5 ms·

An Argument for Race Abolitionism (2020)

27 points by rictoo 6y ago

atemerev 6y ago
This is how it works in European countries, e.g. France. “Race” never figures in any government documents, forms and surveys. Mentioning someone’s race considered to be somewhat rude and is regarded as a thing of the past. Not everybody is race-agnostic, but all government organizations and all businesses are required to be race-agnostic by law. This includes never asking about race, particularly in forms and surveys. Identity politics is actively _discouraged_. I wonder why it is different in America.
- ummonk 6y ago
  America historically developed much more race-based laws (e.g. segregation laws, anti-miscegenation laws, and racially motivated immigration laws, as well as a close association between race and the institution of slavery). As a result, race has become much more entrenched as something with legal status in America than in Europe.
- viraptor 6y ago
  > how it works in European countries some European countries Some are ahead of the curve, some are so far behind due to fairly homogenous population, that the issue of race is not something anyone making forms thinks about. (because they never expect to meet a non-Slavic person for example)
- bendoernberg 6y ago
  I've been very influenced by Isabel Wilkerson's new book to look at America as having a racial caste system that's 400 years old. The entire economic and political history and present of the United States is governed by this caste system; it's even written into the physical geography, e.g. where there is lead and where there are trees. If you don't ask about race on government forms, how are you going to measure progress on dismantling this system? Abolishing race is a good goal, but it's going to come after we've acknowledged and reckoned with the violence and harm this country has done to so many millions of people. And we've barely even started that process.
  - throwaway894345 6y ago
    We can argue that there is work to do toward equality without discrediting ourselves and our objective with incredible claims about “having barely started” as though we still have slave plantations and so on.
- rmrfrmrf 6y ago
  The argument put forth in the book Racecraft [1] is that America's founding on individual liberty juxtaposed with the economic reality of chattel slavery created a contradiction so stark that it was necessary to invent a framework to justify slavery culturally. [1] Fields, Karen E, and Barbara J. Fields. Racecraft: The Soul of Inequality in American Life. 2012.
  - slowmovintarget 6y ago
    We fought our bloodiest war attempting to destroy one side of that contradiction. Individual liberty remains the most important tenet of a free society. Preserving it demands personal responsibility and impartiality. Anything less is pandering.
    - 082349872349872 6y ago
      Nota Bene: other countries got rid of slavery, earlier, without bloody internecine wars.
- skinkestek 6y ago
  This is true as far as I am aware, and I agree. It is (IMO) objectively backwards and ugly to discuss someones physical characteristics instead of their contributions, especially backwards if one are trying to get rid of differences. That said, you will find many larger companies actively trying to be or at least look diverse.
- Tainnor 6y ago
  Identity politics does exist and is encouraged in Europe, it's just not based on "race" (in Europe, or at least in Germany, we prefer to day "ethnicity", as "race" has really bad connotations and is scientifically discarded as a concept). But cultural identity politics have been going strong forever, going back probably at least to the 19th century idea of nation states. That's why minority languages often get special recognition etc.
- justin66 6y ago
  > Mentioning someone’s race considered to be somewhat rude and is regarded as a thing of the past. After reading about some especially unsubtle racism in the French right-wing press today, [1] it struck me how similar France and the United States are in this regard, at least superficially. The centrist people in government condemning the obvious racism, the powerful right-wing political figure offering a weird non-condemnation condemnation that does not call racism by its right name, the far-right publisher's response: "Our text is not racist at all," it argued. "It is convenient for our opponents to throw that accusation at us." None of it seems very alien to an American. [1] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-53972591 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-53972591
Joker_vD 6y ago
> the concept of ‘race’ is scientifically and socially unsupportable. Just like the concept of "culture". See https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/08/12/does-race-exist-does-culture/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/08/12/does-race-exist-does-c... , here's the kicker: "There were two arguments against race being a real concept: it didn’t cluster nicely, and within-group variation was greater than between group variation. And both of these are equally true of culture. Any mathematical argument considering races as clusters of genes can be used equally well considering cultures as clusters of memes, and will likely return the same results. Yet I can’t imagine someone saying “culture doesn’t exist” or “culture isn’t real”."
- aklemm 6y ago
  Except that culture is escapable, changeable. Race isn’t. So what is your point exactly?
  - throwaway894345 6y ago
    The immutability of race is one of the reasons why we ought not discriminate on the basis of race, but the parent is addressing the question of whether or not race is “real” and our inconsistent treatment of race and culture, another social construct.
    - soco 6y ago
      This might be of high interest to scholars, but for the regular Joe on the street the realities are way more important. And my feeling is that the OP is trying to shift the discussion from reality (which can be addressed in a way or another) to philosophical debate (well, good luck with that)
  - Joker_vD 6y ago
    That "race" is as real as "culture" is, or "sex", or "gender". So an attempt to abolish identity politics simply by declaring "Those differences don't exist!" won't succeed. They do exist, and sadly, they're considered by some people when making decisions that affect other people's lives and well-being (while, arguably, those shouldn't be considered).
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
wcerfgba 6y ago
There seem to be some conflicting ideas here. On one hand, the concept of 'race' is what allows racism to exist and we need to remove this concept from our collective ideology in order to defeat racism -- people are just people. On the other hand, it is a fact that external biological characteristics (predominantly skin colour and facial structure) result in social clustering and discrimination, at the individual, collective and institutional levels -- racism is real. I appreciate the principles behind race abolitionism, as I have often applied the same logic to gender, which is arguably even more socially constructed than race, since the appeal to biological characteristics is weaker for defining one's gender than one's race. However, if we remove these ideas from our collective understanding of the world, do we not make it harder to argue cases of legitimate discrimination? If the generally accepted notion is "gender does not exist" or "race does not exist", how does one make the argument "I was discriminated against because of <attributes>?" Or is the idea that once people no longer make the distinction between different groups of attributes, then individual and institutional discrimination will no longer exist? It seems to me that in order for such an approach to be successful, we would need to train ourselves to not notice external characteristics of individuals, effectively becoming colour-blind, a task which not only seems impossible due to the nature of the human mind, but also a dangerous position to take while racism still exists -- since it also blinds us to an understanding of why a person was discriminated against and what factors affected their experience --, and risks destroying our concept of cultural heritage. Perhaps race abolitionism is more suited for a post-racism world?
- notsureaboutpg 6y ago
  > as I have often applied the same logic to gender, which is arguably even more socially constructed than race, since the appeal to biological characteristics is weaker for defining one's gender than one's race. Is this a typo? Surely the appeal to biological characteristics is stronger for defining one's gender than one's race... You can be "mixed" race and pass for multiple races (so the link to biology is less) without doing anything, but you have to do a lot to obscure the biological giveaways of your gender (voice, Adams apple, breasts/hips/shoulders). And also you need cultural understanding to know the race of someone from a different area than you (are dark skinned Italians black/Latino? No, but if you saw a bunch, and didn't have cultural understanding you might think so). But you can tell the gender of nearly all people without any cultural context.
joaomacp 6y ago
As a European, every US election season I'm always dumbfounded by how much the "black vote" is discussed. Just recently, when Kamala Harris was announced as VP, all they talk about is how she will contribute to the black vote. This makes it seem as she was only chosen because of her race, and even worse: it's an insult to black people, grouping them together as having one opinion. I don't know why there's no backlash against this.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- Tainnor 6y ago
  I'm European myself. I don't think we can compare Europe with the US. Due to centuries of slavery and then segregation, black and white communities are still somewhat separate and tend to have different cultures etc. Of course, individually, there are many examples of people who are "in between", but the cultural blocs do exist. And by the way - in Belgium, parties have to pander to the French or the Dutch voters; in Switzerland, the different language regions have different voting behaviour; in Germany, east Germany votes significantly differently, as does Bavaria; and so on. Voter blocs are not something exclusive to the US, even if the history of the black population doesn't have a direct parallel in Europe.
  - seszett 6y ago
    > in Belgium, parties have to pander to the French or the Dutch voters Well it's a bit different, as people in Wallonia can only vote for francophone parties and people in Flanders only for Flemish parties. Only Brussels gets both. So in effect, parties don't really have to choose whether to pander to the French-speaking or Dutch-speaking voters. Which is even worse IMO, because how can you form a functioning federal government from parties that are each elected only by half of the country? Well you can't, as the current situation shows.
mikece 6y ago
Race or culture isn't the issue but "identity politics" which mandates that one must see themselves and others not as the unique and wonderful individuals they are but as an impersonal member of a class to be treated according to the understood (or assumed) qualities of that class. Nothing is more destructive to cordial interpersonal relations than saying "Oh, you're an X and I will treat you as X-types ought to be treated" without regard to who the individual actually is. It's not impossible to see, recognize, and appreciate races and cultures as long as the dignity of the individual is maintained.
- SllX 6y ago
  In other words, a caste system developed from first principles.
- arel 6y ago
  What you're missing here is in reality, your life experience, outcomes and how you are treated in society can be very much a consequence of your "identity". All groups are advocating for is equality of treatment from institutions and from society at large. Is that too much to ask? Once we get to that place there's nothing more marginalised groups would love to do then to stop being defined by race.
  - syshum 6y ago
    What you are missing is that "All Groups" are not simply asking for "equality of treatment from institutions and from society at large" in fact many groups are asking for equity not equality, there is a difference. Sometimes this is referred to was "equality of outcome vs opportunity"
    - arel 6y ago
      This a (frankly lazy) narrative often used to dismiss demands for equality. You might be able to point to isolated incidents but to view group advocacy as a whole as malicious power grab is simply not true and a gross misrepresentation. A better question is probably do you think certain groups are wrong in their perception that they are unfairly treated? If yes then you are not acknowledging a vast amount of very clearly expressed life experience and if no why be against them advocating for themselves as a group?
082349872349872 6y ago
Hofstadter's argument: https://www.cs.virginia.edu/~evans/cs655/readings/purity.html https://www.cs.virginia.edu/~evans/cs655/readings/purity.htm...
cuillevel3 6y ago
As a German I always feel offended, when American sign-up forms (conferences and such) ask for my 'race'. Are they asking for my migrant background? Asking for race is just so Nazi, what should I put there, "Herrenrasse", "Fremdrasse", ...? There are no different human races.
- 082349872349872 6y ago
  Yeah, I used to enter "mutt" What do real Caucasians (people from the Caucasus) enter in these fields? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23914667 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23914667
pcbro141 6y ago
President Trump just issued condolences[1] to a Neo-Nazi who praised[2] the terrorist behind the Portland train stabbing of 3 people who confronted the attacker for racially abusing underage black girls[3]. Now is not the time to ignore race and hope people stop being racist without talking about it. Stopping talking about race will not stop white supremacists from hating black people and talking about race is not why white supremacists started hating black people. [1] https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1300193398477946883 https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/13001933984779468... [2] https://twitter.com/InsideASCIF/status/1300177098955534347 https://twitter.com/InsideASCIF/status/1300177098955534347 [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_Portland_train_attack https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_Portland_train_attack
Zigurd 6y ago
The author is the Brexit Party's person of color. I'm sure a lot of white men will agree with what she is saying. Just don't be fooled into thinking that minorities in general will adopt this position.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
gostsamo 6y ago
There was this aphorism: "It does not matter if you believe in God, but whether God believes in you." In the context of race, the lady can abolish races as much as she desires, but it does not matter as far as their are racists.
wcerfgba 6y ago
Post seems to have been delisted from the front pages, @dang can we get a reason? This is political but seems like a genuinely interesting perspective.
juancn 6y ago
The US is oddly concerned about race. I remember the first time they asked me about my race filling a form. WTF? How should I know? Also the categories are so arbitrary, I ended up picking other and be done with that.
bitemealienboi 6y ago
The problem with race abolitionism is that it removes the language for discussing racial issues and hides these issues where they cant be addressed. Its essentially the equivalent of saying "All Lives Matter". It attempts to dismiss and ignore the problems that wont go away even if ignored. It would be nice to live in a world where racial discrimination and issues dont exist and skin colour is as meaningless and superficial as eye colour or the colour of your clothes. And perhaps, someday, this may be the case. But at the end of the day, racial problems still exists. Racial discrimination still exists. People are still being treated differently by individuals and systems based on their physical features and the colour of their skin. Cops see and treat black people differently, so do doctors and judges and juries and home sellers and bankers and hotel clerks. And that causes real effects and impediments to people of colour that needs to be addressed first. Identity politics is not saying these people are different. Identity politics is saying that society sees these people as different, and that its a problem that needs to be addressed

27 points by rictoo 6y ago

This is how it works in European countries, e.g. France. “Race” never figures in any government documents, forms and surveys. Mentioning someone’s race considered to be somewhat rude and is regarded as a thing of the past. Not everybody is race-agnostic, but all government organizations and all businesses are required to be race-agnostic by law. This includes never asking about race, particularly in forms and surveys. Identity politics is actively _discouraged_. I wonder why it is different in America.

ummonk 6y ago
America historically developed much more race-based laws (e.g. segregation laws, anti-miscegenation laws, and racially motivated immigration laws, as well as a close association between race and the institution of slavery). As a result, race has become much more entrenched as something with legal status in America than in Europe.
viraptor 6y ago
> how it works in European countries some European countries Some are ahead of the curve, some are so far behind due to fairly homogenous population, that the issue of race is not something anyone making forms thinks about. (because they never expect to meet a non-Slavic person for example)
bendoernberg 6y ago
I've been very influenced by Isabel Wilkerson's new book to look at America as having a racial caste system that's 400 years old. The entire economic and political history and present of the United States is governed by this caste system; it's even written into the physical geography, e.g. where there is lead and where there are trees. If you don't ask about race on government forms, how are you going to measure progress on dismantling this system? Abolishing race is a good goal, but it's going to come after we've acknowledged and reckoned with the violence and harm this country has done to so many millions of people. And we've barely even started that process.
- throwaway894345 6y ago
  We can argue that there is work to do toward equality without discrediting ourselves and our objective with incredible claims about “having barely started” as though we still have slave plantations and so on.
rmrfrmrf 6y ago
The argument put forth in the book Racecraft [1] is that America's founding on individual liberty juxtaposed with the economic reality of chattel slavery created a contradiction so stark that it was necessary to invent a framework to justify slavery culturally. [1] Fields, Karen E, and Barbara J. Fields. Racecraft: The Soul of Inequality in American Life. 2012.
- slowmovintarget 6y ago
  We fought our bloodiest war attempting to destroy one side of that contradiction. Individual liberty remains the most important tenet of a free society. Preserving it demands personal responsibility and impartiality. Anything less is pandering.
  - 082349872349872 6y ago
    Nota Bene: other countries got rid of slavery, earlier, without bloody internecine wars.
skinkestek 6y ago
This is true as far as I am aware, and I agree. It is (IMO) objectively backwards and ugly to discuss someones physical characteristics instead of their contributions, especially backwards if one are trying to get rid of differences. That said, you will find many larger companies actively trying to be or at least look diverse.
Tainnor 6y ago
Identity politics does exist and is encouraged in Europe, it's just not based on "race" (in Europe, or at least in Germany, we prefer to day "ethnicity", as "race" has really bad connotations and is scientifically discarded as a concept). But cultural identity politics have been going strong forever, going back probably at least to the 19th century idea of nation states. That's why minority languages often get special recognition etc.
justin66 6y ago
> Mentioning someone’s race considered to be somewhat rude and is regarded as a thing of the past. After reading about some especially unsubtle racism in the French right-wing press today, [1] it struck me how similar France and the United States are in this regard, at least superficially. The centrist people in government condemning the obvious racism, the powerful right-wing political figure offering a weird non-condemnation condemnation that does not call racism by its right name, the far-right publisher's response: "Our text is not racist at all," it argued. "It is convenient for our opponents to throw that accusation at us." None of it seems very alien to an American. [1] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-53972591 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-53972591

Joker_vD 6y ago

> the concept of ‘race’ is scientifically and socially unsupportable. Just like the concept of "culture". See https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/08/12/does-race-exist-does-culture/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/08/12/does-race-exist-does-c... , here's the kicker: "There were two arguments against race being a real concept: it didn’t cluster nicely, and within-group variation was greater than between group variation. And both of these are equally true of culture. Any mathematical argument considering races as clusters of genes can be used equally well considering cultures as clusters of memes, and will likely return the same results. Yet I can’t imagine someone saying “culture doesn’t exist” or “culture isn’t real”."

aklemm 6y ago
Except that culture is escapable, changeable. Race isn’t. So what is your point exactly?
- throwaway894345 6y ago
  The immutability of race is one of the reasons why we ought not discriminate on the basis of race, but the parent is addressing the question of whether or not race is “real” and our inconsistent treatment of race and culture, another social construct.
  - soco 6y ago
    This might be of high interest to scholars, but for the regular Joe on the street the realities are way more important. And my feeling is that the OP is trying to shift the discussion from reality (which can be addressed in a way or another) to philosophical debate (well, good luck with that)
- Joker_vD 6y ago
  That "race" is as real as "culture" is, or "sex", or "gender". So an attempt to abolish identity politics simply by declaring "Those differences don't exist!" won't succeed. They do exist, and sadly, they're considered by some people when making decisions that affect other people's lives and well-being (while, arguably, those shouldn't be considered).

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

wcerfgba 6y ago

There seem to be some conflicting ideas here. On one hand, the concept of 'race' is what allows racism to exist and we need to remove this concept from our collective ideology in order to defeat racism -- people are just people. On the other hand, it is a fact that external biological characteristics (predominantly skin colour and facial structure) result in social clustering and discrimination, at the individual, collective and institutional levels -- racism is real. I appreciate the principles behind race abolitionism, as I have often applied the same logic to gender, which is arguably even more socially constructed than race, since the appeal to biological characteristics is weaker for defining one's gender than one's race. However, if we remove these ideas from our collective understanding of the world, do we not make it harder to argue cases of legitimate discrimination? If the generally accepted notion is "gender does not exist" or "race does not exist", how does one make the argument "I was discriminated against because of <attributes>?" Or is the idea that once people no longer make the distinction between different groups of attributes, then individual and institutional discrimination will no longer exist? It seems to me that in order for such an approach to be successful, we would need to train ourselves to not notice external characteristics of individuals, effectively becoming colour-blind, a task which not only seems impossible due to the nature of the human mind, but also a dangerous position to take while racism still exists -- since it also blinds us to an understanding of why a person was discriminated against and what factors affected their experience --, and risks destroying our concept of cultural heritage. Perhaps race abolitionism is more suited for a post-racism world?

notsureaboutpg 6y ago
> as I have often applied the same logic to gender, which is arguably even more socially constructed than race, since the appeal to biological characteristics is weaker for defining one's gender than one's race. Is this a typo? Surely the appeal to biological characteristics is stronger for defining one's gender than one's race... You can be "mixed" race and pass for multiple races (so the link to biology is less) without doing anything, but you have to do a lot to obscure the biological giveaways of your gender (voice, Adams apple, breasts/hips/shoulders). And also you need cultural understanding to know the race of someone from a different area than you (are dark skinned Italians black/Latino? No, but if you saw a bunch, and didn't have cultural understanding you might think so). But you can tell the gender of nearly all people without any cultural context.

joaomacp 6y ago

As a European, every US election season I'm always dumbfounded by how much the "black vote" is discussed. Just recently, when Kamala Harris was announced as VP, all they talk about is how she will contribute to the black vote. This makes it seem as she was only chosen because of her race, and even worse: it's an insult to black people, grouping them together as having one opinion. I don't know why there's no backlash against this.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
Tainnor 6y ago
I'm European myself. I don't think we can compare Europe with the US. Due to centuries of slavery and then segregation, black and white communities are still somewhat separate and tend to have different cultures etc. Of course, individually, there are many examples of people who are "in between", but the cultural blocs do exist. And by the way - in Belgium, parties have to pander to the French or the Dutch voters; in Switzerland, the different language regions have different voting behaviour; in Germany, east Germany votes significantly differently, as does Bavaria; and so on. Voter blocs are not something exclusive to the US, even if the history of the black population doesn't have a direct parallel in Europe.
- seszett 6y ago
  > in Belgium, parties have to pander to the French or the Dutch voters Well it's a bit different, as people in Wallonia can only vote for francophone parties and people in Flanders only for Flemish parties. Only Brussels gets both. So in effect, parties don't really have to choose whether to pander to the French-speaking or Dutch-speaking voters. Which is even worse IMO, because how can you form a functioning federal government from parties that are each elected only by half of the country? Well you can't, as the current situation shows.

mikece 6y ago

Race or culture isn't the issue but "identity politics" which mandates that one must see themselves and others not as the unique and wonderful individuals they are but as an impersonal member of a class to be treated according to the understood (or assumed) qualities of that class. Nothing is more destructive to cordial interpersonal relations than saying "Oh, you're an X and I will treat you as X-types ought to be treated" without regard to who the individual actually is. It's not impossible to see, recognize, and appreciate races and cultures as long as the dignity of the individual is maintained.

SllX 6y ago
In other words, a caste system developed from first principles.
arel 6y ago
What you're missing here is in reality, your life experience, outcomes and how you are treated in society can be very much a consequence of your "identity". All groups are advocating for is equality of treatment from institutions and from society at large. Is that too much to ask? Once we get to that place there's nothing more marginalised groups would love to do then to stop being defined by race.
- syshum 6y ago
  What you are missing is that "All Groups" are not simply asking for "equality of treatment from institutions and from society at large" in fact many groups are asking for equity not equality, there is a difference. Sometimes this is referred to was "equality of outcome vs opportunity"
  - arel 6y ago
    This a (frankly lazy) narrative often used to dismiss demands for equality. You might be able to point to isolated incidents but to view group advocacy as a whole as malicious power grab is simply not true and a gross misrepresentation. A better question is probably do you think certain groups are wrong in their perception that they are unfairly treated? If yes then you are not acknowledging a vast amount of very clearly expressed life experience and if no why be against them advocating for themselves as a group?

082349872349872 6y ago

Hofstadter's argument: https://www.cs.virginia.edu/~evans/cs655/readings/purity.html https://www.cs.virginia.edu/~evans/cs655/readings/purity.htm...

cuillevel3 6y ago

As a German I always feel offended, when American sign-up forms (conferences and such) ask for my 'race'. Are they asking for my migrant background? Asking for race is just so Nazi, what should I put there, "Herrenrasse", "Fremdrasse", ...? There are no different human races.

082349872349872 6y ago
Yeah, I used to enter "mutt" What do real Caucasians (people from the Caucasus) enter in these fields? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23914667 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23914667

pcbro141 6y ago

President Trump just issued condolences[1] to a Neo-Nazi who praised[2] the terrorist behind the Portland train stabbing of 3 people who confronted the attacker for racially abusing underage black girls[3]. Now is not the time to ignore race and hope people stop being racist without talking about it. Stopping talking about race will not stop white supremacists from hating black people and talking about race is not why white supremacists started hating black people. [1] https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1300193398477946883 https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/13001933984779468... [2] https://twitter.com/InsideASCIF/status/1300177098955534347 https://twitter.com/InsideASCIF/status/1300177098955534347 [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_Portland_train_attack https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_Portland_train_attack

Zigurd 6y ago

The author is the Brexit Party's person of color. I'm sure a lot of white men will agree with what she is saying. Just don't be fooled into thinking that minorities in general will adopt this position.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

gostsamo 6y ago

There was this aphorism: "It does not matter if you believe in God, but whether God believes in you." In the context of race, the lady can abolish races as much as she desires, but it does not matter as far as their are racists.

wcerfgba 6y ago

Post seems to have been delisted from the front pages, @dang can we get a reason? This is political but seems like a genuinely interesting perspective.

juancn 6y ago

The US is oddly concerned about race. I remember the first time they asked me about my race filling a form. WTF? How should I know? Also the categories are so arbitrary, I ended up picking other and be done with that.

bitemealienboi 6y ago

The problem with race abolitionism is that it removes the language for discussing racial issues and hides these issues where they cant be addressed. Its essentially the equivalent of saying "All Lives Matter". It attempts to dismiss and ignore the problems that wont go away even if ignored. It would be nice to live in a world where racial discrimination and issues dont exist and skin colour is as meaningless and superficial as eye colour or the colour of your clothes. And perhaps, someday, this may be the case. But at the end of the day, racial problems still exists. Racial discrimination still exists. People are still being treated differently by individuals and systems based on their physical features and the colour of their skin. Cops see and treat black people differently, so do doctors and judges and juries and home sellers and bankers and hotel clerks. And that causes real effects and impediments to people of colour that needs to be addressed first. Identity politics is not saying these people are different. Identity politics is saying that society sees these people as different, and that its a problem that needs to be addressed