kids, but as cockeyed compensation they don't want to allow them to be battlefield casualties.
How is "speciesm" as you describe it, analogous to demographic discrimination? One can have a variety of species living within the same geographical region, and most importantly, the human group has no species within it. Sexism is not “speciesm” and therefore that analogy is irrelevant.

Specieism is common enough in the animal kingdom. In South America many conure species (small parrots very similar and closely related to mini-macaws; you Brits and Aussies confuse us all by insisting that they're "parakeets") are on the endangered list and it's not easy for them to find mates. Yet they will avoid interbreeding with another species almost to the point of preferring extinction. When they finally do interbreed and produce fertile, hybrid offspring, the hybrids are invariably uniquely colored and patterned since conures are one of the most colorful families of parrots. The hybrids continue the tradition, preferring to mate only with other hybrids of the same genetic mixture and appearance, rather than other hybrids or the ancestral species. There's no reason to dismiss racism as a totally learned behavior when it has a well established hereditary vector.
The original premise that specism is a natural trait for human beings has not been confirmed! Firstly there are no species within the human race. Secondly, the behaviour of parrots does not warrant the conclusion that humans are naturally racist. Mammals of different locales mate. Racism is a learnt behaviour for the discrimination must be justified. Without attributing certain characteristics to the group that is discriminated against, one cannot therefore reach the conclusion that this group if for instance dangerous, stupid, etc... These are all learned.

And from your initial argument:
So yes, we have racism in us, it's just left over from our ancestors. We've managed to overcome it to a huge extent. We have a long way to go, yes. But we have proven that human willpower can triumph over human instinct.
This is not racism! The instinct if you will, to feel distrustful outside of the protective construct-- which at its most fundamental is the family, and when abstracted--by LEARNING, becomes the clan, does not warrant that one, a group of people living thousands of miles away from each other (White Americans, Europeans), can still identify with each other and then discriminate against another group that lives with them (African Americans). This is a very important characteristic. The identification with a race is completely unnatural and a very modern attribute of the human being, and to equate that with our natural instincts for belonging in groups is absurd.

laughing weasel
The few Koreans that I have known have made it very clear that they do not believe that they are the same race as the Japanese. For specific groups that hate each other look at the Yankees versus the Rebs. My 70 year old grandmother would have shot someone for calling her a Yankee and that is not even a racial slur. You can always find something to hate about any other group if you look hard enough.
The Koreans and the Japanese have a very long history of hating each other; this I quite agree. However, outside the context of the two entities, that is, in bringing an African or a Hispanic into that context, current perception have that, the Koreans and Japanese will identify themselves as Asians. This is the peculiarity that accompanies racism-- the attachment to more generalized entities than the nation/tribe.

I consider racism to be pre-judging people based on their race, and making generalizations about the inherent value or lack thereof of certain races.

You're wrong. Racism is just the belief that the races are geneticly different. It has nothing to do with generalizing.

Even if race is a factor in these test scores, there is no way to conduct such tests with specimens from equivalent socio-economic backgrounds, and this makes any difference in the scores that race might have played negligible in comparison to that played by background, and impossible to distinguish from it.

There is a way to distinguish race and socio-economic backrounds: compare IQ test results from blacks and whites from all backrounds (upper, middle, lower) and look for correlations. This has been done. It has proven that children with parents who had higher IQ scores will have higher IQ scores as well, reguardless of social and economic backrounds. To summarize: Nature > Nature.

Racism is behaving in a biased manner toward someone due to differences for which they are not responsible, such as color of skin, or location of birth.

No, it's not. Racism is simply the belief that there are differences in the various races in the world. You're adding more things to it than need be.

Anyways, yes, people can't control their skin colour, but they can choose to not immigrate to other countries.

Your arguments have all been based in fact but they make they all make the leap into moralist territory by the time you finish them.

Racism is the belief that a race is "better" or "more civilised" than another.

No, it's not. It's the belief that the races have different geneticly different. That is all.

If you really want to question racism go spend atleast a week talking with the various racist groups. Here, I'll start you off with one: http://bbs.anus.com/ ('ANUS' is an acronym for the American Nihilist Underground Society) - I encourage you all to go there and argue with them.

Webster's dictionary defines racism as a belief that one race is genetically superior than the other.


There is a way to distinguish race and socio-economic backrounds: compare IQ test results from blacks and whites from all backrounds (upper, middle, lower) and look for correlations. This has been done. It has proven that children with parents who had higher IQ scores will have higher IQ scores as well, reguardless of social and economic backrounds. To summarize: Nature > Nature.

Even if blacks in general have lower IQ scores than whites, it would not make whites genetically superior. Statistics never can prove something.

I disagree with Websters then. If racism means the belief of racial superiority, then what word means the belief that the racists are geneticly different?

Even if blacks in general have lower IQ scores than whites, it would not make whites genetically superior. Statistics never can prove something.

You're saying that these statistics only show that White people only score higher on IQ tests, and they can't prove that black people tend to stupider because their poorer scores could be the result of a "culture" (can one say there is a black culture in America?) that doesn't encourage individuals to strive mentally, or it could be the result of any other possibilities.

The problem with that theory is that these statistics prove stupidity and success in society is genetic. As in, dumb white parents who didn't succeed will most likely have dumb white children who won't succeed. You could have from two idiotic parents who became millionaires through dumbluck, who have children, and subject these children to the best possible environments for learning. These children will remain dumb. The same thing goes for children from idiotic parents who were adopted by rich, smart parents.

The problem with that theory is that these statistics prove stupidity and success in society is genetic. As in, dumb white parents who didn't succeed will most likely have dumb white children who won't succeed. You could have from two idiotic parents who became millionaires through dumbluck, who have children, and subject these children to the best possible environments for learning. These children will remain dumb. The same thing goes for children from idiotic parents who were adopted by rich, smart parents.

I'm always wary of statements with "statistics prove".

I'd like to see the statistics that "prove" this. Because statistics are *always* open to interpretation. I would argue, for instance, that parents that became millionaires by dumb luck would be less likely to encourage their children's learning. From the point of view of parents who were extremely successful without education, education is unnecessary for success.

These statistics are very questionable unless we actually have information about how they were obtained. How large was the sample group? What was the demographic makeup? How were "smart" and "dumb" classified? How many different IQ tests were used? How was the validity of the tests verified? and so on. I don't mean to be overly pedantic, but saying that "statistics prove" something doesn't prove anything.

Soldier, the bellcurve (the much maligned book) is supposed to have a great repository of statistics. Have I read it? No. But I've researched the internet enough to see correlations. http://www.eugenics.net/ - Guess what that site provides? :p

Anyways, I must clarify: I am not racist, but most people do not question whether or not the racists are right seriously enough. Most people use racists as a strawman to make themselves feel superior to others. I hate that.

Soldier, the bellcurve (the much maligned book) is supposed to have a great repository of statistics. Have I read it? No. But I've researched the internet enough to see correlations. http://www.eugenics.net/ - Guess what that site provides? :p

Yes, a few years ago, on the advice of a friend, I read both "The Bell Curve" and "The Mismeasure of Man". Guess which one I found more convincing?

The website you linked to also provides little in the way of actual studies, and is more disposed to purely logical arguments, or similarly vague "studies prove" statements, and, just from their mission statement page, I've found enough fallacies that I don't trust their logic. Examples:

In the United States, we may be losing as much as one IQ point each generation.

This is objectively impossible, since the benchmark for IQ is that the American average = 100

Japan has an average IQ of 104, compared to the U.S. average of 100 (Lynn, 1991). A small shift in the average makes a big difference in the tails of a bell-shaped distribution. (The tails in this case represent the very intelligent, and the very unintelligent.) So is it any wonder Japan is a an economic powerhouse, despite being a tiny country with virtually no resources? It's also a peaceful and predictable place in which to live. In Tokyo, a bag of money left on a park bench will probably sit there a while, and eventually someone will turn it in to the authorities.

The bag of money anecdote is one of compassion, not of intelligence. And the US is actually economically stronger per capita than Japan, despite having "lower intelligence".

If poverty causes crime, shouldn't the U.S. have had an astronomical increase in the crime rate during The Great Depression?

Straw Man. Most egalitarians I know argue not that poverty causes crime, but that economic disparities cause crime. By this (notably egalitarian) logic, crime should have if anything decreased during the great depression, as mass poverty yields mass parity (an extremely poor way of accomplishing it, obviously). In short, impoverished people don't steal from each other, only from people who they perceive as having more. In the great depression when nobody had anything, this was precisely nobody.

Furthermore, if egalitarianism is detrimental to civilization, would you perhaps mind explaining why we have built what is arguably the greatest civilization (and at the very least the most economically prosperous) on egalitarian principles? ("that all men are created equal" aside, the people that came to America from Europe did so to escape their position as an underclass in Europe).

Obviously, if civilization depended entirely upon being exposed to an "enriched" environment, we'd all still be skulking about in caves!! Think about it--if human beings first existed in primitive conditions, and if civilization depended entirely on the environment, how could any progress ever have occurred? It's obvious there's an inborn streak of genius that drives the creation of technology and civilization.

Not necessarily, because social evolution is not the same as biological evolution. Social evolution involves each generation learning what the previous generation knows and building on it. Therefore, society continues to advance as long as it's members are capable of conscious thought, because the knowledge of the previous generation is the starting point for the next one.

I disagree with Websters then. If racism means the belief of racial superiority, then what word means the belief that the racists are geneticly different?

Besides those who do not believe race exists, everyone who believes in race believes there are genetic features which separate the different race.


You're saying that these statistics only show that White people only score higher on IQ tests, and they can't prove that black people tend to stupider because their poorer scores could be the result of a "culture"

Well, culture is a big thing, but a test cannot measure every intellectual endeavor. Even if the test did measure intellectual capacity, someone's intellectual superiority does not necessarily imply general superiority.


(can one say there is a black culture in America?) that doesn't encourage individuals to strive mentally, or it could be the result of any other possibilities.

It matters alot, especially at a young age.


The problem with that theory is that these statistics prove stupidity and success in society is genetic.

No, they don't. If a parent is more intellectually inclined than another parent, don't you think the former will be better equipped to teach their children reading and writing at an early age when it matters most?

Racism is an interesting historical progression. In ancient times there was no real concept of 'race', but people were generally referred to by their color: Nordics called the Africans "blue men", Romans called people by their nationality, Native Americans called people black, white, or red. Arabs had more sophisticated classification for races. When races first became defined, they started to have names like Caucasoid, Africanus, etc. In ancient times, any outsider was considered inferior by ethnocentric standards, but generally this was based on culture, not race (think of the patchwork of races in Egyptian times, for example.) This situation was different in Asia, where racism was very strong. This continues today, where the West is still demonized and race mixing is outlawed.

Not until colonial times did the concept of racism equate to racial supremacy. More often then not it was the English who spread this doctrine. Often times they would even invent races based on nothing simply to suppress a people: The Irish were considered a different and inferior race, despite their Anglo-Celtic ancestory.

Racism today is more or less considered an abomination, but you must remember that in retrospect there was nothing morally wrong with it. This makes it difficult for anyone to speculate on racial differences (or racial existence for that matter) without being shut down. Abraham Lincoln for example, beleived that slavery was horrible, but he had no problem calling blacks inferior. When he met Frederick Douglass, he changed his mind.

Here is a good example of what I mean:

http://www.friesian.com/racism.htm

You're wrong. Racism is just the belief that the races are geneticly different. It has nothing to do with generalizing.
Note that I said, "I consider racism to be..." If I had followed that with "a species of trout" I would still have not been wrong if its what I believed.
Definitions are not static, and eventually they change in accordance with what people consider them to be.
At this point in time most people(and most if not all dictionarys) consider racism to imply more than simply the belief that races are genetically distinct



There is a way to distinguish race and socio-economic backrounds: compare IQ test results from blacks and whites from all backrounds (upper, middle, lower) and look for correlations. This has been done. It has proven that children with parents who had higher IQ scores will have higher IQ scores as well, reguardless of social and economic backrounds. To summarize: Nature > Nature.
There is a way to distinguish race from economic background easily enough, but not from social background. You would need to find individuals who had been raised in exactly the same manner, had exactly the same education, and were subject to the exact same societal conditions.

There is a way to distinguish race from economic background easily enough, but not from social background. You would need to find individuals who had been raised in exactly the same manner, had exactly the same education, and were subject to the exact same societal conditions.

Cambodian refugees scored relatively close to their well-educated asian neighobors on most IQ tests despite the tremendous environmental differences. I would certainly guess that asiatic peoples have a hereditary-ily high IQ. No matter how much stuff people throw at me about "nurture" or "self-fulfilling prophecy" I'm going to be skeptical. And I'm white.

Hastein,
That is interesting. Can you provide a link?

Here you go. http://www.friesian.com/racism.htm

On IQ tests, blacks overall do much worse than whites, as East Asians (Chinese, Japanese, etc.) do much better. Shockley took this to reflect the genetic inheritance of intelligence -- high for Asians, middling for whites, low for blacks -- and Herrnstein and Murray ended up agreeing with him. Explanations for these results and criticism of these views have focused on the notion of "cultural bias" in the tests, e.g. that questions are about things like the proper dress for yachting, which is mostly not part of the experience of non-whites, etc. However, such explanations don't work for many Asian groups (especially refugees from Vietnam and Cambodia) that score well on IQ tests and have little more knowledge than blacks of the kinds of cultural bias that might be expected to relate to middle class WASP culture; and, in any case, although for more than twenty years great efforts have been made to eliminate any possible cultural bias in the tests, the characteristic level of scores among blacks, whites, and Asians has continued.

Although, as the article points out, innate mental abilities probably have to be fostered by particular cultures in certain ways. I know that different races can be equally intelligent, but I'm not sure that each of them is equally as able.

I also use the term 'race' here very loosely, since that is a question for another time. Perhaps the term 'population' would be best. Whites might be the smartest people in North America, but their southern friends might be dumb as rocks.

That doesn't actually say that poorly educated cambodian refugess scored similiarly to their well-educated asian neighbors, it says that asians in general score higher than blacks, which could certainly be the result of cultural factors.

Why are the IQ scores of African Americans extrapolated to fit that of other "Black" populations? Has anyone calculated the IQ scores of Burundians?

I would like them do conduct more studies. There is no sense hiding from this IQ situation. If the races are equal as they say, then let's do the tests and see if it's true. Certainly, I know many a black man who is my intellectual equal, if not superior.

Even without knowing you outside what you present on sciforums, I can assert I know countless "Black" men more intelligent than you Hastein. The issue, the overriding issue, the issue that most pisses me the fuck off, the issue that is most fucking ignored, is that a lot of these bloody IQ tests are done in the bloody USA-- where the cultural biases ferment the miseducation and the intellectual famine of the so called black man. I tire at laughing at morons always spewing the inferiority of 'Blacks' when at one point the Jewish population because of cultural and environmental biases had one of the lowest IQs around-- they have the highest amongst the 'White' population now.
Morons.

I enjoy purposely fucking up on IQ tests and claiming my race as "White" and then choosing violet as my race when I ace the pathetic junk. IQ tests are stupid. The higher your education, the better you do. Any moron knows that access to the best education is situational and economical. Anyone who can think knows that proverbs and other cultural nuances that are implied or sometimes even directly asserted are moronic. Anyone who can think knows that 'intelligence' cannot be quantified without a bias. Was Beethoven any less intelligent than Newton because he was a master in music and not physics? Bah. I'm bored.

I would like them do conduct more studies. There is no sense hiding from this IQ situation. If the races are equal as they say, then let's do the tests and see if it's true. Certainly, I know many a black man who is my intellectual equal, if not superior.
Such tests would have to begin with creating a controlled group of mixed race infants who would be raised in an identical fashion and insulated from knowledge of racial differences. Thats quite a lot to show that skin color isn't linked to test-taking ability, a link there is no good reason to think exists.

Even without knowing you outside what you present on sciforums, I can assert I know countless "Black" men more intelligent than you Hastein. The issue, the overriding issue, the issue that most pisses me the fuck off, the issue that is most fucking ignored, is that a lot of these bloody IQ tests are done in the bloody USA-- where the cultural biases ferment the miseducation and the intellectual famine of the so called black man.

And you are certainly not one of those intelligent 'black'* men, since you reply to my post with vengence and anger where none is due. While I'm trying to have a rational conversation you come out of nowhere and 1) assert I am unintelligent 2) assume I am being some sort of hate monger for adding a bit of knowledge to the topic and 3) shout some nonsense about the US that has nothing to do with the topic. For all you know, races don't exist. Yes, these tests are probably done in the US. Thank you for pointing that out. I'm sure some are done outside of the country too. Thanks, have a nice day.

* Now I suppose you are offended by the term 'black', what would you like?

"“ Japan has an average IQ of 104, compared to the U.S. average of 100 (Lynn, 1991). A small shift in the average makes a big difference in the tails of a bell-shaped distribution. (The tails in this case represent the very intelligent, and the very unintelligent.) So is it any wonder Japan is a an economic powerhouse, despite being a tiny country with virtually no resources? It's also a peaceful and predictable place in which to live. In Tokyo, a bag of money left on a park bench will probably sit there a while, and eventually someone will turn it in to the authorities. ”


The bag of money anecdote is one of compassion, not of intelligence. And the US is actually economically stronger per capita than Japan, despite having "lower intelligence"."

I WANT TO SLAP YOU COOLSOLDIER!!!

"And the US is actually economically stronger per capita than Japan, despite having "lower intelligence"."" <---- THAT ISN'T TRUE. There are several other facts that need to be accounted for before making such a narrow-minded statement. Where ever you pulled that out of your ass needs to be reassessed please. Since I really don't want to take more time to type this I will summarize the facts and expose your mind to something that you wouldn't even have concieved of that ALL affect the MEAN IQ and amount PER CAPITA a country makes.

-The fact that Japan is smaller than the US <--Can't argue that. :bugeye:
-The fact that there are people that are not as inclined intellectually. People DO learn more from their parents especially if their parents are smart. Children pick up habits by watching and learning what their parents do, and their parents habits become intuitive to the children by seeing them in repitition. :confused: <--Confused? Email me @ mls_hopeful@msn.com[/email] and I will send you the paper I wrote on it.
-What about the fact that the US has a higher diversity? DIVERSITY = LOWER NATIONAL MEAN IQ, however diversity also means more people for jobs. Which means there is a greater workforce. Japan's population has a majority of old people in the country, a majority so large that it is becoming difficult for current workforce to contribute enough to social security for the old people to live off of :mad: Send me another email if you have questions.


The list goes on and I would be glad to talk to you about it but typing is really incovenient so I don't want to :/ Anyways, I am sure you didn't consider any of these when you said that. Also, the anecdote you have can also be one of intelligence, but you didn't see that because you felt like you should just belt out your opinion instead of examining the logic behind it. But it is ok if you didn't see it because some people just aren't as smart as others. --;

Oops, I should say DIVERSITY = VARYING MEAN IQ, LOWER IN THE CASE OF THE UNITED STATES :/

If the notion of standardized tests is inherently biased against blacks then why not let the blacks write their own standardized tests? And then do the same for the whites, asians, hispanics, etc., etc. That way nobody can claim racial bias as a justification for low test scores. For pete's sake, you helped author your own tests, so you should ace them, right? That way nobody ever gets their feelings hurt and after all, isn't that really the most important rule for any system? Making sure nobody ever makes less than a perfect score. Shit, shouldn't we just give everybody the big trophy at the end of every contest?

So let's hear it from all of you that are too smart for standardized testing. What's the best way to screen applicants to schools, for jobs, etc.? I wont argue that there isn't some amount of bias in any test, but since you're the super-genius that purposefully fails the test to screw with the bias, what is a better alternative? I'm applying to grad school later in the year and I want to be sure and tell the interviewer why my GMAT scores really aren't relevant and he/she better not use them against me if I don't make as high as another applicant. I'm sure they are going to be really impressed by the arguments supplied by the Illuminati of Sciforums. :D