Racism, Neo-Nazism, and Catholic Teaching

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Jump4Joy said:
Racism is the belief that your race is inherently superior and others races are thereby inferior.
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Good thing no one believes that (as far as anyone has been able to find).
It is rooted in prejudice, fear, hatred and mostly ignorance.
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It’s hard to discuss the cause of something without known examples of it, but the belief that you described doesn’t indicate fear or hatred.
 
Arkansan said:
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Jump4Joy:
Racism is the belief that your race is inherently superior and others races are thereby inferior.
Click to expand...
Good thing no one believes that (as far as anyone has been able to find).
It is rooted in prejudice, fear, hatred and mostly ignorance.
Click to expand...
It’s hard to discuss the cause of something without known examples of it, but the belief that you described doesn’t indicate fear or hatred.
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White supremacists, who literally call themselves that, don’t believe ago races are inferior to theirs?
 
I believe racism is an instinctual part of the human condition. Early man was tribal and is any one of any race encountered a person of another race, they both recognized the other person was not part of their tribe and were therefore to be viewed with suspicion, fear and even hatred and violence. That was a key to survival. So racism is always there in our “lizard brain.”

Add to that, there is still a lot of racism in our media, our churches and our communities that reinforce those ancient instincts. The real question is how do we rise above it as we know we have to? I think it starts with each of us realizing that it is in us at some level and really owning up to it, examining it and trying null it out in our own lives. I think it starts there. I don’t think governments or institutions can eliminate it unless individuals start to understand and deal with their own racism.

Another fallacy in racism is that you can cure it with more racism, that “reverse racism” will balance the scales. Really? Who is ever going to declare "OK, that’s enough, we’re OK now. No. If racism is wrong, it’s has to be always wrong. One race’s lives only matter if all race’s lives matter.
 
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Alex337 said:
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Arkansan:
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Jump4Joy:
Racism is the belief that your race is inherently superior and others races are thereby inferior.
Click to expand...
Good thing no one believes that (as far as anyone has been able to find).
It is rooted in prejudice, fear, hatred and mostly ignorance.
Click to expand...
It’s hard to discuss the cause of something without known examples of it, but the belief that you described doesn’t indicate fear or hatred.
Click to expand...
White supremacists, who literally call themselves that, don’t believe ago races are inferior to theirs?
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Who identifies as a white supremacist?
 
nobody

check out twitter’ as i am sure you have

thousands of twitter posters w/ the word “atheist” in their “twitter name”
 
I think people do indeed their race is exceptional and others are inferior. Remember the idea of eugenics. Hitler’s beliefs. As for fear, some fear that intermingling in a certain race with bring about “stained” offspring or more inferior. There have been studies in the past trying to prove which race is more or less evolved than the other. I think people are prejudiced because they overgeneralize or stereotype. Thereby they fear certain races because they associate them with negative characteristics which is fear and ignorance. Hatred comes about when someone dislikes people of a certain race for just being that race. In some way they must believe their race is exempt from carrying these negative characteristics and those negative characteristics are inherent to people within that group.
 
I think the question is, how widespread are the racist ideas? Do you think that every single person considers his or her own race to be superior?

Don’t you think we might have moved on since eugenics was a thing, which was quite some time ago?
 
Jump4Joy said:
Here are some textbook definitions of racism:
“prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against someone of a different race based on the belief that one’s own race is superior.”

“the belief that all members of each race possess characteristics or abilities specific to that race, especially so as to distinguish it as inferior or superior to another race or races.”
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I agree with the above.

However, I personally believe that racism (while it does exist) is not really that prevalent in America. Instead, I think the real issue is classism.

Americans like to pretend that we have a classless society, because we do not have formal classes (i.e. nobles vs non-nobles in England and other European nations); the caste system in India, etc.

However, we really do have an informal class system in America. I would argue that the color of your skin doesn’t matter in America. Instead, I would argue that your class does. People who dress and speak like the upper classes in America do well. Regardless of race, creed, sex, etc. While the people who do not dress and speak like the upper classes have a much harder time.

You don’t hear of many rags to riches stories of white people from poor parts of Kentucky who stereotypical look and sound like the poor there. But you do hear of several when the person dresses & sounds like upper class (even if it’s Southern Upper Class). Same thing about people from the inner cities. If they sound and look like people from a poor, crime-ridden neighborhood, then they will be treated as such. However, when the sound and dress successful; the doors are open for them.

This is something that George Washington Carver used always say. He said back in the late 1800s, the major issue in America is class-ism, and that if African Americans focused on education, then they would eventually be accepted like some of the earlier European immigrants (like the Germans).

Personally, I think George Washington Carver was correct. While there are some racists everywhere, real racism is rare but classism is everywhere.

NOTE: I say this as someone who has experienced racism during my youth, and was negatively affected by it, because my mother is Puerto Rican.

God bless
 
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Do you really think that ancient humans divided themselves by race? If they were worried about people who were not members of their own tribe, strangers, well, how often were the strangers they ran across of other races?
 
Jump4Joy said:
I think people do indeed their race is exceptional and others are inferior. Remember the idea of eugenics. Hitler’s beliefs. As for fear, some fear that intermingling in a certain race with bring about “stained” offspring or more inferior. There have been studies in the past trying to prove which race is more or less evolved than the other. I think people are prejudiced because they overgeneralize or stereotype. Thereby they fear certain races because they associate them with negative characteristics which is fear and ignorance. Hatred comes about when someone dislikes people of a certain race for just being that race. In some way they must believe their race is exempt from carrying these negative characteristics and those negative characteristics are inherent to people within that group.
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You’ve not introduced any examples of people believing in racism, as you defined it.

The speculative cases you cited involved consequent fear. And you simply repeated your assertion that hatred is relevant without any justification.
 
I think ancient humans were basically xenophobic as a survival mechanism. Race was just one very outward sign of difference that said, “These people are not our people.”
 
Since the vast majority of contacts with stranger would be with people who looked a lot more like oneself, evolution would dictate more suspicion of those who looked more like oneself, as having suspicions of people of the differing groups we call races would be so rare as to not affect our genetic structure.
 
Arkansan said:
It has no generally known definition and is simply a slur for people that the person speaking disagrees with.
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(Please Note: This uploaded content is no longer available.)

Presented without comment 😉
 
Well, yeah, what I said doesn’t match your idea that we somehow evolved to see certain other people as members of different races and to judge them on that as inferior.

I think evolution would have made us much more suspicious of people who were more like ourselves.
 
Arkansan said:
examples of people believing in racism
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Once a month there’s a handful of people who stand on a corner in the city near me holding signs that explicitly state white supremacist and racist ideas. I agree with you quite a bit but I think you’re being a bit disingenuous here.

Hell, my own grandfather spent his last days bemoaning the fact that one of his nurses was black and would repeatedly use the N word at her.
 
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