The linked article discusses sceintific racism which pretty much did arise in the nineteenth century.
Given that the term “race” was not coined for what we now view as “races” until around 1750, that is not all that hard to understand.
Of course, if we use the word “racism” as simply a sloppy term for xenophobia, then that aspect of human society goes back much further. When we note that people considered people different from themselves as “other” and mocked or derided or expressed contempt for the “others” because their skin was lighter or darker or the men did or did not have facial hair or the people had straight or curly hair, then I suppose that we can use “racism” a bit anachronistically prior to 1800 or in places other than Europe and European dominated Americas. On the other hand, it is probably more accurate to identify such practices as xenophobia as there was no real effort to separate and identify others according to “racial” characteristics prior to that time.
The blueskin tribe might be in continous warfare with the greenskin tribe, but their propaganda tended to say “those people in the West are evil/stupid/icky; look at their green skins,” but it was pretty rare for anyone to say "green skin is evil and if you ever meet someone from the East with green skin, they will be just as evil/stupid/icky. People just do not seem to have left records indicating anyone actually thought that way.
Sigh. I’ve already addressed everything you said. You keep adding an extreme value judgment to the word “racism” that makes you uncomfortable with associating it mostly with Europeans. Yes, racism is a European phenomenon. That doesn’t mean any non-European atrocity or conflict that doesn’t quite fit under the racist umbrella is automatically not as bad as anything Europeans have done in the name of racism.
In theory, that is. Of course, so far Europeans lead history in horrible atrocities against other people, as you’ve so gleefully bragged.
Sure, you can be racist against your own people. Why not? Racism is a statement that all people of X race are inferior, poorer, etc… No reason I can see why your own race / phenotype could be X in that particular equasion.
I’m not “uncomfortable” with associating racism “mostly with Europeans.” I just think it is naive to do so. Nor is it a question of non-Europeans doing things that are “equally bad” as racism. It’s a question of them doing the identical thing.
Throwing in the gratuitous term “gleefully bragged” may make you feel better but it misses the point and it falsely attributes to my post a colorization which it does not contain. The point is that simply because a population is more successful at codifying a concept or carrying out their will to implement it does not make the underlying behaviour any different.
If we both want to kill one another solely because the other is not a member of our tribe/clan/race, and you’ve only got a spear while I have a bazooka, I’ll probably be more successful in the venture. If you barely have a written language while I have universities in every city, I’ll probably do a better job explaining why, scientifically speaking, you need killing.
Our underlying condition is the same, and pretending that one behaviour is racist while the other is not is silly.
I might add that I actually posited in an early post that the Rwanda genocide might be in the lead, as measured by percent of population slaughtered on racist grounds in recent years. As far as who has the “lead” in “history” the substance of what I’m trying to say is that there is none without sin among us since competetive reproduction was invented.
A situation of two warring factions has nothing to do with racism in of itself. Racism means something else entirely, and can be used can describe various situations, from education policy, to dating preferences, to warring nations, but only if those situations include the criteria being based on some type of ranking of the world’s races. If one situation includes that criteria and the other doesn’t, then that’s the difference that makes one racist and the other not.
I think what people are looking for is examples, especially on the “Koreans make incredibly numererous distinctions” concept that you and Paul in Saudi have mentioned. (That’s a paraphrase.)
I’m not disputing your point. I just want to learn more about it.
pizzabrat, your comments are perfectly valid assuming that every place you use the word “racism,” we substitute “19th Century scientific racism.”
But since you’re the only one who seems to be employing that specific definition, and since it seems evident that the OP’s question was not about scientific racism, I’m not sure why you continue to belabor the point.
No need to. It’d be redundant since the term and concept was born from “19th Century scientific racism”. Does “scientific method” refer to any type of observational learning employed before the development or not matching the criteria of the scientific method?
I’m not the only one willing to speak out against the sloppy wielding of the term. Yes it’s vogue these days to use it to mean anything bad, but that doesn’t mean such usage is universally accepted. And the definition I’m adhering to isn’t really obscurely precise as you’re trying to make it seem. We all really know what racism is - the political movement to disingenuously extricate the term from its European heritage is what’s laborious.
Fine, let’s build from there. If racism = scientific racism, and those 19th century pseudoscientific theories are no longer in fashion and are no longer taught, then racism no longer exists.
Whew, that’s a load off. Guess we just need to get the word out now.
I’ve been out of school for a while, but I have to say I don’t remember any classes in which I was presented with a “ranking of the world’s races.” No pyramid graph with whitey on top, nothing. I think I would’ve remembered, being on top and all.
Can you provide some examples (other than perhaps racist/kook websites like Stormfront) of where these theories are still taught?
(missed the edit window)
I guess you’re trying to imply a further precision that includes an instruction of race that matches exactly the rhetoric of the 19th century, such as the typological terminology they used. Never said that. Racism is no more or less than the belief that there are biological races and that some are inherently better than others. If a Tutsi can be “demoted” to a Hutu, then their ideology is by definition not racist.
Had a feeling that was coming. I admit to not having read the book, but I am familiar with the controversy, and the fact that the book and its authors were widely trounced by the scientific community for their methods and conclusion.
What I have really been trying to determine is, based on your own definition of racism, where you feel it exists in the world today. Accepting your proposition that white Europeans were the originators of racist theory, do you believe that only whites of European origin can legitimately be called racist?
(I’m familiar with the argument that only whites can truly be called racist because they are the ones with all the power, but the suggestion that only whites can be racist because we invented racism—if that is what you are saying—is new to me.)
It’s been defended and accepted by those in the relevant fields at least as much as it’s been criticized.
Various arenas - in education where blacks are thought to have unique learning styles; in sports where blacks are “naturally talented” compared to their white team mates who worked hard to make it.
No, of course not. No more than I think that only whites can practice psychology.
Time to restate the question. Is there a country without racism.? Is there one it is not a big problem. I wonder about England, Canada, Sweden .
I remember the movie the Gods Must Be Crazy when the native was looking down on the English for being unaware and inferior.
But it’s not just “two warring factions.” It’s two factions warring over the fundamental that one tribe/clan/race deserves ranking and priority over the other precisely because of that belonging.
As I said earlier, it doesn’t seem that we’ll agree so I won’t post in this thread again. I’m bemused but disappointed that the Hutu/Tutsi conflict (and their ranking of the Twa) seems less racist to you than white guys doing the same thing.
Those are some powerful anti-European lenses through which you see the world, and it is a very non-colorblind world, indeed. I personally find it indistinguishable from any other racist paradigm that finds exactly similar behaviour for exactly similar motives to be somehow “different” based on the color of the perp.