Colorism, passing and eugenics

"Colorism," passing and eugenics

October 2 2008

The "New York Times" had an article on "colorism," which it termed not an outright racism, but a shade or degree problem.(1)

Discussion of colorism can easily lead to eugenics theories and MIM finds much lack of clarity on this point in the left-wing of parasitism, especially lately because certain key Democratic interests are connected to eugenicists. In his book Caste, Class, and Race, Oliver Cox pointed out that the first European explorers did not find African natives repulsive. To argue that there is a white physical response to a black visual stimulus would be wrong. It is not the genetics of pigmentation or other facial features which is a problem in the world today.

Not surprisingly, there is someone on the Internet directly opposing Cox and speaking for neo-eugenics.(2) MIM has spoken of others who fantasize about selecting genetic specimens of each race for a new Noah's Ark. At the time the New York Times hosted the colorism editorial, it was in fact siding with those and yet other eugenicists in the Democratic Party.

MIM would suggest that the reason there may be a benefit for shades of lighter skin is that people reflexively draw information from others in social interaction that pick up on cultural matters. In other words, Ward Churchill is correct when he says what matters is not the percentage of blood but how one is raised.

The shade question arises because people of lighter shades generally have parents of white culture. So an initial impression by appearance will have follow-up with language and other subtle social questions. The general idea that lighter skin coincides with white parenting is not a prejudice. It is a truth that holds up more often than not, just not in every instance. However, only the minority of social interactions will start and end with a visual impression, so we cannot locate racism's or colorism's power there.

If a study of racism/colorism took large samples of Black infants raised by white parents and white infants raised by Black parents, MIM would suggest that over time the white infants raised by Black parents would be in more trouble with the white power structure than Black infants raised by white parents. Perhaps in a very quick, one-time and distant interaction, Black skin would land one in more trouble than having Black parents. Colorism would be a degree question within the culture question.

On a broader basis, Mao said all race questions boil down to class. We would say that once there is an economic motivation such as slavery or a land question, then there becomes a basis for attaching social or political meanings to shades or race. Race by itself does not really exist, so there is a danger of taking pigmentation too seriously. The use of skin color in social settings should be thought of as standing in for assumptions about social upbringing and interactions, including class.

One thing we agree with the African People's Socialist Party on is that racism is whites' problem in Amerika. Attempting to psychologize why some minorities "act out" and take white heat instead of conforming is wrong.

Colorism among Blacks cannot be just psychological(3) or pigment related. A psychology would not persist in one particular widespread direction without rewards.

The New York Times recently and in the past psychologized resistance to chauvinism among mixed race people by saying they take up greater extremism to push to either one side or the other and fit in at least on one side.(4) It raises the question of whether as one becomes darker in color one is more involved in anti-chauvinist action or not.

In contrast, MIM would say that for the same reason that recently arrived Spanish-speakers from Mexico stand out, within mixed race and non-mixed race people, some are more recently arrived than others. Some have more history of not being bought off in their background. The point is to ponder the economic and cultural factors instead of leaving standing the false idea of an inherent pigment effect or facial feature effect.

Then of course, there is the pure arbitrariness of racism in cases where there does not seem to be any pattern. Once whites can theorize racism, arbitrariness without an apparent pattern becomes possible. We often point to the wedding of two whites that ended with a fictional abduction story as an example of how someone could just be arbitrarily chosen as not fitting in the white power structure. The only way that such arbitrariness can disappear is after structural racism and chauvinism have been gone a long time.

Conversely, spies also have rewards for passing as an ethnicity they are not. Whites may try to pass in various non-Western countries. Hence, spies are the ultimate proof that reward is the key, not genetics.

With post-modernism it is trendy to extend the study of biography to biographicalism. MIM wrote this last sentence before finding documentary proof, but "Shades of Black And Shadows On the Life Of a Writer"(4) is an example of an article where the first sentence is about whether a theory is true or just a "personal musing."

At revleft.com we also had a writer who when confronted with the question of discrimination profits as discussed at length and overall by Victor Perlo in addition to MIM and many others, he replied without citation on Black faculty salaries, as if faculties were the question at hand, not the substance of what Perlo was talking about. Psychologism has progressed so far that there are only writers and faculty members in the world according to some. Apparently the rest of society is conjured up to fit into vivid biographical imaginations.

Yet, what Oliver Cox said about the first Europeans exploring Africa since the year 1000 is either a fact or it is not. We can either draw theoretical inferences from that fact or we cannot. There is nothing about that point that depends on the biography of Oliver Cox or anyone who repeats him, and MIM is not correct because Cox was Black. Instead of jousting aimlessly among biographies, opponents of racism and chauvinism should refine their knowledge of theory and history as well as paying attention to even-handed method. Otherwise it is very easy to end up in bed with Hitler's ideas about eugenics.

In the end, chauvinism is the subject of the real root and racism is the figment of pigment. The MIM analysis of class and nation addresses the real underlying causes of racism including corollary questions of shade and "passing." Aside from cultural difference which is always an issue, there is a question of poor people's culture versus rich people's. Exploiters mostly believe they deserve their riches and "worked hard" to get them instead of believing something oppressive is going on globally.

If countries were militarily and economically equal for all of history in living memory, racism and shadeism would start to disappear. That's why it is so key to understand economic development questions. Development is not a question of "work ethic" and "abilities" and therefore "qualifications." The problem for leading a movement against rewards for chauvinism of various kinds is that the leaders must be theoretically prepared and economic development is a divisive topic that few study. Intellectuals can lend a hand or we can wait for Third World struggle to handle class and development differences via intuitive struggles.

Notes:
1. http://theboard.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/08/22/as-racism-wanes-colorism-persists/
2. http://home.comcast.net/~neoeugenics/joe.htm
3. Lena Williams, "The Many Shades of Bigotry," 22Nov1992,
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E0CE6DA133DF931A15752C1A964958260&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss
4. Felicia R. Lee, http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C05E5DE1F3BF932A15757C0A9629C8B63&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=2