Racism Racism is the belief that certain “races” are not only different from, but also superior to, other “races.” This may result in discriminatory practices ranging from insulting behavior and unequal treatment to enforced segregation and even genocide. Such beliefs and practices are now generally condemned on both moral and scientific grounds but were widespread up to—and beyond—the Second World War. The concept of “race” itself is both complex and questionable. In the past, limitations on communications and transport made communities suspicious of outsiders, but this was largely on grounds of language and custom—what we would now call ethnicity. If the outsider adopted the ways of the community, he or she might well find themselves accepted. In this version of race, there is nothing innate about difference. In the nineteenth century, there arose a new attitude of superiority toward non-European colonial peoples. This was reinforced by the emergence of various pseudo-scientific theories of race, in which humans around the world were classified into different “subspecies” according to physical characteristics such as skin color and physiognomy (differences that modern geneticists discount as very superficial). According to these pseudo-scientific theories, white Europeans were supposedly the most “evolved” or “advanced” humans, both physically and mentally. These theories were taken up by Social Darwinists—proponents of “the survival of the fittest” in human affairs and eugenicists, who urged that the breeding of people considered “inferior” on either intellectual, physical, or racial grounds should be restricted, so as not to dilute the quality of the “stock.” In the earlier twentieth century eugenics was considered quite respectable, but it fell out of favor once it became forever associated with the Nazis. Hitler’s regime took racism to its ultimate conclusion, exterminating as many as 14 million people—Jews, Slavs, Gypsies, and others—whom they regarded as “subhuman.” It was the largest—though not the last—genocide in history.
Posted on: Fri, 14 Mar 2014 20:03:55 +0000
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