Talk:Racism

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 23 August 2021 and 3 December 2021. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Cmetoyer, Ijwilliams (article contribs).

Racism

Racism is like a Police violence is a leading cause of death for young men in the United States. Over the life course, about 1 in every 1,000 black men can expect to be killed by police. Risk of being killed by police peaks between the ages of 20 y and 35 y for men and women and for all racial and ethnic groups. Black women and men and American Indian and Alaska Native women and men are significantly more likely than white women and men to be killed by police. Latino men are also more likely to be killed by police than are white men. On the other hand, the possibility that police officers are more racist than the average American does not mean that the job of police officer should be eliminated. Psychologist Steven Pinker has cogently argued that one of the biggest reasons why human beings kill one another at much lower rates today than they did at about any other time in human history is because of modern police forces (and the associated “rule of law”). In the 1700s, the annual homicide rate in what became the United Sates was about 30 per 100,000 people. Apparently, the founding fathers found a lot of reasons to kill one another. This value dropped to 20 per 100,000 by 1800 and dropped again to about 10 per 100,000 in 1900. In 2018, the annual U.S. homicide rate, high profile mass school shootings included, had dropped further to about 5 per 100,000. Most progressives thus realize that police officers do an important job. But they foresee a better potential future in which police officers take a kinder, gentler approach to maintaining public safety. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2600:1702:1380:4420:740B:AA03:6BAA:4D55 (talk) 03:24, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

The data You've given, only shows a correlation between being non-white and getting killed by police. There are no evidences shown that this ia due to racism among policemen. 195.43.72.230 (talk) 04:24, 13 July 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for this suggestion which should provide insight into an overlooked aspect of institutional racism in America, a stumbling block for me is the start, I dont understand "Racism is like a Police violence" is it me, or is an edit required? 23Enigma (talk) 08:33, 28 September 2021 (UTC)

"Anti-white racism" listed at Redirects for discussion

A discussion is taking place to address the redirect Anti-white racism. The discussion will occur at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2021 August 16#Anti-white racism until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. Sangdeboeuf (talk) 02:58, 16 August 2021 (UTC)

Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 20 August 2021

I will add more links to the "Aversive racism" section. WinnipegMA (talk) 20:25, 20 August 2021 (UTC)

 Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 20:41, 20 August 2021 (UTC)

racisim in artificial intelligence (AI)

in the entire article, there is no mention of racism in AI or any software-based discrimination even though its affecting society in a major way right now. for example in banking the insurnace industry and the justice system and also software-based hiring.

a few short videos on the subject:

https://www.ted.com/talks/gunay_kazimzade_racial_and_gender_biases_in_ai

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N-Lxw5rcfZg

https://www.ted.com/talks/kriti_sharma_how_to_keep_human_bias_out_of_ai/transcript?language=en — Preceding unsigned comment added by RJJ4y7 (talk • contribs) 20:54, 31 August 2021 (UTC)

Algorithmic bias. ––FormalDude talk 08:04, 9 September 2021 (UTC)

Discussion of Anthropology and Biology in the Justification of Black Subjugation

I am planning on revising the 19th century history aspect of this page to include the prevalence of the use of science and higher education to conclude that Black Americans were an inferior species, and thus made it okay to discriminate against. These individuals studied the cranial capacities of different races, and used the sizes to conclude that they were different species. There is a wide variety of research into this topic that I will make sure to cite with my article edit. Cmetoyer (talk) 20:09, 16 September 2021 (UTC)

You might want to have a look at our articles on Scientific racism and History of anthropometry. Feel free to add material here, but please consider adding to Racism against Black Americans, the more specific article. --Rsk6400 (talk) 04:44, 17 September 2021 (UTC)

Scientifically invalid

It seems extraordinary to me to start an article about a socio-political concept like this by asserting that it's scientifically invalid. I'm not particularly interested in racism, personally, but I'm interested in science, and in encyclopedic neutrality, and I would like to know more about the science that's being cited here. (I properly placed a citation-needed template on the claim, but it was almost immediately reverted by AndyThe Grump, who I hope will comment here soon on his reasoning). Eleuther (talk) 20:30, 18 September 2021 (UTC)

If you want to know more about the well-established science behind the statement in the lede, I suggest you read the sources cited in this article, and in the Wikipedia article on race. And no, your 'citation needed' template was not properly placed, since the article body discusses this in detail, citing the necessary sources. The lede summarises the body of the article, and per standard Wikipedia practice, needs no citations. As for why the lede needs to stress the scientific invalidity of racist concepts, I would have hoped this was obvious, given the history of discredited 'scientific racism' that has bolstered 'socio-political' racism for so long. This is an encyclopaedia, reflecting, per well-established policies, the mainstream academic perspective on any topic covered by the sciences. It states consensus. Not Wikipedia contributors' consensus, but that of science. 'Neutrality' as Wikipedia understands the concept, does not extend to suggesting that experts on subject matter might possibly be wrong because some random Wikipedia contributor doesn't know enough about the subject matter to be sure a statement is correct.

I suggest that if you want to perform 'experiments' [1] on articles, you find a better way to do so than you have demonstrated here. AndyTheGrump (talk) 20:55, 18 September 2021 (UTC)

Hi, Grump. My simple point is as follows. Starting the article with the term "scientifically invalid" is unnecessary, because the article is not about a scientific topic. The term's only purpose seems to be to relegate the topic to a political realm in which discussion is not allowed. Eleuther (talk) 12:46, 21 September 2021 (UTC)

There were a lot of scientists trying to justify racism, see Scientific racism. And some people still have those justifications in their heads, so I hold the term "scientifically false" to be very necessary. --Rsk6400 (talk) 12:52, 21 September 2021 (UTC)

I fully agree. The Bell Curve is not that old, and it is still touted by certain people on the far right. It’s important for us to be without ambiguity concerning these matters where there is no ambiguity in serious science either (this is very much something else than "not allowing" (scientific) discussion). Cheers ⌘ _hugarheimur 13:42, 21 September 2021 (UTC)

This should not be in the opening sentence of the article, though. The lede sentence should cover what the subject is, nothing more. Racism is the belief that one race is superior to another. If there needs to be some comments about how some people have attempted to use science to prove their own agendas is important, but should be mentioned after the opening comments. To me "scientifically false" means nothing. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 19:35, 21 September 2021 (UTC)

My suggestion would be Racism is the belief that groups of humans possess different behavioral traits corresponding to physical appearance and can be divided based on the superiority of one race over another. It may also mean prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against other people because they are of a different race or ethnicity. Modern variants of racism are often based in social perceptions of biological differences between peoples. These views can take the form of social actions, practices or beliefs, or political systems in which different races are ranked as inherently superior or inferior to each other, based on presumed shared inheritable traits, abilities, or qualities. There have been attempts to prove racism through scientific means, this has been overwhelmingly shown to be false. Or similar. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 19:40, 21 September 2021 (UTC)

I don't think that "...attempts to prove racism through scientific means..." is very well worded. I'd suggest that "There have been attempts to legitimise racist beliefs through scientific means, which have been overwhelmingly shown to be unfounded" would express it better. AndyTheGrump (talk) 20:01, 21 September 2021 (UTC)

I'd sign off on that. That's fine (I was really just trying to give a location for the info). Much better than the opening sentence. 08:14, 22 September 2021 (UTC)

Yes it is better and better is good. Dushan Jugum (talk) 08:25, 22 September 2021 (UTC)

I too don't understand "scientifically false". There is a difference between proven false and we have looked really hard and have no good reason to think it true. Here are examples from other pages, not because they are right, but they may be less fraught and therefore useful. They were selected from my personal train of thought.

Aether (classical element) 1st sentence: According to ancient and medieval science...

Geosyncline 1st sentence: A Geosyncline (originally called a geosynclinal) is an obsolete geological concept...

Flat Earth 1st sentence: The flat Earth model is an archaic conception....

Eugenics The vibe I get from the introduction is that it's fine, just don't misuse it.

Humorism 2nd sentence: Humorism began to fall out of favor in the 1850s...

Classical mechanics The vibe I get from the introduction is that it is science, as long as you don't look too closely (Ed. note: a bit like Human Race)

Race (human categorization) 3rd sentence: While partially based on physical similarities within groups, race does not have an inherent physical or biological meaning.

Steady-state model 1st sentence: In cosmology, the steady-state model is an alternative to the Big Bang theory Dushan Jugum (talk) 21:15, 21 September 2021 (UTC)

Hi, thanks for all the comments. There seems to be a sort of consensus that, while the idea of racism is unscientific per se, the use of the term "scientifically invalid" is out of place at the front of the lead sentence. Rather, the fraught relationship between race and science should be discussed a bit later in the article. Is that a fair summary? Eleuther (talk) 16:29, 22 September 2021 (UTC)

Per WP:BOLD, I've made the change to the lede I proposed above, removing the phrase from the first sentence, and adding a new one at the end of the first paragraph. Obviously if anyone objects, we can discuss it further, but I think that should probably settle any concerns. The 'Scientific racism' section in the article seems to summarise the topic fairly well, and includes a link to the main article too. AndyTheGrump (talk) 16:43, 22 September 2021 (UTC)

Well hey, now let us salute the editor who has so boldly removed the phrase "scientifically invalid" from the lead sentence, never mind that he earlier angrily reverted my attachment of a citation-needed template to the phrase. What guff. Eleuther (talk) 07:53, 28 September 2021 (UTC)

Good point, Thanks Andy, Thanks Eleuther, personally I like to think of it as a team effort. I have just had a drink to us. So shall stop editing Wikipedia. WP:DRUNKEDIT there is link for anything. Dushan Jugum (talk) 08:20, 28 September 2021 (UTC)

References

Physical appearance

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

At the risk of raising another storm of invective, I question the use of the phrase "physical appearance" in the lead sentence of the article. The Nazi's didn't classify Jews on the basis of appearance, but rather on the basis of ancestry. I propose changing the phrase "physical appearance" to something like "their perceived ancestry". I have placed a discuss template on the phrase in the article, inviting you all to comment here. Thanks in advance for your comments. Eleuther (talk) 10:27, 29 September 2021 (UTC)

You are grossly misinformed. Nazi propaganda was riddled with stereotypes regarding physical appearance - both of Jews and of the 'Aryans' the Nazis imagined themselves to be. In apartheid-era South Africa, people were routinely legally assigned to 'racial' categories according to appearance - even when such assignments resulted in placing siblings in different groups. Appearance has always been central to racism, as the default means to decide where someone fits in whatever socially-constructed shoving-people-into-boxes scheme is normative in context. Beyond that, certainly, perceived ancestry often comes into play, but only when framed through social norms that have already decided what the 'valid' groupings are. Hence ignore-what-ancestry-means-entirely nonsense like the 'one-drop-rule' in the United States, the classification of Australian Aborigines as 'Blacks', and the endless arguments about where exactly the limits of 'being white' can be found. Racism isn't built around 'ancestry', it is built around assumptions that ancestry can be used as a means to determine where people fit into a predetermined and arbitrary scheme. AndyTheGrump (talk) 11:13, 29 September 2021 (UTC)

Well, I agree with a lot of that, except the "grossly misinformed" part. Is insulting invective really the only form of rhetoric you know? In particular, I didn't propose that racism is built around 'ancestry'. Rather, I used the term 'perceived ancestry', which is pretty much the same thing you're saying in your last sentence. My basic point is that racism is about the arbitrary scheme you refer to, not simply about physical appearance. So it seems overly simplistic, to me, to define racism in terms of "physical appearance" in the lead sentence of the article. In trying to come up with a more appropriate descriptive term for the idea of racism, as generally understood in the sources, I came up with "perceived ancestry" as a proposal, but other terms are certainly possible as well. Eleuther (talk) 09:31, 30 September 2021 (UTC)

Another possibility would be to replace "physical appearance" with "a perceived idea of race", or something like that. Eleuther (talk) 10:08, 30 September 2021 (UTC)

"physical appearance and socially constructed classifications regarding ancestry' would possibly be closer. We certainly don't want to use 'race' to define 'racism' in the manner you suggest though, since once again it tends to imply that 'race' is more than a social construct. And because defining something using the same word (or word root) as the word being defined is desperately poor English (and arguably illogical, since if you know what a word means, you don't need it defined), even if the habit is widespread in Wikipedia ledes. AndyTheGrump (talk) 11:26, 30 September 2021 (UTC)

The term "perceived idea of race", which I proposed, does not at all imply that "'race' is more than a social construct", or anything else about race. It is just a convenient way to kick the definitional can over to the article on race, which seems to me to be the most logical approach. We don't need to define "race" in two separate places, both here and there. Logically speaking, this article should defer to the concept of race defined in that article. That was the simple idea behind my proposal. Eleuther (talk) 09:43, 1 October 2021 (UTC)

Eleuther I don't normally butt into important conversations. However, if we are of one race, that being the Human Race. Would our definition of racism be based on a created Social Construct of the Perceived Idea of Race to where how we are defining race on the basis of the amount of melanin in one's skin? The opening paragraphs of this article seem to misrepresent the historical construct of racism. This is a social construct that has been passed down for millennia that somehow a certain color of skin was superior to another color of skin. It is an extreme form of prejudice. Since racism is a prejudice with active discrimination, would that not be proper to clarify that into

If I were to suggest an opening line and some of the second line, it would go with one of these two options:

Racism is the Social Construct that has been created by humans to divide humans on the Perceived Idea of Race based on the amount of melanin in another human's skin and other characteristics. Racism is a form of prejudice that has been traditionally used as a belief of superiority through active antagonistic discrimination over another human.

Racism is the Social Construct that has been created by humans to traditionally divide humans on the Perceived Idea of Race by the use of prejudice that is used as a belief of superiority through active antagonistic discrimination over another human.

If I am correct here, racism is the active use of a prejudice, using discrimination. I just thought I would toss this out there but I could be completely wrong as to my rewrite ideas. Mjp1976 (talk) 00:07, 2 October 2021 (UTC)

Hi, thanks, Mjp1976. I like your use of the word prejudice. Indeed, if I had full freedom to edit the article, I would start it with something simple like "Racism is prejudice based on race", period, deferring the definition of the term race, and the sense in which it is a social construct, or is based on appearance, or ancestry, etc., entirely to the other article, where the discussion properly belongs. But I don't have this freedom, so the best I can do here is to argue for incremental changes. In this regard, I don't think your proposed prose is productive. It's too elaborate. Would you really continue to read an article that started with those sentences? Cheers, Eleuther (talk) 13:34, 2 October 2021 (UTC)

There's no denying that physical appearance is by far the most commonly used method of determining race, but it is not the only method. Eleuther's point about the Nazi's use of ancestry to designate Jews as a separate race stands, and to claim otherwise because the Nazis made claims about the physical appearance of Jews suggests that they would not have discriminated against Jews if they were identical to Aryans, which I think we can agree is untrue. The best solution is to recognize that both physical appearance and perceived ancestry are used to determine race.Gasolineman3 (talk) 02:48, 5 October 2021 (UTC)

Hi, thanks, Gasolineman3. You agree with me, then, that the current lead sentence is too simplistic ("on the basis of physical appearance"), because it doesn't take the important factor of perceived ancestry into account. This is why I placed the "discuss" template on the phrase. I'm hoping more editors will chime in soon, so we can get a better idea of the consensus. (The page has thousands of watchers, after all.) There are other generally-recognized cultural factors as well, such as speech (accents and dialects) and costume, and self-organization, and so on. My basic feeling is that the discussion of all these factors should mostly take place in the article on race, rather than here in the article on racism, simply on the logical grounds of reducing duplication. In other words, the article on racism should not try to provide its own definition of the idea of race. Do you agree? Eleuther (talk) 17:18, 5 October 2021 (UTC)

Hi, all, this discussion seems to have stalled, so this is my attempt to revive it. There seems to be a consensus that the term physical appearance is not a valid proxy for race, so some other term is needed in the lead sentence. I have proposed the term perceived idea of race, deferring the definition of race to the article on that subject. Does this make sense? Eleuther (talk) 03:56, 11 October 2021 (UTC)

No, for the reasons I have already given. 'Race' is a social construct, and as such has no basis beyond 'perceived ideas' in of itself. Your proposal amounts to a statement that 'racism consists of perceived ideas about (specific) perceived ideas'. And 'perceived ideas' is poor English, given its ambiguity. Who's ideas are being perceived by whom? AndyTheGrump (talk) 04:10, 11 October 2021 (UTC)

I would like to add this link from Harvard that discusses the Stanford study to the conversation on the perceived idea of race: https://sitn.hms.harvard.edu/flash/2017/science-genetics-reshaping-race-debate-21st-century/ . I believe that if we can actually corner this concept with scientific studies on this, to show that this is actually the case, that there is a perceived idea of race, then one of the two sentences I wrote above would be accurate. I am leaning towards the first.

This entire article really needs a rewrite to properly articulate that racism is a made-up construct based predominantly on skin color. Physical appearance in this article does not denote accuracy on the topic, as that is more along the lines of Ancestral and ethnic prejudice and discrimination. (Such as not serving the Irish in new york Italian neighbourhoods in the 1800s, or blacks not being able to ride anywhere but the back of the bus.)

The problem is this article has become so hotly contested that we have ignored accuracy to please those that feel their position is correct, but not accurate. IMPO, We need to ignore illogical thinking on the topics and work towards accuracy. Mjp1976 (talk) 17:12, 11 October 2021 (UTC)

Nothing in the Harvard blog you link is remotely new to anyone familiar with the topic. And nor, as far as I can see does it demonstrate that this article has any problem with 'accuracy' that you have been able to adequately explain. The article could be improved, certainly. But that will require more than statements that it is 'illogical'.

And no, racism is not 'based primarily on skin colour'. It is based entirely on the premise, (as articulated in the blog you link) that 'race' has a biological basis. Skin colour and/or other physical characteristics are then used (arbitrarily, since such characteristics are a continuum across humanity) to classify individuals or groups into whichever socially-constructed 'races' are normative and/or in the interests at the time of those with the power to impose them. It isn't an exercise in chromatography, it is politics - as the Harvard blog again makes abundantly clear. That is what this article needs to emphasise. That is what the sources tell us. AndyTheGrump (talk) 18:27, 11 October 2021 (UTC)

Looking at the above post again, it clearly came across more aggressively than I intended. Apologies to Mjp1976. I should probably try to avoid making posts while short of sleep, and maybe think about this some more when I'm in a better mood to do so. AndyTheGrump (talk) 02:44, 12 October 2021 (UTC)

Clearly, though, skin color does have a biological (genetic) basis. It is inherited. The genes in question are well-identified. There are many other inherited traits that are also correlated with race, such as the prevalence of sickle-cell anemia, etc. The question the article needs to address is how the present idea of race is related to these inherited traits. I think the answer is, not very much, but a little bit, i.e., you can't simply dismiss the ancestral element on ideological grounds. (Before you go into attack mode, Grump, please note that I am largely agreeing with you here.) I further think, as I've said a few times before, that the proper place to sort out these issues is in the article on race, not here in the article on racism. In this article, I still think the best approach is to just use a phrase like "perceived idea of race", deferring the heavy lifting to the other article. Eleuther (talk) 18:53, 13 October 2021 (UTC)

Poor English: all ideas are 'perceived'. As for 'ancestral elements', so far, you haven't actually offered any explanation so far of how this has any relevance. Everyone has ancestors. Any suggestion that this has any meaningful bearing on 'race' appears to be based on an exercise in fallacious circular logic: assuming that 'race' is something that can be inherited, and therefore people must have inherited it from their ancestors. Neither ancestry nor population genetics do anything whatsoever to demonstrate that 'race' has an objective meaning: something which should be self-evident when one looks at just how arbitrary, contextual and overtly politicised it is, and always has been. Population generics has instead, in regard to the specific example you cite, the sickle cell trait, demonstrated that rather than being a consequence of 'race', its relative prevalence is instead the consequence of natural selection due to local environmental pressures (e.g. the presence of malaria-bearing mosquitos), and that 'race' has nothing to do with it. People with ancestors from areas where malaria was prevalent are more likely to have the relevant allele. Areas widely distributed across the world, with no correlation with 'race'. And much the same can be said for any other cross-population genetic variations - there are no genes for race. No single gene for skin colour. Skin colour is influenced by multiple genes, with distributions of different alleles varying widely in a manner that has next-to-no correlation with 'race' beyond the obvious one that the 'lighter-skin' people inventing the racial categorisations have been using 'darker skin' as one of their arbitrary criteria, as and when expedient.

So no, Wikipedia should not defer definitions of 'race' elsewhere. This is an encyclopaedia (or at least, tries to be), and articles are expected to actually discuss their subject matter. Not shuffle it off elsewhere because someone doesn't like what the article has to say. AndyTheGrump (talk) 20:53, 13 October 2021 (UTC)

Further to this, it should be noted that the article cites four sources for the disputed sentence (the first in the lede) I have looked at three of them, and as it currently stands, the article concurs with what these sources say (I've not been able to check remaining source, as it is effectively a dead link to an Oxford Dictionaries definition of unknown date, and thus not much use as a source anyway). It is a requirement that Wikipedia articles be sourced - particularly anything likely to be disputed. Accordingly, per policy, we cannot simply revise the lede to say something else, based on our own personal opinions. Unless and until alternate sources are offered, the lede has to stand. If other sources of equal validity and weight are ever found suggesting that it should say something else instead, we may have to reconsider, and include what such sources say as well (not instead...) but that isn't the case now. AndyTheGrump (talk) 23:49, 13 October 2021 (UTC)

Yes, Wikipedia is an encyclopedia. But the article on race is part of the same encyclopedia. So deferring the elucidation of the term race to that article does not constitute "shuffling off" the issue. It is just a suggestion for organizing the overall material in a more logical manner, so that the same term is not defined separately, and perhaps conflictingly, in two different places in the encyclopedia. This should not be a controversial idea. Eleuther (talk) 19:36, 14 October 2021 (UTC)

This is an article on racism. Like any other article, it explains in the lede what its topic is. And cites appropriate sources when doing so. Sources defining what racism is. Your personal objections to what the sources cited have to say on the matter are of no consequence here. Since you have offered absolutely no source-based or Wikipedia-policy-based justifications for changing the lede, I consider this topic closed. AndyTheGrump (talk) 20:12, 14 October 2021 (UTC)

I haven't raised any objections to the cited sources. You are imagining that, I guess as part of your general attack on my proposal, from every direction you can think of. I am only suggesting a better way to organize the material between the two articles. Cheers, Eleuther (talk) 20:55, 14 October 2021 (UTC)

This is an article on racism. Like any other article, it explains in the lede what its topic is. Go troll somewhere else. AndyTheGrump (talk) 22:05, 14 October 2021 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Physical appearance redux

I would like to raise again the idea of replacing the phrase "physical appearance" in the lead sentence of the article with something more appropriate. Please comment if you have a constructive idea on the subject. Thanks. Eleuther (talk) 22:27, 15 October 2021 (UTC)

I have just revised the lede. It no longer uses the term 'physical appearance', and now probably concurs with the cited sources more closely. AndyTheGrump (talk) 22:35, 15 October 2021 (UTC)

Thanks. Eleuther (talk) 22:46, 15 October 2021 (UTC)

Are we glancing past the question of definition: is the combination of othering and essentialization and hatred accurately called "racism" even in the absence of phenotypic distinctions between in-groups and out-groups? Perhaps we should report clearly the rather distinct minority view that no phenotypic distinction is required? Sylvia de Jonge (talk) 19:44, 23 October 2021 (UTC)

If a minority view is one that is held by a significant subset of relevant commentators on the subject, it should probably be discussed in the article. I'd think we'd need pretty strong sourcing to include it in the lede. AndyTheGrump (talk) 21:30, 23 October 2021 (UTC)

We have a closely-related discussion at Islamophobia#Racism, but I feel that we need at least an explicit mention here. I'd also suggest that a sentence in the lede if only to spare others my own experience of confusion. I see limited, but I'd say significant, comments based on the assumption that any dislike of a group or its conceptual basis is racism, even if no heritable or visible distinction is involved. Heng's long argument for this idea does at least enable me to comprehend the redefinition used for these comments, even if I don't propose to use that redefinition myself.

So I propose that we include in the article, perhaps at the end of the section on etymology, definition, and usage, something like: "Some commentators argue that racism need not involve any heritable or visible characteristics, and that hatred of a group believed to have essential characteristics is sufficient to qualify as racism. Comments welcome. Sylvia de Jonge (talk) 12:18, 24 October 2021 (UTC)

Do you have sources other than Heng making this argument? If so, we should try to get a sense of what their general consensus is. I'd assume that from a social-science perspective, it will have to be rather more nuanced than a simple suggestion that "hatred of a group believed to have essential characteristics is sufficient to qualify as racism", at least without a clearer definition of what 'group' means. Prejudice is essentialist almost by definition, and is frequently extended to 'groups' that have nothing whatsoever to do with 'race'. We need to be wary of implying that 'racism' is just a synonym for 'group prejudice'. It isn't, at least as I understand current academic consensus. It is a specific phenomenon, with specific historical roots, that set it apart as an object for analysis, distinct from say simple xenophobia, and from the all-too-common tendency to essentialise the 'other'. AndyTheGrump (talk) 17:27, 24 October 2021 (UTC)