Racism among white Christians

[Politesse]

The problem is the studies bend over backwards from considering whether the effect is due to race or due to socioeconomic status. Since race is a proxy for socioeconomic status this exclusion renders the data meaningless.

How does that, in any sense, make those two qualities not interconnected? Why is race "a proxy for socioeconomic status" if they are not interlinked?

So ice cream sales cause rape?

The connection betweeen the two can be easily explained.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

See? You care more about the supposed "implicit" insult to yourself than the much more important social issue at hand.

It's not an "implicit" insult. It is a false and unwarranted accusation. And of course, the social issue at hand is also the unwarranted and false accusations of racism that you and so many others in your group level against so many other people. The issue is that evidence that White Christians were more likely to disagree that there is cultural racism is taken for no good reason as an accusation against White Christians. But many others are accused as well. That is indeed an important social issue...well, it is important to some of us, mostly to those of us on the receiving end. But like any social issue, it is important to some, not to everyone. If you mean whether it is morally important, sure it is. People are being accused of racism for no good reason.

Forget it. I never called you a "racist", and I'm not going to.

If I were to say that all Christians are evil, I would not be calling anyone "evil" by name. But it would be reasonable for a Christian reading that to reply.

It's really not the point. Whether you are or not is best left to your own conscience in any case. But the ideas are what they are, whatever you call them. I don't care if you call yourself a racist or not, or even whether you believe in your innermost heart that you are a racist or not. If you have something to confess, do it to God; I've got no interest whatsoever in accusing or absolving you on this account.

God does not exist. However, if God existed, it would be pointless to make confessions to an omniscient agent. But that aside, I am not trying to get you to absolve me. I am trying to counter the accusations you spread against many people - including but not limited to me -, not by name, but in the claims you make. And yes, the ideas are what they are. In particular, the idea that races exist and the idea that some race is superior or inferior to another are very different ideas. Some - many - of us reckon that the former is true, but the latter is not true.

Not a single piece of concrete evidence was offered, that I can see, he went off on an irrelevant tangent about Ernst Mayr and Richard Dawkins, accused me of elitism for testifying as to the current consensus of my own academic discipline, then got frustrated and quit in confusion. What would you describe as his most salient points exactly, if you see that conversation in some different lens?

That's not at all what happened. You even say " then got frustrated and quit in confusion" whereas it is very easy to check that you quit - I don't know whether in confusion, but you insisted in your refusal to actually read his substantive arguments, and you were definitely confused about his views, which you chose not to read but about which you made several claims (which were mistaken, unsurprisingly as you chose not to actually read his views).

Anyway, let us take a look at the exchanges if you are interested: first, the two of us disagreed on whether races had a biological basis, and I offered links to some of the relevant threads when you asked (see this post, this one and this post ). In those threads, B20 made more than enough points - and do did Apostate Abe, despite his mistake about the meaning of 'racism'.-


B20 did not go off on an irrelevant tangent about Mayr or Dawkins. Rather, he brought up Mayr in this post not as a means to argue that races have a biological basis, but rather, to counter your argument from authority by providing another authority. He also pointed out that your reply in this post did nothing to counter the arguments in those other discussions: in fact, you just imagined the discussions in which defenders of biologicial races lost - whereas in the actual discussions, they won, but you imagined their loss instead of reading them. See my reply to you here as well, which you did not reply to, but made decisive points against your arguments - still not addressing the central points, but rather the sort of arguments you were making; but I did provide the links to the other threads, in which both Apostate Abe and Bomb#20 made decisive points on the substantive issue.


Let us move on to the rest of the exchange:
Here B20 points out how you chose not to even read the arguments he and Apostate Abe made in other threads I had referred you to.
He also replied to your argument about Mayr. That was not irrelevant, because you objected to B20's use of Mayr to counter your authority argument with another authority, so you decided to keep it going. It was tangential in the sense that it was a debate about an authority argument rather than a case of bringing direct arguments and evidence to the exchange. However:

1. That was your choice of argument. He was replying to your authority argument, and then to your challenge to his challenge to your authority argument (and yes, you then said you did not mean to make an authority argument, but you did make one, and in any case, you chose to continue to challenge the points about Mayr, at least until you quit).
2. The substantive arguments and relevant evidence had already been provided, in the other threads, and in detail.

Moving on, here you attributed to B20 beliefs he does not have. He replied here pointing out among other things that you had no idea what his views were because you had refused to read the posts in which he explained them, so your claim that his views were nothing like Myers was unwarranted. So, this is a tangent, but it is one of your making.

Then, you put words into his keyboard again - so this is again a tangent that you made; he replied here.


As for Dawkins, he brought it up in a reply to Toni here because neither she nor any other one of his accusers (including you) bothered to read the actual, detailed arguments he gave in the other threads, in which he debunks race denialism in detail.

Then your reply was to charge him with not describing his position, whereas he had explained it in broad terms, and further, he had already pointed out to you that you had chosen not to read the threads that I referred you to - and in which he made his arguments carefully - but instead imagined that the arguments failed.

He replied to you here.

And then here he replied again about Myers and what a specialist is. The sequence was: You made an authority argument -> he brought up Mayr to reply to it, as you refused to read his actual, non-authority arguments -> you challenged his reply -> he replied to it, etc.

At this point, you quit. You did not address B20's posts again. But here I replied again, letting B20 know that many of the posts in the archives were once again available, and providing an example. So, he replied here when he even provided the money shot. So, if you want a salient point, that is the one: the money shot. (that sounded pretty salient on its own, but it was after you had already quit, so maybe you missed it? ).

Of course, that money shot is a single post. There is many more in the other threads, and in the archives. But in the thread I linked to, you choose not to read them, and instead chose to attribute to B20 some views you imagined he had. It is difficult for me to understand how you think you did not lose that debate entirely.

 

[Politesse]

It's not an "implicit" insult. It is a false and unwarranted accusation. And of course, the social issue at hand is also the unwarranted and false accusations of racism that you and so many others in your group level against so many other people. The issue is that evidence that White Christians were more likely to disagree that there is cultural racism is taken for no good reason as an accusation against White Christians. But many others are accused as well. That is indeed an important social issue...well, it is important to some of us, mostly to those of us on the receiving end. But like any social issue, it is important to some, not to everyone. If you mean whether it is morally important, sure it is. People are being accused of racism for no good reason.



If I were to say that all Christians are evil, I would not be calling anyone "evil" by name. But it would be reasonable for a Christian reading that to reply.

It's really not the point. Whether you are or not is best left to your own conscience in any case. But the ideas are what they are, whatever you call them. I don't care if you call yourself a racist or not, or even whether you believe in your innermost heart that you are a racist or not. If you have something to confess, do it to God; I've got no interest whatsoever in accusing or absolving you on this account.

God does not exist. However, if God existed, it would be pointless to make confessions to an omniscient agent. But that aside, I am not trying to get you to absolve me. I am trying to counter the accusations you spread against many people - including but not limited to me -, not by name, but in the claims you make. And yes, the ideas are what they are. In particular, the idea that races exist and the idea that some race is superior or inferior to another are very different ideas. Some - many - of us reckon that the former is true, but the latter is not true.

Not a single piece of concrete evidence was offered, that I can see, he went off on an irrelevant tangent about Ernst Mayr and Richard Dawkins, accused me of elitism for testifying as to the current consensus of my own academic discipline, then got frustrated and quit in confusion. What would you describe as his most salient points exactly, if you see that conversation in some different lens?

That's not at all what happened. You even say " then got frustrated and quit in confusion" whereas it is very easy to check that you quit - I don't know whether in confusion, but you insisted in your refusal to actually read his substantive arguments, and you were definitely confused about his views, which you chose not to read but about which you made several claims (which were mistaken, unsurprisingly as you chose not to actually read his views).

Anyway, let us take a look at the exchanges if you are interested: first, the two of us disagreed on whether races had a biological basis, and I offered links to some of the relevant threads when you asked (see this post, this one and this post ). In those threads, B20 made more than enough points - and do did Apostate Abe, despite his mistake about the meaning of 'racism'.-


B20 did not go off on an irrelevant tangent about Mayr or Dawkins. Rather, he brought up Mayr in this post not as a means to argue that races have a biological basis, but rather, to counter your argument from authority by providing another authority. He also pointed out that your reply in this post did nothing to counter the arguments in those other discussions: in fact, you just imagined the discussions in which defenders of biologicial races lost - whereas in the actual discussions, they won, but you imagined their loss instead of reading them. See my reply to you here as well, which you did not reply to, but made decisive points against your arguments - still not addressing the central points, but rather the sort of arguments you were making; but I did provide the links to the other threads, in which both Apostate Abe and Bomb#20 made decisive points on the substantive issue.


Let us move on to the rest of the exchange:
Here B20 points out how you chose not to even read the arguments he and Apostate Abe made in other threads I had referred you to.
He also replied to your argument about Mayr. That was not irrelevant, because you objected to B20's use of Mayr to counter your authority argument with another authority, so you decided to keep it going. It was tangential in the sense that it was a debate about an authority argument rather than a case of bringing direct arguments and evidence to the exchange. However:

1. That was your choice of argument. He was replying to your authority argument, and then to your challenge to his challenge to your authority argument (and yes, you then said you did not mean to make an authority argument, but you did make one, and in any case, you chose to continue to challenge the points about Mayr, at least until you quit).
2. The substantive arguments and relevant evidence had already been provided, in the other threads, and in detail.

Moving on, here you attributed to B20 beliefs he does not have. He replied here pointing out among other things that you had no idea what his views were because you had refused to read the posts in which he explained them, so your claim that his views were nothing like Myers was unwarranted. So, this is a tangent, but it is one of your making.

Then, you put words into his keyboard again - so this is again a tangent that you made; he replied here.


As for Dawkins, he brought it up in a reply to Toni here because neither she nor any other one of his accusers (including you) bothered to read the actual, detailed arguments he gave in the other threads, in which he debunks race denialism in detail.

Then your reply was to charge him with not describing his position, whereas he had explained it in broad terms, and further, he had already pointed out to you that you had chosen not to read the threads that I referred you to - and in which he made his arguments carefully - but instead imagined that the arguments failed.

He replied to you here.

And then here he replied again about Myers and what a specialist is. The sequence was: You made an authority argument -> he brought up Mayr to reply to it, as you refused to read his actual, non-authority arguments -> you challenged his reply -> he replied to it, etc.

At this point, you quit. You did not address B20's posts again. But here I replied again, letting B20 know that many of the posts in the archives were once again available, and providing an example. So, he replied here when he even provided the money shot. So, if you want a salient point, that is the one: the money shot. (that sounded pretty salient on its own, but it was after you had already quit, so maybe you missed it? ).

Of course, that money shot is a single post. There is many more in the other threads, and in the archives. But in the thread I linked to, you choose not to read them, and instead chose to attribute to B20 some views you imagined he had. It is difficult for me to understand how you think you did not lose that debate entirely.

As I said, I have no interest in debating this "are you a racist" nonsense. It's not my position that you are, it's boring, and it is entirely beside the point. If you think the definition of racism applies to your views, that's your problem not mine.

And your summary of the debate would be more interesting if it focused on the actual debate rather than the nonsensical asides. I produced quite a range of evidence to support my views, Mr. Bomb did not. That's not a victory, that's a waste of everyone's time.

 

[Politesse]

As for that "money shot", it's true I missed that one at the time, but looking at it now, I am not particularly impressed; in fact, I'm pretty sure he was counting on no one having read Cavalli-Sforza et al 1994, as that volume was hardly a ringing endorsement of traditional concepts of race. The very idea is if you've ever read the work in question. Which I have, it was very widely read and distributed in my grad student days, and indeed I have a copy right here on my Kindle.

From the introduction to the text, literally the third page:

"Upon the whole, every circumstance concurs in proving, that mankind are not composed of species essentially different from each other; that, on the contrary, there was originally but one species, who, after multiplying and spreading over the whole surface of the earth, have undergone various changes by the influence of climate, food, mode of living, epidemic diseases, and the mixture of dissimilar individuals... However, the major stereotypes, all based on skin color, hair color and form, and facial traits, reflect superficial differences that are not confirmed by deeper analysis with more reliable genetic traits and whose origin dates from recent evolution mostly under the effect of climate and perhaps sexual selection."

His book in fact strongly concluded that although populations did vary, and in some particular ways you often find continental trends with respect to certain tell-tale genes and other markers (especially the "bottleneck effect" that Cavalli-Sfroza helped define, a characteristic marker of a time of frequent intermarriage within too small a group which allowed his team to hypothesize a rough model of how and in what order the continents were settled by human beings) these differences do not rise to the level of being signifcantly more variant than the differences within those continental populations. Doubly true of Eurasia and quadruply true of Africa. Genetically, races would not meaningfulto the biologist even if they did on some level exist, because they would be functionally useless as predictors of overall genetic variance between any given two individuals. These well-known markers do exist, but they don't predictably correspond to racial categories, and almost all are phenotypically either meaningless or neglible in their effect, counterbalanced by the natural variability of the average human population.

Because of this, the work in question was one of the most frequently cited documents throughout much of the early 2000's - because it had put the nail in the coffin of academic racism, not affirmed it. Only an incredibly selective reading could lead you to any other conclusion. After that time period, Li et al 2008 became the go-to paper for arguing against academic racism, as it confirmed the results of Cavalli-Sforza et al 1994 in much more detail, a larger sample size, and the benefits of more advanced technology: "race" was a defunct concept with little utility to a biologist, and the much more precise and accurate language of clustered and clinal structures has judtifiably become the default means of discussing contemporary human genetic variation, as Cavalli-Sforza had recommended.

If you don't want to struggle with the classic itself, you can read a nice science-minded obituary for Luigi Cavalli-Sforza here; it contains a brief summary of his findings and contributions to the field in layman's terms.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

If you think the definition of racism applies to your views, that's your problem not mine.

I don't think of course that my views are racist, in the usual sense of the word 'racist'. I do know that your definition of 'racism' applies to my views, because I know my views, and you have made your definition clear enough to determine that.

I produced quite a range of evidence to support my views, Mr. Bomb did not.

You produced zero. He produced conclusive in the other threads, plus the money shot. But he did (and I did) debunk other claims you made in the context of the debate.

As for that "money shot", it's true I missed that one at the time, but looking at it now, I am not particularly impressed; in fact, I'm pretty sure he was counting on no one having read Cavalli-Sforza et al 1994, as that volume was hardly a ringing endorsement of traditional concepts of race.

Now you just make an accusation that is both unwarranted and false. Why do you come to believe such a thing? He provided the proper references. He repeatedly tried to get you to read the arguments he made and evidence he provided. And now you are pretty sure that he was counting on no one having read it.

As for your rebuttal, it's an argument from authority vs. the actual data.

 

[Politesse]

Now you just make an accusation that is both unwarranted and false. Why do you come to believe such a thing? He provided the proper references. He repeatedly tried to get you to read the arguments he made and evidence he provided. And now you are pretty sure that he was counting on no one having read it.

Because he inaccurately summarized its conclusions, obviously. See above. In detail.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

Now you just make an accusation that is both unwarranted and false. Why do you come to believe such a thing? He provided the proper references. He repeatedly tried to get you to read the arguments he made and evidence he provided. And now you are pretty sure that he was counting on no one having read it.

Because he inaccurately summarized its conclusions, obviously. See above. In detail.

He did not summarize its conclusions. He used the data.

 

[Politesse]

Now you just make an accusation that is both unwarranted and false. Why do you come to believe such a thing? He provided the proper references. He repeatedly tried to get you to read the arguments he made and evidence he provided. And now you are pretty sure that he was counting on no one having read it.

Because he inaccurately summarized its conclusions, obviously. See above. In detail.

He did not summarize its conclusions. He used the data.

Yes, I know he didn't. He quote mined a brief passage that he didn't understand, and interpreted it in a way that the original authors of the text explicitly debunked in the very same work.

And now, once again, you're trying to derail the conversation in the direction of whether or not I may have somehow unjustly characterized or insulted Bomb#20, rather than the substance of the argument.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

He did not summarize its conclusions. He used the data.

Yes, I know he didn't. He quote mined a brief passage that he didn't understand, and interpreted it in a way that the original authors of the text explicitly debunked in the very same work.

And now, once again, you're trying to derail the conversation in the direction of whether or not I may have somehow unjustly characterized or insulted Bomb#20, rather than the substance of the argument.

No, I'm not trying to do any of that. Rather, you are once again making unwarranted and false accusations.
That is not a derail. You accused him - and now again - of doing wrongful things he did not do and you have no good reason to believe he did. I point out that you are making false and unwarranted accusations. It is not a derail on my part. Rather, you decided to - in addition to finally make a substantive point - bring up the accusations. And now you do the same with me.

But regarding the substantive points, I already replied. You are trying to use authority vs. data. Data wins. In order to bring down the data, you would need a substantive reply to the argument based on the data, or show the data was flawed, or whatever.

 

[Politesse]

He did not summarize its conclusions. He used the data.

Yes, I know he didn't. He quote mined a brief passage that he didn't understand, and interpreted it in a way that the original authors of the text explicitly debunked in the very same work.

And now, once again, you're trying to derail the conversation in the direction of whether or not I may have somehow unjustly characterized or insulted Bomb#20, rather than the substance of the argument.

No, I'm not trying to do any of that. Rather, you are once again making unwarranted and false accusations.
That is not a derail. You accused him - and now again - of doing wrongful things he did not do and you have no good reason to believe he did. I point out that you are making false and unwarranted accusations. It is not a derail on my part. Rather, you decided to - in addition to finally make a substantive point - bring up the accusations. And now you do the same with me.

But regarding the substantive points, I already replied. You are trying to use authority vs. data. Data wins. In order to bring down the data, you would need a substantive reply to the argument based on the data, or show the data was flawed, or whatever.

I did. With references. You're willfully ignoring this as we speak, trying to stir up halfwitted drama instead of addressing the facts.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

No, I'm not trying to do any of that. Rather, you are once again making unwarranted and false accusations.
That is not a derail. You accused him - and now again - of doing wrongful things he did not do and you have no good reason to believe he did. I point out that you are making false and unwarranted accusations. It is not a derail on my part. Rather, you decided to - in addition to finally make a substantive point - bring up the accusations. And now you do the same with me.

But regarding the substantive points, I already replied. You are trying to use authority vs. data. Data wins. In order to bring down the data, you would need a substantive reply to the argument based on the data, or show the data was flawed, or whatever.

I did. With references. You're willfully ignoring this as we speak, trying to stir up halfwitted drama instead of addressing the facts.

No, you did not. You gave references. But you did nothing to challenge the argument based on data. And now you once again make false and unwarranted accusations against me. I am not the one trying to stir up drama. I am replying both to your substantive points, and to your false and unwarranted accusations - that you deliberately keep doing; I do not mean "deliberaly" as in knowing that they are false and unwarranted; you know neither, but "deliberately" as you obviously choose consciously to accuse me, and keep at it. Yes, granted, you do not realize that your accusations are unwarranted or false. You are pretty sure that they are not. But that is not going to make me less inclined to reply to them.

Back to the substantive points, again, you are going with authority vs. data. Data wins. Funnily, B20 also replied to an objection just like yours (coincidentally, quoting one of the same statements), among others.


https://frdbarchive.org/viewtopic.php?f=109&t=301409&hilit="fixation+index"&start=250

From a scientific point of view, the concept of race has failed to obtain any consensus…the major stereotypes, all based on skin color, hair color and form, and facial traits, reflect superficial differences that are not confirmed by deeper analysis ...

Sounds like a good reason not to stereotype people based on their race. Did you have some deeper point? Does Cavalli-Sforza's disinclination to use the term "race" give his computer program the super-power of responding to social constructs?

Again, you are going with authority vs. data. Data wins.


And here is also a more detailed reply, which I will quote just in case.

. C-S is using the word "race" as technical jargon. There's nothing wrong with him doing so, but it has no bearing on whether or not the people working in his field fifty years ago were doing their jobs scientifically and discovering biological realities. Where did the definition of "race" in use at that time specify what was "enough genetic differences"? Where did it specify that there should be a "threshold" based on a "discontinuity"? These are not part of the common usage understanding of race, and they weren't what classical physical anthropologists were looking for. They were looking for natural clusters in the data, just like C-S was. And they found them, just like C-S did. And enough of them were the same clusters C-S found that they cannot plausibly not have been doing science.

Thresholds, discontinuities and "enough" genetic difference come from the concept of subspecies. So C-S is evidently using "race" as a synonym for "subspecies". Biologists do that. And it's fine. It's a free country. But it means that all C-S is telling us in the quoted passage is that H. sapiens doesn't have subspecies. It doesn't show we don't have real races in the ordinary sense. You can't make an idea unscientific by borrowing its terms and redefining them.

 

[laughing dog]

What the hell does any of the above have to do with the actual OP?

 

[Politesse]

What the hell does any of the above have to do with the actual OP?

It's the same nonsense, whether you back it up with pseudoscience or woo. Perhaps Bomb#20 and Angra Mainyu are uncosnciously trying to demonstrate by example that white Christians do not have a monopoly on being unwilling to give up on Victorian era social dogmas.

 

[Bomb#20]

What the hell does any of the above have to do with the actual OP?

"Any of the above" was a rebuttal to a religious guy claiming it's racism to disagree with one of his own religion's religious doctrines. The actual OP was a report of an editorial by another believer in that same religion claiming that some other people were racist because they didn't accept another of his own religion's religious doctrines.

"Racism among white Christians is higher than among the nonreligious. That's no coincidence."

"In public opinion polls, a clear pattern has emerged: White Christians are consistently more likely than whites who are religiously unaffiliated to deny the existence of structural racism."​

Seems on-topic to me. YMMV.

 

[ruby sparks]

I admit I am having trouble wrapping my head around the question of whether race is or isn't a social construct. One minute I see how it is and the next....

 

[Bomb#20]

I admit I am having trouble wrapping my head around the question of whether race is or isn't a social construct. One minute I see how it is and the next....

That's perfectly natural -- race has both a socially constructed and a biological aspect.

The fact that you can download raw gene frequency data and plug it into a math formula and compute genetic distances between populations and run a tree-finding algorithm on them and your computer will independently rediscover the same natural subgroup of the human species that 1960s-era physical anthropologists called "Caucasoids" proves that the Caucasoids are not a social construct. Social constructs live in human minds and math formulas don't have ESP.

On the other hand, the fact that a person such as President Obama, who is genetically half Caucasoid and half Negroid, is commonly considered in the U.S. to be a black man and not a white man, well, that's a social construct. There's nothing in the math or the genetic data to support the American social custom of treating African ancestry as more important than European ancestry.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

What the hell does any of the above have to do with the actual OP?

That is a good question. It resulted from exchanges that were relevant. But here Politesse makes the following claims:

But I don't know with what term we should refer to the idea of constitutively separate races, if not "racism". And I would argue that it is pretty harmful whether or not you admit to seeing one race as superior or inferior to another.

As B20 pointed out he is both using the word 'racism' improperly (applying it to something that is not racism, namely the belief that races exist - not just the idea of races, but races), but also implying that those who believe that races exist are indeed racists in the actual sense of the word - just that perhaps "they" do not admit it.

The debate when on from there.

ETA: Oops, B20 beats me to the point; sorry, I didn't see that. At any rate, you can assess whether it is relevant by yourself. If you it is sufficiently related, great. If not, it is then not related, and resulted from a non-related accusation introduced by Politesse.

At any rate, the accusation was similar, but not exactly the same: In the OP, White Christians are unfairly accused of being racists for believing that structural racism does not exist, whereas later, the accusation of racism is against those who believe that races exist. It's a similar and similarly unfair accusation, and result from adherents to the same religion, but it is not the same accusation.

 

[ruby sparks]

I admit I am having trouble wrapping my head around the question of whether race is or isn't a social construct. One minute I see how it is and the next....

That's perfectly natural -- race has both a socially constructed and a biological aspect.

The fact that you can download raw gene frequency data and plug it into a math formula and compute genetic distances between populations and run a tree-finding algorithm on them and your computer will independently rediscover the same natural subgroup of the human species that 1960s-era physical anthropologists called "Caucasoids" proves that the Caucasoids are not a social construct. Social constructs live in human minds and math formulas don't have ESP.

On the other hand, the fact that a person such as President Obama, who is genetically half Caucasoid and half Negroid, is commonly considered in the U.S. to be a black man and not a white man, well, that's a social construct. There's nothing in the math or the genetic data to support the American social custom of treating African ancestry as more important than European ancestry.

Thanks. That helps. And it makes broad sense. I tend to think that most things in such spheres are rarely simply one thing or the other. I would even add that there are often more than two things they can be. And that all the relevant things are usually inter-related, typically in complicated ways.

So then we would face the trickier issue, of how much it is this or that. And my guess is that the proportions will vary enormously from situation to situation. To the point that it would be a mistake to claim that race (as a whole issue) is this or that proportion either way.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

What the hell does any of the above have to do with the actual OP?

It's the same nonsense, whether you back it up with pseudoscience or woo. Perhaps Bomb#20 and Angra Mainyu are uncosnciously trying to demonstrate by example that white Christians do not have a monopoly on being unwilling to give up on Victorian era social dogmas.

A computer program found it. Was the computer program being unwilling to give up on Victorian era social dogmas? Clearly not. You would need a different explanation for the data. Or continue interpreting it improperly, of course.

 

[ruby sparks]

I admit I am having trouble wrapping my head around the question of whether race is or isn't a social construct. One minute I see how it is and the next....

That's perfectly natural -- race has both a socially constructed and a biological aspect.

The fact that you can download raw gene frequency data and plug it into a math formula and compute genetic distances between populations and run a tree-finding algorithm on them and your computer will independently rediscover the same natural subgroup of the human species that 1960s-era physical anthropologists called "Caucasoids" proves that the Caucasoids are not a social construct. Social constructs live in human minds and math formulas don't have ESP.

On the other hand, the fact that a person such as President Obama, who is genetically half Caucasoid and half Negroid, is commonly considered in the U.S. to be a black man and not a white man, well, that's a social construct. There's nothing in the math or the genetic data to support the American social custom of treating African ancestry as more important than European ancestry.

To add...

Would you think it fair to say that race is an arbitrary categorisation? We could argue about what arbitrary means I suppose, whether it implies a mere whim or lacks any reason, but what I mean is, for example, hair colour (or in one famous experiment, eye colour) could have been used, or height, or even biological sex. Men and women as different races, anyone? People with big noses? Those would not merely be social constructs, because the groups really would differ, and in biological, heritable ways.