THE MYTH OF RACE: RELIGION, SCIENCE, AND RACIAL SEPARATISTS

A person’s perceived racial identity can be a blessing or a curse. In the United States race has always been an important subject, which has carried with it oppression and segregation. This history began with the encampment and genocide of the Native Americans by the European explorers, the enslavement of Africans in the New World, the recent history of the strong segregation of the Jim Crow laws in Southern states, and the long and hard fight for racial integration. Racial hatred still thrives today in the United States and throughout the world, sometimes in the light, and sometimes in the shadows. Separatist groups, using both faulty science and twisted religion, try to separate the human race into sections and define each race into superior and inferior species. But what really is race?

The origin of the human race has always been a fascination for both science and religion. Charles Darwin in 1859 was one of the first scientists to come up with a theory based in science, which explained the human race’s existence called evolution. Darwin’s theory of evolution supported the fact that the human race was one species. However, this also allowed for other scientists to come up with theories of unequal evolutional processes, and the theory of “survival of the fittest”, where human groups are in competition for resources. This view also allowed for racism in a different way, viewing darker skinned ethnic groups as less evolved than lighter skinned ethnic groups. Science today bases its theories on bones, genetic findings, and artifacts from the distant past, to support the theory of evolution and the development and movement of the human race. “The earliest hominids evolved from apes about 5 million years ago, but modern humans (Homo sapiens) didn’t emerge until 150,000 - 200,000 years ago in eastern Africa, where we spent most of our evolution together as a species” (“Go Deeper: Human Diversity”) http://www.pbs.org/race/000_About/002_04-godeeper.htm. Most of today’s scientists do not view people through any mythical racial scenario; they categorize human beings by geographic and cultural differences.

The various world religions have many kinds of stories to explain the human race’s beginnings, and why we are here on planet earth, weaving beautiful and sometimes horrific tales of creation. In the Hebrew Bible’s Genesis, the human race began with Adam, a being sculpted by God from the earth. This story of the human race’s creation is recognized by three major religions Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Many Native American creation stories also have the human race created from the earth, being of one race. In the Hopi tribe’s first story of creation they include a being called Spider Woman, who gives life to the human race after creating everything else on earth. In this story the human race slowly separates, going to different parts of the world causing conflicts within the human family, and forgetting the Creator. Finally they are destroyed and recreated, and we may be being recreated right now. In most of these creation stories, the message is the same; we are one species and to go against your fellow human being, is to sin against a Creator.

White separatists in the United States and throughout the world have a different viewpoint on the origins and the definition of what race is. They have used science and religion for hundreds of years to categorize humans into races and even different species, for their theories and beliefs. Using scientific research of the past and their own pseudo anthropologists, archaeologists, historians, linguists, and bio-scientists to come up with an alternate theory for the human race, where each race developed independently and in different parts of the world. Religion has also played a part in separating the human specie, using stories of creation to support their viewpoint. The Christian Identity movement (which started in England), and other separatists Christian sects throughout history have used religion to support their theories of racial divide. They have used both the story of Christian creationism and the mythical “Tower of Babble”, which they believe is God separating the races once again. Followers of this form of Christianity believe that the separation of the races started even before the Garden of Eden itself, using creationism instead of evolution, to support their theology of racial separation and racial purity. Non-whites are viewed as soulless beast, which must be controlled or exterminated for their own good and to protect against racial or species mixing. Jews are viewed as the children of the devil, which the serpent represents, and a danger to the white race and Christianity itself. Any interracial breeding, which they believe was the real meaning of the “original sin”, is considered an abomination to God and the Christian faith, weakening the white race’s genetic and spiritual heritage. The white race is supposed to be protected at all times from the other races. The mythical white womanhood is to be protected, because women are the doors to the white race’s future generations and they have inherited Eve’s weakness for interbreeding with the other species. A white woman’s primary job is to ensure that the white race continues by picking a husband, who is racially pure, and having children and educating them about the importance of the white race and its purity.

White Christian separatists in the United States believe that at some time there will be what they call a race war, where the white race will have to battle against all the other races on earth, and that they will have to forcefully take the United States back from non-whites. Some of these groups believe this is already beginning with what they call the “culture war”. The movement teaches its followers not to trust the United Nations or the United States’ government, which they believe are backed by a Jewish agenda to destroy the white race and to take away its God given rights and country. Equal rights laws and affirmative action protections are viewed with mistrust, because separatists believe these laws are made to take away the mythical white man’s power. They also view hate crime laws as a push towards this perceived race war, where they are prosecuted for doing their Creator’s work. 

The theory that the human animal is separated into different races is a very young one. Even slavery predates the belief in different races, and was the product of conquest and power, not physical differences between people. “Ancient societies, like the Greeks, did not divide people according to physical distinctions, but according to religion, status, class, even language. The English language didn’t even have the word “race” until it turns up in a 1508 poem by William Dunbar referring to a line of kings” (“Go Deeper: What is Race”) http://www.pbs.org/race/000_About/002_01_a-godeeper.htm. Science today shows us that we are one species, not different sub-species. The human race has traveled and adapted too many different environments, which have changed our body size, type, and appearance. We have also seen recessive genes add to the different types of appearances that one may encounter in the human race, examples include blues eyes and red hair. Ancestry controls what your appearance and genetic makeup will be, not race. “Skin color really is only skin deep. Most traits are inherited independently from one another. The genes influencing skin color have nothing to do with the genes influencing hair form, eye color, blood type, musical talent, athletic ability or forms of intelligence. Knowing someone’s skin color doesn’t necessarily tell you anything else about him or her” (“Go Deeper: What is Race“) http://www.pbs.org/race/000_About/002_01_a-godeeper.htm. The side effects of defining the human race into races has been disastrous, causing untold harm and death, allowing for brutal slavery, segregation, and numerous genocides in the past several hundred years. In the United States racial segregationists have committed numerous terrorist attacks on African-Americans, Jews, and other ethnic groups, burning and bombing churches, synagogues, and businesses. They have murdered their fellow human beings, without legal ramifications, using constitutional protections to back their agenda and actions. Today, these white separatist individuals and groups pose a danger not just to the individual, who is the perceived other, but also to the security of the countries they inhabit. 

Separating people into races and even species is scientifically and spiritually wrong. The theory that the human animal is separated into different races is a very young one, and hopefully it can be reversed, with cultural and diversity education. We call ourselves evolved and have the brain power for many great things, yet we look toward our own species with hate, seeing simple differences as an excuse to do inhuman and un-Godly crimes against each other. So are we really as evolved as we profess to be? This question may never be answered, if we do not want to even admit there is a problem.