February is being observed as Black History Month throughout the world. In multicultural Guyana, there can be no doubt that our various peoples have been victims of racial prejudice and discrimination at many points in our history. Recently, though, reports of discrimination against Black (African) Guyanese have become a daily occurrence. Those reports have been emanating from multiple directions and credible sources of information. Such a situation cannot be ignored; it must be confronted.
In this series of articles, we will examine the topic of racism; we will learn about its various aspects, and what is being done to remedy the problems? And importantly, what can we do about it?
For the issue to be confronted we need to understand the situation. One aspect of fostering that understanding is the comprehension of what is being said by various persons and groups, and written about in the newspapers and elsewhere. We must know what various terms mean: what is meant by race, ethnicity, discrimination, institutional racism, inequality, and so on? From where do those terms come?
This series of articles seeks to address some of those issues and questions for the purpose of public education without making any editorial pronouncements regarding any individual or group.
We may begin by asking, where did the idea of race come from?
During the 1800s, many scientists had the belief that the human population can be divided into races. That is to say, the belief that the human population can or should be classified into races — based on physical characteristics — with different abilities and dispositions, that belief in turn may motivate a political ideology in which rights and privileges are differentially distributed based on racial categories.
We now know that the concept of race has no scientific basis. Biologists, anthropologists, sociologists, and other experts now reject the concept of races in favor of more specific and objectively verifiable criteria, such as human geography, culture, history, customs, and traditions. Human genome research conducted by geneticists around the world indicates that race is not a meaningful genetic classification of humans. There is no genetic difference between humans of different races. In other words, the idea of different races is a social construct; it has no scientific basis or meaning. To put it bluntly, we made it up.
Having learned that the idea of race is not scientifically justified, we may ask. What is racism? Most experts define racism as, “the belief that groups of humans possess different behavioral traits corresponding to inherited attributes and can be divided based on the superiority of one race over another.” Considering what the experts say, we may conclude that such a belief is false. And racist is a person who holds those false beliefs.
Another term that we hear a lot is racial discrimination. The United Nations (UN) defines racial discrimination as, “any distinction, exclusion, restriction, or preference based on race, colour, descent, or national or ethnic origin that has the purpose or effect of nullifying or impairing the recognition, enjoyment or exercise, on an equal footing, of human rights and fundamental freedoms in the political, economic, social, cultural or any other field of public life.”
In other words, racism is a false belief that exists in the mind of a racist, and racial discrimination is the physical manifestation and result of that belief.
Incidentally, the UN makes no distinction between the words, race and ethnicity.
Racism may be considered to be a contagion that can spread like a physical disease. Individuals may have racist beliefs and pass those false ideas to their children. In this way, whole communities can be infected. Incidentally, it must be emphasised that no baby is born as a racist; racism is learned.
Racism may take various forms. Supremacism is the belief that a certain group of people is superior to all others. Xenophobia is the dislike or hatred of anything which is seen as being foreign or strange. It is an expression which is based on the perception that a conflict exists between an “in-group” and an “out-group” and it may show itself as suspicion of one group’s activities by members of the other group, or a desire to eliminate the presence of the group which is the target of suspicion.
Based on what we have examined so far, there is absolutely nothing positive about the false belief of racism. Racism can do great harm as it has done throughout history. As such, it is the duty of all right thinking people to confront it and stamp it out.
An article by the UN states, “Every day, each and every one of us can stand up against racial prejudice and disrespectful attitudes.
“Let’s build a world beyond racism and discrimination, where we all exercise our human rights.”
How can we do this as individual Guyanese, as communities, as regions, and as a country within the international community?
We will examine those important questions in another article in this series.
