ANTI-RACISM

'Anti-racism' refers to beliefs, actions, movements, and policies adopted or developed to oppose racism. In general, anti-racism is intended to promote an egalitarian society in which people do not face discrimination on the basis of their race, however defined. By its nature, anti-racism tends to promote the view that racism in a particular society is both pernicious and socially pervasive, and that particular changes in political, economic, and/or social life are required to eliminate it.

Contents

American origins of modern anti-racism

Racial equality proposal of Japan in Paris Peace Conference, 1919

The revival of anti-racism in the United States

Anti-racism's influence

Controversies

See also

Anti-racist organizations

External links

American origins of modern anti-racism

Anti-racism is implicit in the statement "all men are created equal". Black westerners, like Olaudah Equiano, and even some whites, like Thomas Jefferson, did point this out, though the blacks were often not in a position to do much about it, while whites, like Jefferson, were often unwilling.
Eventually, however, that changed. The first great successes of anti-racism were won by the abolitionist movement, both in England and the United States. Though many abolitionists did not regard blacks and mulattos as equal, they did in general believe in freedom and often even equality of treatment for all people. A few, like John Brown, went further. Brown was willing to die on behalf of, as he said, "millions in this slave country whose rights are disregarded by wicked, cruel, and unjust enactments...." Many black abolitionists, like Frederick Douglass, explicitly argued for the humanity of blacks and mulattos, and for the equality of all people.
During the American Civil War, anti-racism in the North became much stronger and more generally disseminated. The success of black troops in the Union Army had a dramatic impact on Northern sentiment. After the war, Reconstruction government was often explicitly anti-racist, most notably in passing the Fourteenth Amendment and Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution to guarantee the rights of blacks and mulattos, but also in its general support for black and mulatto rights and in its commitment to equal treatment. As a result, many ex-slaves had access to education for the first time. Blacks and mulattos were also allowed to vote, which meant that African-Americans were elected to Congress in numbers not seen before -- or since.
Due to prolonged racist resistance in the South, however, and a general collapse of idealism in the North, Reconstruction ended, and gave way to the nadir of American race relations. The period from about 1890 to 1920 saw the re-establishment of Jim Crow and a general abandonment of anti-racist ideology. Woodrow Wilson, a revisionist historian who regarded Reconstruction as a disaster, resegregated the federal government. The Ku Klux Klan grew to its greatest peak of popularity and strength. D.W. Griffith's "The Birth of a Nation" was a movie sensation. During this period, John Brown's anti-racist stance was so incomprehensible that he became regarded as insane.

Racial equality proposal of Japan in Paris Peace Conference, 1919

:''(For more detailed information, see Paris Peace Conference, 1919).''
Japan proposed that they added the elimination of racial discrimination articles to the rule of the League of Nations.
This is a first proposal concerning international elimination of racial discrimination in the world.
Although the proposal received a majority (11 out of 16) in the voting, the chairman, U.S. President Woodrow Wilson, overturned it saying that important issues should be unanimously approved. It is said that behind the scenes, Billy "Sea Otter" Hughes and Joseph Cook vigorously opposed it as it undermined the White Australia Policy.

The revival of anti-racism in the United States

Anti-racism showed signs of revival in the 1920s and 1930s. At that time, anthropologists such as Franz Boas, Ruth Benedict, Margaret Mead, and Ashley Montagu argued for the equality of humans across races and cultures. Other whites, too, began to speak out in favor of racial equality; Eleanor Roosevelt, for example, was a very visible advocate for minority rights during this period. Socialist organizations like the wobblies, which gained some popularity during the Great Depression were often explicitly anti-racist. Perhaps more importantly, beginning with the Harlem Renaissance and continuing into the 1960s, many famous African-American writers, including James Weldon Johnson, Langston Hughes, Richard Wright, and James Baldwin argued forcefully against racism.
Anti-racism won its most notable and lasting victories in the United States during the Civil Rights Movement. Jim Crow laws were repealed in the South and blacks finally re-won the right to vote in Southern states. Civil-rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.'s famous "I Have a Dream" speech is probably the best-known condensation of anti-racist ideology in the U.S., and possibly in the world.''

Anti-racism's influence

Anti-racist ideology has been hugely influential. It has been a catalyst for feminism, anti-war, and anti-imperialist movements. Henry David Thoreau's opposition to the Mexican-American War, for example, was based in his fear that the U.S. was using the war as an excuse to expand American slavery into new territories. Thoreau's response was chronicled in his famous essay "Civil Disobedience", which in turn helped ignite Gandhi's successful campaign against the British in India. Gandhi's example in turn inspired the American Civil Rights movement.
Indeed, as James Loewen notes in "Lies My Teacher Told Me": "Throughout the world, from Africa to Northern Ireland, movements of oppressed people continue to use tactics and words borrowed from our abolitionist and civil rights movements." In East Germany, in revolutionary Iran, in Tiananmen Square, in South Africa, images, words, and tactics developed by anti-racism, or pro-human rights supporter, or supporters of self-determination and national freedom have been used regularly and repeatedly.
Many of these uses have been controversial. For example, Ho Chi Minh was an admirer of John Brown. The pro-life movement often draws connections between its goals and the goals of abolitionism. In Zimbabwe, Robert Mugabe has used anti-racist rhetoric to a land-distribution scheme which resulted in widespread starvation (primarily due to its weak administration and implementation rather than any inherent fault with the notion of anti-racism). However, it has been argued that Mr Mugabe is himself a racist due to his blatant acts of hostility and opression toward White Zimbabweans (see zimbabwe cricket) Still, whether one supports or despises use or abuse of the anti-racist ideal or rhetoric in any particular context, anti-racism's success, at least in one sense, has been overwhelming. Not so long ago, racism was the explicit ideology of the West. Today, on the other hand, it is eschewed -- at least in name -- by almost every prominent figure of note. Today, virtually no one -- not Strom Thurmond, not David Duke -- wants to be known as a white supremacist.

Controversies

Despite anti-racism's successes, however, some people feel that racism is still a powerful force in Western societies. Proponents of the stronger forms of anti-racism point to ongoing differences in quality of life among different races and say that rooting out discriminatory attitudes and practices is a requirement of simple justice. Thus, they argue that racism still drives such phenomena as the drug war, the prison system, ongoing defacto segregation of housing, racial profiling, police brutality, U.S. imperialism, and possibly the immigration reductionism movement. Many political commentators have also noted that politicians play on racially biased fears when advocating policies associated with the War on Terrorism, such as those policies relevant to the current Iraq War. Anti-racists may advocate various responses to this problem, from constitutional changes (for instance, changes in drug laws or in school funding) to greater individual sensitivity. A few of the more controversial programs advocated by some anti-racists include reparations, affirmative action, diversity training, and the antifa movement.
Critics of contemporary anti-racism say that ethnicity amid some degree of ethnocentrism is legitimate and beneficial, that there are non-discriminatory explanations to most racial differences in social and economic position, and that the presumption that discrimination is pervasive, hidden and immensely destructive leads to intolerable bureaucratic interference in the daily lives of individuals, organizations, and communities. Many consider anti-racism to be fueled by a leftist coalition between white guilt and identity politics, and have stated that anti-racism, as practiced in the contemporary Western world, is essentially racism against white people. However, as noted above, anti-anti-racist groups do not consider themselves racist. They often charge the left with reverse racism, and insist that the right is the true inheritor of anti-racism's egalitarian tradition. This, however, does not address the large amount of evidence (as Valian has pointed out) to the existence of preconceptions towards race, gender and age which affect the way we see and relate with/to others and which accumulate over time leading to considerable differences which in turn mold the person into a preconceived role with "proper" limits and aspirations.
In recent years the belief that race has no effect on intelligence or potential -- a basic tenet of anti-racist philosophy -- has been challenged by scholars such as Charles Murray, Michael Levin, and J. Philippe Rushton and defended by other scholars such as Stephen Jay Gould, Richard Levin and Richard Lewontin.
Some fear that strident anti-racism measures may actually have the paradoxical effect of increasing racism. The appearance of "pandering to minorities" may be perceived as injustice, and those with mild ethnic loyalties are agitated into more extreme positions than would otherwise have occurred without anti-racism.

★ Weaver v NATFHE/Bournville College Racial Harassment IssueInformation about a racial discrimination case in the United Kingdom where an ‘anti-racist’ trade union had a racially discriminatory policy of refusing to assist complainants of racist harassment.

See also

★ Affirmative Action

★ Allophilia

★ Anti-racist mathematics

★ Feminism

★ Racism

★ Political Correctness

★ Race and intelligence

★ Racial realism

★ Racism in the United States

★ Social criticism

★ Teaching for social justice

Anti-racist organizations

★ By Any Means Necessary (BAMN) (United States)

★ Aktion Kinder des Holocaust (Switzerland)

★ Anti-Racist Action (North America)

★ Anti-Fascist Action (United Kingdom)

★ Campaign Against Racism and Fascism (United Kingdom)

★ (United States)

★ Centre for Equal Opportunities and Opposition to Racism (Belgium)

★ Copwatch (United States)

★ FightDemBack! (Australian and New Zealand)

★ Institute of Race Relations (United Kingdom)

★ National Assembly Against Racism (United Kingdom)

★ Newham Monitoring Project (United Kingdom)

★ One People's Project (United States)

★ Red and Anarchist Skinheads

★ Roots of Resistance (Canada)

★ Southern Poverty Law Center (United States)

★ World Conference against Racism (United Nations)

External links

★ Africa Unite

★ New Demographic, an Anti-Racism Training Company

★ Speaking Out Against Racism

★ Hubert Harrison

★ Ben Fletcher

★ Open Directory category

★ Gamers Against Racism (GAR)

★ White Anti-racist Community Action Network (WACAN)