The Human Race

I am proudly married to an Asian-American. Asian-American is not a hyphenated word that describes race. It is a hyphenated word that evidences a personal journey. The hate and violence in America must stop. A starting point is to stop using words and phrases that make artificial distinctions between human beings.

Let us be real here. There is only one race: The Human Race. All this talk of a Black race, Asian race, American Indian race, etc. are all fictions created by ignorant white supremacists under some ill-conceived ideology of division. These are the same ignorant white supremacists that support Donald Trump and the 250 or so new laws and pending bills to suppress voter rights in America.

I implore media outlets, journalists, and public officials to stop referring to any human being as anything other than simply human. Immutable physical characteristics do not define a human being and calling them out offers no value to the public discourse. When race is used interchangeably with a physical characteristic the message to the public is that those physical characteristics are differences that matter. In fact, they are not differences that matter. As one of my professors used to say, “is that a difference that makes a difference?” In the case of physical characteristics, the answer is an unequivocal, resounding no, so stop referring to them and talking about them as though they do make a difference.

The public lexicon needs to be turned on its head. Instead of calling a violent crime motivated by animus toward a person with a certain physical characteristic a “racial hate crime” or even just a “hate crime” we should be calling it a “supremacist crime” or a “white supremacist crime” or a “crime against humanity”. Let us put the emphasis where it belongs — on the mentality and ideology of supremacy or barbarism, not on the artificially created differences that do not make a difference.

I understand the concept of physical characteristics cannot be ignored entirely, but by turning the lexicon on its head we can make a difference. For example, in a case like the murder of George Floyd, why can’t the headline be “barbaric Minneapolis Police Officer kills man after knelling on his neck for 8 minutes and 46 seconds?” Or “Minneapolis Police Officer inhumanely kills a man after kneeling on his neck for 8 minutes and 46 seconds”.

I do not want to remove the spotlight from the horrific treatment of black people by some in positions of power. That needs to be called out and punished every time. Instead, I am suggesting that not reinforcing differences through the public discourse can help, even if only a little.

Let us ban the use of words like “biracial” that again emphasize differences that do not exist. There is only one race: The Human Race. The word biracial is an oxymoron and a dangerous one at that because it perpetuates the fiction that there are actually differences between members of the human race.

Likewise, hate crimes laws should be renamed or eliminated. A crime against humanity should be severely punished. When we call a law a hate crime law instead of a supremacist law or a crime against humanity we are again feeding the present zeitgeist with a dialogue that physical characteristics are a difference that make a difference. Instead, we should be saying that a violent crime against any member of the human race, regardless of the flawed supremacist thinking or ideology of the criminal, is a crime against humanity that is severely punished.

Let us do better by loving and supporting the Human Race while we suppress and discourage supremacy of any type.