Antiracism 101: So, You Just Found Out You're Racist-Day 9

 What is Race?

Like time, holidays, nations, and almost everything else in humanity, race is a social construct. We made it up, because we like to categorize things and label everything possible. We invented nationalities, ethnicities, all to distinguish one group from another.

I must admit that this particular topic is something I am still learning about, myself. Like me, you probably grew up assuming race is all about pigmentation of the skin. Perhaps that’s how it began back when Europeans wanted to find people to work for them, unpaid, and have an easier way to distinguish who was who. Skin color was a convenient distinction. People went from being European and African, or British and Senegambian, to Black and white.

We also know, though, that not all groups of people considered white today have always been considered white. Italians and Irish are famously known in the US as not having been considered white when they first started immigrating to this country, until their numbers were so great that the advantage of considering them so made admitting them to the club worth it. That had nothing to do with skin pigmentation.

We know too, that things like the one-drop rule we invented also worked to determine who is and isn’t considered Black. Before DNA testing, it was based on lineage. Anybody who could be proven to have a Black ancestor was considered Black, regardless of pigmentation. People with light skin can be considered Black, where as white people who tan well, are still considered white, regardless of their pigmentation.

And now in the age of DNA testing, it shows the one-drop rule to be arbitrary, as well. Somebody like me, a white person who has a small % of African DNA, is still considered to be white, with all the advantages that comes with it.

All of this is arbitrary and made up. We all know this. But when we say things like “there is only one race, the human race,” it comes across as disingenuous, because that platitude refuses to see us and our ancestor’s role in white supremacy. In getting us to where we are now. It’s trying to weasel out of the work, and people can sense that. We have to put in the work to undo all of this.