Topics Race

Question 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?

Accepted:
November 17, 2008

Comments

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", there are several ways of interpreting this. Consider a White person X, and a person Y of a non-White racial group R:

X treats Y differently from how X treats White folk because X thinks that R's are by nature different from White people in ways that warrant different treatment (good or bad).

There are two things one should ask about this: 1) Are R's by nature different from White people? and 2) Does this supposed difference warrant different treatment (good or bad)? Since we have no reason to think that any racial group is different from Whites "by nature," the answer to (1) is no, and so the answer to (2) must be no as well. I think this was the thought behind your question.

But consider another interpretation:

X treats Y differently from how X treats White folk because X thinks that R's have been socially and historically disadvantaged compared to White folk and this disadvantage warrants different treatment, e.g., with an eye to correcting the disadvantage. [Does this count as being "motivated by the color of that person."? I'm not sure.]

Again there are two questions: 1) Are R's different from White people due to social and historical factors? and 2) Does thissupposed difference warrant different treatment? Sincewe have no reason to think that there have been social and historical differences between Whites as a group and non-Whites, the answer to (1) is yes; the answer to your question then turns on how we answer (2). It seems to me that there are facts about the social and historical differences between the races that justify institutions having different policies toward different groups: if injustice has been done to R's in the past, there should be efforts to remedy the injustice. But what about individual interactions? Should I treat my Black neighbor differently from my white neighbor? This is tough, for it will depend a lot on the details of the situation, I think. You'll have to look at the ways in which the social and historical differences matter in the particular situation and so might (or might not) warrant different treatment. I don't think you need to worry, though, about ignoring color completely and always treating everyone the same, for that would, in effect, be ignoring an important part of our history that has caused serious harm.