Racism And Why Essay Research Paper As

Racism And Why Essay, Research Paper

As children, most of us were given a playground definition of racism. Racism meant assuming bad things about someone just because of the color of his/her skin. Think about this definition. Its apparent simplicity actually contains three separate components. First, a racist has “bad intent.” Second, a racist makes prima facie assumptions. And third, a racist targets an immutable characteristic; in other words, something we cannot change and which we did not choose.

Let’s begin with the notion of race as an immutable characteristic. Race is in our genetic makeup. We did not choose our ancestors. The luck of the draw, the miracle of creation, determined our racial heritage. An integral part of liberal culture is respect for immutable characteristics. We do not deserve either praise or slander for them. We did not earn our race, nor can we be blamed for it.

Immutable characteristics are only one part of us. An individual also has ethnicity, culture, religion, morals, political affiliations, opinions, beliefs, feelings and traditions, for example. None of these other parts of individual identity are completely, exclusively, directly tied to race. Not even ethnicity and culture are absolutely predetermined by race, much less other aspects of our identity. For example, a Caucasian may be born in China, and grow up firmly entrenched in Chinese culture. In fact, every individual — however encumbered by ancestors, family traditions and expectations and cultural setting — is at least capable of creating an independent personal identity. Multiracial individuals are a perfect illustration; they do not have a multiracial ethnicity or culture, but rather a personal, individualistic approach to how race affects their identity.

All of these other aspects of identity are changeable, not immutable. Of course, it may be far easier to change our political affiliation than our religion, but certain aspects of our identity can conceivably be changed. Unlike race, they are not genetically determined.

Race is special because we do not choose it. It is the one value you can claim as your own. We can be held responsible, however, for what we do and believe, for how we dress and what we eat, for whom we love and how we love, for how we worship God and how we treat the government. Race may be a sacrosanct characteristic of individual identity, at least in a liberal society such as ours, but what individuals do and believe is not protected from commentary and criticism.

We may be inclined to defer to others’ emotional attachment to ethnicity, culture, tradition, etc. Many people hesitate to outright deplore how individuals from other cultures dance, sing, eat, dress and so on. Since another part of liberal culture is deference to individual autonomy — free will to choose one’s own conception of the good life — one may sometimes refrain from “judging” one’s own identity morally superior to another. However, liberal culture in no way commands that we grant conceptions of the good life immunity from criticism. All cultural norms — from infanticide, spousal abuse and genital mutilation to arranged marriage, individualism and eating with utensils — are not immune from discussion. If we were to treat all cultural, political, ideological, intellectual and moral opinions as equally valid just because they were expressions of individual identity, we would have to fear for our society’s stability.

Thus far, we have discovered that non-immutable characteristics are not immune from criticism. Let’s look at the second part of our playground definition of racism: prima facie assumptions, or prejudice. Note that prejudice is necessary but not sufficient to

fit the full meaning of racism. Everyone is prejudiced, but not everyone is racist. The real racist is irrational, because he comes to conclusions about racial identity due to false premises or even no premises at all. But what about those individuals who use evidence and personal experience to come to certain conclusions about racial identity. Of course, some of these “rational” individuals may use flawed evidence or employ faulty reasoning. For example, someone may say: All the Caucasians I know are drunks. Here is a Caucasian I do not know. He must be a drunk. While this individual is using evidence, personal experience and reason to come to his conclusion, his logic is faulty.

However, other individuals take these ingredients of reason and employ rather convincing logic. For example, Dinesh D’Souza has said something like this: When controlling for class background, blacks still score lower than whites. Class background often affects performance. If class background is not affecting performance, something else must be doing so. I (D’Souza) think

that “something else” is black cultural norms, and I have evidence supporting my claim.

Just as we are able to criticize non-immutable characteristics, then, we may also make statements based on prejudice, as long

as we can back these statements up with logic and evidence. Further discussion may challenge or reinforce “prejudices,” but

prejudice alone does not indicate racism.

Returning back to the first part of the playground definition, “bad intent,” will show how prejudice is not necessarily racism.

Many students have charged that D’Souza personally hates