We Don’t Have Race Relations; We Have Racist Relations
Racism is real, but race is a real lie. Those are two facts I must remind myself. But when you believe a lie long enough, parts of it can become true — at least to you.
Unlike the past, experts today believe there’s no biological basis for race. Whatever we think of as race isn’t really race. Ancestry isn’t race. Nationality isn’t race. Culture isn’t race. Skin color isn’t race. Physical features aren’t race. There are no races. There’s only one quality or state of being human.
It’s as James Baldwin said, “Color is not a human or a personal reality; it is a political reality.”
In her insightful and detailed book, The History of White People, Nell Irvin Painter, a great historian, seems to provide a two-part definition of racism that surprised and challenged me.
She writes that racism is “the belief that races exist, and that some are better than others.”
If anyone believes in races, even if they don’t believe in inferiority or superiority, they’re still inaccurate, wrong, and halfway to racism or “internalized” racism.
In order for a racist to believe their race is superior, they must believe in races, right? There are…
