Race 2
In the previous post, I talked about how racism and race distinction makes no sense. What I mean is that no “race” or whatever is genetically superior, as superiority is a floating term, one that can have whatever meaning you find convenient. But they are different. I recently came across the notion that the most superior race for a given area is the indigenous race. It makes sense, those individuals had adapted to surviving in that area, there’s no reason to mix people around, they don’t belong there. And given how much mixing has already occurred, I know how outlandish that sounds in pragmatic terms. It’s an ideal.
Many pre-industrial are indigenous races had created an at least somewhat sustainable system for their local environment, since they were stuck there, they needed this property. Although, to contradict that, there were some empires which I have heard were not sustainable but probably indigenous, like the Mayans and whoever screwed up in Mesopotamia and made the Middle East a desert. So, we have a habit of screwing up, and global shiftlessness isn’t helping.
My middle college teacher, Ms. Louie, has given us a speech my Martin Luther King to read, and I am experiencing difficulty as I keep stopping and thinking. And blogging.
From “Social Ends: Racial Integration versus Separation.”
“What is freedom?” Indeed, what *is* freedom? I’m glad he included this, because I’m not really sure. According to MLK, freedom “expresses itself in decision.” This is, I think, a conventional decision. But suppose I want two things which are mutually exclusive or impossible, i.e. your whole body going two ways simultaneously, being a negative distance from something. Or things which are for all practical intentions contradictory, like wanting to not breathe but stay alive.
Ok, ok, I’ll spare any further immaturity regarding lack of freedom from physics or biological necessity. That’s not really the meat of the thing. A better example would be wanting to be a surgeon without going through medical school, or accomplishing wealth without effort. It’s possible but not feasible. In reality, we exist in a system, whether it’s nature or society, which imposes rules and expectations which must be followed before you can achieve anything. We are not free. What they want is a perceived ability to control their life.
“…some system has already made these a priori decisions for me, and I am reduced to an animal….” Hey, animals can make decisions too. A wild animal anyway would be more “free” because they don’t obey the rules of our society.
“The only resemblances I have to real life are the motor responses and functions that are akin to humankind.” We’re all just bags of protein with functions akin to intelligence. Don’t pretend you’re better than that.
“this inherent dignity of man in the biblical term the image of god.” :/ He’s a reverend, what was I expecting. Since the bible should really be classified as fiction, let’s have a little fun. God made us in his image because he *ran out of ideas*. He’s very uncreative, you see. He stole the ideas from other reli… OK that’s enough. This isn’t about religion.
“Is there any argument to support the withdrawing of life-quality form groups because of the color of their skin…?” Nope.
“…man is by nature a societal creature.” This is an interesting topic. Yes, we are societal, but only in small groups or packs. We can’t genuinely care about people we haven’t seen or heard of. This is why we started with capitalism and why socialism isn’t taking the world by storm.
“Man-made laws assure justice.” Not even. I’ve been taking these quotes out of context a bit, but they keep reminding me of modern issues. Large corporations trample all over “inner law[s], written on the heart,” in other words the spirit of the law, with their huge teams of lawyers and unwillingness to sacrifice a single fucking cent for the sake of something more important.
I should actually response to the passage. He spends a lot of time talking about “desegregation” versus “integration,” which is basically the difference between forcing equality through laws, and actual equality. And I agree with him. The laws need to be in place, but so do people’s attitudes. This is, of course, in the context of the goals of Civil Rights.
I am curious though, does freedom include the right to be racist? I mean it sure sounds like it does. Things like ideals and religion have this tendency to be ill-defined and partially contradictory.
When I was in elementary school, we learning about racial equality and treating others equally. Why does that need to be taught? Are we naturally racist? Most Likely, as babies tend to associate better with those similar to them and their family.
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