Well, humans are connected genetically. Isn't all life genetically related, going back to a common ancestor? Not like I know when the first eukaryote evolved out of a prokaryote though.
But the notion that all humans are connected by a real bond - biology - just serves to indicate how disconnected humans are, how barriers are constructed, and the material of these barriers isn't anything real, nothing concrete. That's what race is, as one of my professors put it: it's everything, and it's nothing.
But of course race is more complicated than that. It can't easily be reduced to a single aphorism. What does it mean to be "white"? "Asian"? Merely the color of your skin? Is it what's on the outside? The inside? Race is as much external as it is internal. Why else would memes like "oreo" or "coconut" exist?
Race also exists as a function of class. btstormb2006 writes:
I am white because my aparents are white and my afather makes more money than your father, so that makes me white. It’s about the color of my aparent’s skin and amount of money my afather makes, but nothing to do with me.
Why is it that being rich can, to an extent, count as being white, regardless of ethnicity and heritage? I've seen this growing up too.
Eventually...idealism can be nice, but it's just a means to an end. \end marxism
Probably because of 'he who makes the gold makes the rules'. The rich can say that they are any race they want, and because of the economy. Look at China. The Han people are, what, ninety-something percent, and there are lots of other ethnic groups too, in their own regions, for example the Tibetans and the Urghirs. But the Urghirs have things the Han people want, like for resources.
ReplyDeleteAnd isn't 'white' these days merely a lack of colour or culture (pace Lacan)? The Irish people, for instance, are called 'white but not quite' as are the Jews. And then these cultures fracture among themselves. And then Judaism is a race AND a religion, and the Irish are very strongly tied up with their religions. Protestantism is a very 'white' religion, and Catholicism not so much. (And then there are the missionaries).
What about race as performance? Like African-Americans and hip-hop. Then there are white people who want to be like them.