The myth of race: Why are we divided by race when there is no such thing?

An interesting article I read this morning. I've felt like this for years, having read a lot of evolutionary biology and the subsequent studies done to combat the notion that 'race' is something quantifiable.

The Myth Of Race

In 1950, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) issued a statement asserting that all humans belong to the same species and that “race” is not a biological reality but a myth. This was a summary of the findings of an international panel of anthropologists, geneticists, sociologists, and psychologists.

A great deal of evidence had accumulated by that time to support this conclusion, and the scientists involved were those who were conducting research and were most knowledgeable about the topic of human variation. Since that time similar statements have been published by the American Anthropological Association and the American Association of Physical Anthropologists, and an enormous amount of modern scientific data has been gathered to justify this conclusion.

As far back as 64 years ago, science was already stating the obvious. This isn't some hypothesis given out by a single fringe person either, this is a conglomerate of scientific evidence, which has been peer reviewed and approve for decades.

What many people do not realize is that this racial structure is not based on reality. Anthropologists have shown for many years now that there is no biological reality to human race. There are no major complex behaviors that directly correlate with what might be considered human “racial” characteristics.

There is no inherent relationship between intelligence, law- abidingness, or economic practices and race, just as there is no relationship between nose size, height, blood group, or skin color and any set of complex human behaviors.

These myths, still go on to this day. As I'm sure within this very thread, some people will come out in full swing, telling all of us that race exists at the genetic level and that we should all pay attention to it.


Although, the last bit of the article sums it up nicely.

If races do not exist as a biological reality, why do so many people still believe that they do? In fact, even though biological races do not exist, the concept of race obviously is still a reality, as is racism. These are prevalent and persistent elements of our everyday lives and generally accepted aspects of our culture.

Thus, the concept of human races is real. It is not a biological reality, however, but a cultural one. Race is not a part of our biology, but it is definitely a part of our culture. Race and racism are deeply ingrained in our history.

We do have RACISM, not RACE, because it's perpetuated culturally by the media and us.

I once heard a quite, pretty sure it was from Noam Chomsky.

" The best way to rid ourselves of Racism, is to stop participating in it."

~Tenth

I agree. Maybe if all the different sects of humanity had stayed isolated for longer periods of time (like hundreds of thousands of years), then there would be races thanks to evolution, but as it stands humans haven't been dispersed across the planet long enough for that to have become a reality. And now that we are all widely interconnected again, race is an illusion. Humanity is heading for a homogenized look as opposed to a multi-racial look.

A good start would be to remove all mentions of race from our laws. No special recognition or treatment because of race. That should level the playing field and make everyone treat each other equally. .....
Wow
Could not type that with a straight face...lol

originally posted by: [post=18645668]tothetenthpower[/post
" The best way to rid ourselves of Racism, is to stop participating in it."

Except it is institutionalized by our government.

Well couple o things many if not most people do not accept the science behind it,many will choose to believe what their eyes tell them thinking it's just about being P.C, another factor is some in science itself although the ,although they said race is a social construct not based in science some continue to use those race based Nomenclature in their publications,for example the remains of a male white is found badly damaged almost unrecognizable the autopsy will read body of a male most likely Caucasian ,this for the general public reinforce the concept of "RACE"

We are all human.
There are differences in specific humans. If you find a skull, science can tell you just by different measurements whether it came from a person whose roots trace back to Asia, Africa, Europe or Australia. This is where the idea of race comes from. DNA testing tells us even more.
I am a mix of three different groups.
Races of man exist, IMO.
Racism sucks.

Bigots will be bigots...
Racists will be racist...

Scum will be scum basically.


As you said the Media perpetuates this on going struggle.
Police do a fair amount of it as well.


It's nurture, not nature.


Some will disagree because they've been nurtured to think otherwise!

I'm not being racist this is the truth. The Caucasian people are only to be referred to as a race because when they where scientifically made around 6000 years ago, the maker only gave them 6000 years to rule, so they were moving in haste and they were successful as We see today. But there was a self destruction mechanism built in them.

originally posted by: MX61000
I'm not being racist this is the truth. The Caucasian people are only to be referred to as a race because when they where scientifically made around 6000 years ago, the maker only gave them 6000 years to rule, so they where moving in haste and they were successful as We see today. But there was a self destruction mechanism built in them.

?????

a reply to: tothetenthpower

This needs to be shouted from the highest rooftops, great thread tenth.

Explain it to me in easy to follow terms please. As if I had a GED and slight brain damage

What I understood from the article is that there is no genetic correlation between race and behavior. (ie Asians =/= math, Europeans =/= civilization, blacks =/= crime). I can understand that and support it 110% as those are environmental factors rather than genetic ones.

To use that to say there is no "race" is far fetched. Two Africans create an African not an Asian. Genetically.

We can "church" it up by calling it a subset or a sect or anything else, but it is a race pure and simple. Not inferior nor superior in any form or fashion. Emotional involvement creates the issues. Whether it becomes racism or anti-racism is up to the individual.

Perhaps "breed" would be better served than race? Would people have more or less concern/hostility if a persons "pedigree" was discussed rather than their "race". I wouldn't , but then again I'm a mutt so I have little skin in the came.

Does the new information coming out involving HSN/HSS interbreeding have any effect on these studies I wonder?

a reply to: MX61000

First off, anyone who starts an online post with, "I'm not being racist this is the truth" or some variation of that is just telling everyone that their post is going to be extremely racist.

The Caucasian people are referred to as such because it describes people from the Caucasus mountains. Those people happen to be pale skinned (white). That is because they don't see a lot of sun because it is cold in the mountains all the time. Whatever you said sounds racist (and superstitious).

originally posted by: butcherguy
We are all human.
There are differences in specific humans. If you find a skull, science can tell you just by different measurements whether it came from a person whose roots trace back to Asia, Africa, Europe or Australia. This is where the idea of race comes from. DNA testing tells us even more.
I am a mix of three different groups.
Races of man exist, IMO.
Racism sucks.

No Dna is only a bar code that lets us know where a particular ancestor were at a given time we all have multi lines and are more closely related than two group of Chimps .

This is a bit of pop science and kinda cheesy but it got the point.

What ever, but even Caucasian people agree with me and know this truth, evident by their symbolic movies, commercials and so on. They even have much symbolism about the New ruler coming after their rule.

a reply to: Krazysh0t

originally posted by: MX61000
What ever, but even Caucasian people agree with me and know this truth, evident by their symbolic movies, commercials and so on. They even have much symbolism about the New ruler coming after their rule.

a reply to: Krazysh0t

I would ask you to provide evidence but I know there ain't non.

a reply to: MX61000

I'm Caucasian and I don't agree with you. You are also getting progressively more racist with each post you type.

a reply to: tothetenthpower

Yes, we could just say we are the human race and that would close the debate.

A thread I created some time ago on the subject, feel free to revive it.
www.abovetopsecret.com...

originally posted by: MX61000
What ever, but even Caucasian people agree with me and know this truth, evident by their symbolic movies, commercials and so on. They even have much symbolism about the New ruler coming after their rule.

a reply to: Krazysh0t

NO, Just NO


I don't,

why would you think I and other would agree with you?

Maybe the UFO or religious forum is where you can debating your ideas about created humans and what not but this is a thread about unity of humans, you want to divide us when we attempt to unite?

Yeah really funny, I'm not in the business of exposing people like that. But just take what I say and remember it while watching tv, it's becoming blanton. They are coming out with a new movie called Exodus. a reply to: Spider879