If one were to treat someone differently based on their appearance, would that be racism, or would it only be considered racism if the outcome of this action was to hurt or insult the person of "other race" in question? If I for instance helped colored people because of their color, I am treating them differently than other human beings. Many people encourage helping people of other races out, yet aren't we simply affirming they are different based on color if our action is motivated by the color of that person?

Good question. If race is a morally irrelevant feature of persons, to what extent should it matter (if at all) in deciding how to act? To begin, it is worth noting that there is huge controversy about what to make of our ordinary racial categories. There seems to be a fairly wide consensus amongst geneticists that there is no meaningful genetic or biological classification that maps onto the racial classification system that we currently use in the US. So some have argued from this that 'races' are illusions. However, it is compatible with this that our racial terminology actually picks out social groups, i.e., groups of people who are viewed and treated in a certain way within the dominant cutlure. It seems fairly clear that people who appear "white" and people who appear "black" or "asian" or "hispanic" are viewed and treated differently within our culture. So when you suggest that by treating people of color differently Whites are "affirming they are different based on their color",...