"Racist" has become the most commonly used pejorative of early 21st-century America, replacing the popular "fascist" and "communist" of earlier days. This new bit of name-calling has become broad enough to use against anyone who might disagree with you, and unlike "anti-Semitic," which, as we just saw, can really only be used against critics of Israel, "racist" can be used even if ethnicity is not really the issue, as in the immigration crisis.
It used to be that the definition of racism was clear and simple: If you judged an individual or entire group by ethnicity, you were a racist. The underlying idea is that race is entirely irrelevant in forming a judgment of another and to do so is ignorant and pernicious. Only intellect and character matter, and if ethnicity is involved in your judgment, even if it is positive, you are a racist.
This is clearly no longer the case, and our society has in many ways now embraced racism. Granted, it is all done in the name of social good, of eradicating racist practices from our society, yet it is difficult to see how employing racial parameters, indeed even institutionalizing them, will banish the stupidity and silliness of racism from America. Affirmative action, with its implicit quotas and the celebration of ethnicity under the guise of multiculturalism, can only prop up the element of race in our social interaction.
The idea of racism has been so distorted that it has reached the extreme notion, contrary to all evidence and rational thought, that only whites are capable of racism. I have been informed that at the very least, I am an unconscious racist, so shaped by my inherently racist culture that I cannot escape the prejudices instilled in me. Not only is this an outlandish expression of cultural determinism, but were it true, what point would there be in education?
Western civilization, and thus America, is seen as hopelessly racist as well as patriarchal, sexist and homophobic. The fact is that the Greeks and Romans were cultural racists, convinced that it was their culture - not their ethnicity - that made them superior to all others. This ultimately gave their imperialism a progressive character, one that more and more ignored birth in favor of culture as the determining factor - learn Greek or Latin, and act like a Greek or Roman, and you are recognized as a Greek or Roman.
Because of this, the high Roman Empire becomes the most cosmopolitan and inclusive political system until the rise of America. The Western tradition has its problems, but for all its faults and crimes against other peoples, the West has certainly been far less xenophobic than other societies.
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Providing special consideration on the basis of race in order to eliminate racism is akin to destroying the hamlet in order to save it. Such simply preserves and promotes thinking in ethnic terms, as well as creating resentment, suspicions of favoritism and incompetence and a socially destructive tribalism. Exacerbating this is the perception, largely true, that nonwhites can engage in behavior that would be considered blatantly racist were whites to do it.
Imagine if, following in the footsteps of El Centro de la Raza, a group of students established The Center for the White Race. Chanting "black power" makes you a progressive in the eyes of some; chanting "white power" makes you a person of interest to the FBI.
Less important, but certainly more annoying, is attaching the label racist to someone who simply disagrees with an ethnic party line, much as anyone who disagreed with Lenin was a counterrevolutionary or bourgeois. To the bafflement of my Jewish friends, I have been called an anti-Semite for 30 years because of my criticism of Israeli policies.
Were I a Jew, I would, like Holocaust survivor Israel Shahak, be called self-hating, an interesting notion when you think about it. Likewise, if you express concern about the immigrants pouring across our southern border, you are a racist or a nativist when, in fact, securing one's borders is the fundamental aspect of national sovereignty.
Say, perhaps we can get Israel to defend our border with Mexico? Within a decade, Sonora would be filled with settlements.
Richard M. Berthold is a retired professor of classical history at UNM. He is the author of Rhodes in the Hellenistic Age.
