Despite “racism science” of the 19th century, eugenics and the amorous attempts by so many social commentators and white philosophers, no valid or empirical science (genetics) has proven by any measure the superiority of one race over the other, simply because race doesn’t exist as taxonomy, but is a social construction, and an extraordinarily dangerous one for black and brown people.
Why are so many if not the vast majority of white people either in denial of its existence as a systemic set of oppressions; designed to advantage them in all areas of human endeavours or falsely argue claiming instead that the so-called, white race is in danger of extinction or being threatened by black people?
So the first reason would have to be that the genius of white supremacy and the unearned social advantages it confers on white people is its invisibility. At least its relative invisibility to the very recipients of white privilege; white people whom it seeks to reward, simply because they are white.
The second reason why white people defend white supremacy and racism is that they, (like us) are explicitly taught not to question our socialisation (read upbringing or brainwashing). Subconsciously, we’re taught that this is the way of the world, the “natural order” of things and the Master, Slave relationship has existed since time immemorial.
On reflection, this is a difficult thing to comprehend. It has the same social impact analogous to an alien race arriving on earth and telling our most knowledgeable physicists that they got the math all wrong.
The third reason why white people are in denial of racism is that it asks of them to question their before unquestioned academic, scientific, commercial, business, individual and personal achievements, and perhaps the hardest part of it all. It can be compared, to a star student discovering that his teachers were “marking him up” all along. From a mental and psychological perspective, this goes to the very heart of what it must be like for white people to learn about the benefits of white supremacy and racism, the socioeconomic phenomenon of white privilege. Could it be that this deep questioning automatically triggers a defensive response?
The fourth and perhaps most obvious reason is that on discovering white privilege, a tiny minority aren’t ready or are reluctant to acknowledge it because of the material benefits derived from it. That’s not to say that “loud and proud” racists like Steve Hofmeyr are intrinsically untruthful, but rather, either one or a combination of the above. There’s hardly an instance in one’s childhood of the spoilt sibling requesting equity and equality for the other siblings because of the mental and material benefits of being favoured by the parents?
A river runs two-ways, it is either running away from you or running towards you, it just depends on your vantage point or where you at, at any moment in time. I do believe that this analogy is roughly the kernel of Einsteinian thought? The same river, providing the same bounty would by definition be experienced differently by different people, again, depending on positionality.
That, in a nutshell, seems to me, to be the reason for such voluminous amounts of counter-storytelling by white people, racist apologists, and the many white supremacist groupings around the world today. No one can prove genetic differences between the races because there’s only one race. But they, (white people) can point to the successful results of their endeavours, and point to the quantitative differences between theirs and black people’s, what they are of course missing, like the analogy of the river, is where they are in positions of advantage.
