INTRODUCTION:
Oxford Dictionary gives a set of meanings
for the word “Race”: ‘each of the major divisions of human kind, having distinct physical characteristics’; ‘an
ethnic group’; ‘a group descended from a common ancestor’; ‘a group of people
or things with a common feature’; ‘ a distinct population within a
species: a subspecies’. It goes further
to define ‘Racism’ as ‘the belief that there are characteristics, abilities or
qualities specific to each race’. It subsequently added the later developed connotation
that ‘Racism denotes discrimination against or antagonism towards other races’.
Charles Darwin’s ‘Theory of Evolution’ has explained to us the preferential
selection of fitter races (species) in their fight for survival. Taken
together, we logically have to accept that ‘race’ and so perhaps ‘racism’ was
pre ordained in the order of the system of evolution of living species on this
earth (and perhaps the entire cosmic system).
HISTORICAL
BACKGROUND:
Before we come to the core issue of how to
tackle ‘racism’ as it manifests today, it is useful to consider how we came
through the ages with our racial prejudices. As the very definition of ‘racism’
hinges on the word ‘belief’ that one class of people is superior or different,
racism pre-supposes imagined prejudices. Prejudices give rise to pride,
rivalry, contempt and therefore culminate in violence. If we look back into our
history we see the pages replete with any number of instances of one race
subjugating the other. In Europe, the Celts were systemically eliminated first
by the Vikings, then both the Celts and Vikings were brutally wiped out by the
Saxons and Normans, then by Greeks and Romans. At the same time, the Egyptians
(a great Civilization they were!) were systematically enslaving the ‘Jewish’
pagans, using them to haul mountain rocks in the scorching desert heat to build
the tombs for their dead.. the Great Pyramids!! Romans invaded and annihilated
or bastardized the Egyptian culture as well as parts of the Middle East which was part of their Byzantine Empire
spanning across Mesopotamia.
In and around the same time, the Arab
tribes were fighting amongst themselves
(again a characteristic of
‘racism’ by which sub-sects fight with each other; like
the Catholics persecuting the Protestants
and vice versa in the 16th Century).Prophet Mohammed, himself a tribal
chieftain, evolved “Islam” so as to unite all these warring Arab tribes, which he did during his time.
However, after his demise came again their infighting, broadly the eastern
tribes became the Shias and the others
remaining Sunnis; even today Shias and Sunnis continue their cat and mouse
relationship!.That was the time when yet another race was having a flourishing
civilization east of Arabia--- the great Persian civilization. It had all the
wealth, trade and so a flourishing culture. Islam invaded them; racially it was
an invasion of the Arab race to cut to size the splendour of the Persian race.
Persians could not stand up to the brute might of the hoards of Arab tribes.
They converted themselves to Islam, but as ‘Shias’! The enmity
continues till date on which I need not elucidate. Suffice it to say, so
many bitter gulf wars have been fought mainly on the basis of this historic
prejudice between the Persians and the Arabs, fuelled further by the modern day
greed for fossil fuel resources.
The 16th and 17th centuries saw the
European colonialism: the white race establishing its hegemony over the entire
world .British loaded the poor Indians
in leaky ships like sardines and moved them across perilous seas to do their
plantation work in their other far off colonies in South Africa, West Indies, Fiji and many such
places. Many such ships sank in the tumultuous high seas, but then the British
had unending supply line from the large Indian population! The British, French
and the Spaniards who settled in
the two Americas, systematically
massacred and exterminated the ethnic Red Indians (the ‘apaches’) and the
Hispanic races. Those stories are equally
brutal and violent, smacking of total inhumanity. Some of those familiar
with the evolution of modern USA will know the brutality meted out to the
brave Sioux Indian Chief, Tatanka Lyotake
nicknamed by the settlers as the ‘Sitting Bull’. Likewise, the
systematic way in which the settlers of Australia and the New zealand in the
18th and 19th century, decimated almost
the entire population of the ’aborigines’ (the word is derived from the Latin
word ‘ab-origine’ meaning ‘coming from the beginning’) and the native Maoris. All
these brutalities, bloodshed and cruel programmes were enacted fundamentally
because of ‘racism’: a belief that a set of people were superior to others and
the ‘others’ were born to be slaves or
if not found useful as slaves for
the purposes of the usurping race, to be annihilated so that their possessions
can be grabbed.
The
later part of the 19th century saw the American conscience being roused
against slavery practised by the southern states where, the
African blacks, who were bought and brought as indentured labour as
also as slaves from the continent of Africa
were being treated as sub human beings. For the practice to be eradicated it needed
the tireless and dauntless efforts of many a renowned men: to name
the two prominent ones ,Abraham Lincoln and in the middle of the 20th
century, Martin Luther King. King was assassinated but his 'civil rights
movement' once for all delivered to the blacks
equal rights in all the states of America.
Around the same time Mahatma Gandhi fought for
the rights of the browns and blacks in the British colony of South Africa; he
later on carried on the war against 'untouchability' practised in India by
upper caste Hindus against some of the
lower castes(so graded by society!! is it not racism?).Later Nelson Mandela fought
against 'apartheid' practised by the white to discriminate against the blacks
and browns in South Africa; this was in fact intensification of the movement
earlier initiated by Mahatma Gandhi.
The
violent convulsions on an unprecedented scale that human race as a whole
faced in the 1930s and 1940s when the Nazis
tried to exterminate the entire
"Jewish race" from the face of the earth through their concentration
camps and gas chambers and the mass
murders of millions of ethnic Jews in the erstwhile USSR by Joseph Stalin
through his 'gulags", were extraordinary and ghastly
aberrations of the racial prejudices; Nazis suffered from a myth that 'Aryan'
race is superior to all races, that all other races were born to serve the
superior race and that the Jewish race was considered a pestilence-- an
extreme and bizarre distortion of the existing prejudices amongst races.
Stalin's action was more political: to annihilate an unorganized set of people
so as to ensure the meager resources for the ethnic Slav race; also elimination
of Jews meant routing out intellectual thinking and political opposition, and that eminently
suited him to cement his position as the dictator.
All this is history. What does this make us
understand? Racism raises its head in various forms of prejudices and basically
the objective of its practioners is to exploit the weaker sections for the
benefit of the 'pre-conceived' superior race or caste! Kenya fought for
independence from the white domination. It got. So did many of the African
states. But did 'racism' stop? No. On the contrary, it reared its head in
different forms. 'Tutsi' tribes started massacring other tribes of Rwandans and
Burundians! Eritreans killed Ethiopians and vice versa. Somali tribes are
involved in internecine intra and inter group warfare. Southern Sudanese have
been still fighting against the hegemony of the Northerners. The list is
endless. Japanese's maltreatment of the Koreans and the Chinese in the 19th and
20th Century is still bitterly remembered. Chinese's ill treatment of the
Tibetans and Vietnamese and all these continue. We now realize that 'racism'
can never be eradicated. It can only be controlled and kept in check, if we
have the will.
WHAT
ARE WE TO DO:
Before we chalk out a plan on what we have
to do and then implement it , we need to know in what forms we see now and we
may see in future , the ugly 'Racism'. Unlike yester years, 'racism' today,
represents exploiting the weaker and the unorganized sectors of population by
the organized sectors or the privileged classes. Exploitation by the Industrially
developed nations of the developing countries is another form of modern racism
practised by the peoples of developed world against the peoples of the under
privileged world. Exploitation of women, abusing children and violations of human
rights of the meek by the mighty, are all modern forms of racism. Inequality of
justice to women in certain conservative societies controlled by religious
fundamentalism, is another form of modern day racism.
Having said that, one has to understand the
stark reality. Let us go back to the very definition of 'racism' with which we
started this paper."Racism" is a belief. In that sense, each
individual can carry his/her own prejudices and preferences in his/her mind:
For example, even today many men from the brown, black and yellow races
have a fascination for a 'white woman', though as communities they complain of racism. Amongst the Indians,
preference for 'fair complexion' is well known. Likewise, the majority
of the white race or yellow race may
not want to inter marry or marry the blacks or browns. We can keep listing
all such individual' racial preferences and prejudices' in the minds of people.
These can never be removed. Also, we have, as a society, no right to curtail
individual preferences so long as they do not interfere with the society's
rights. It is fundamental human right to have one's own preferences WITHOUT
trampling on others' preferences. We must respect that. We must never, by force,
try to remove these preferences and prejudices; such coercion will only
boomerang as the 'hardened crude racism'
that existed in the previous centuries.
As a society and as governments and
organized bodies, we should not promote these preferences and prejudices. In
terms of rights and justice, all should have equal opportunities and rights and
none less or more, on the basis of colour, class, creed or the stratum of society
to which one belongs. Women and children should have full rights as male
adults. If the United Nations is empowered to push the governments all over the
world to follow such a simple but egalitarian principle, the world will slowly
get rid of 'racism’; over a period it will be totally weeded out of the human
society in such a way that it does not rear its head again in a different
'avatar' of exploitation by one set of people
of another. Believe me, a century of such egalitarian existence, if
consciously followed by the entire human race, will make individual preferences to vanish
and intermingling of the entire human race into one, will happen at least by
the next century.
Thereafter, human race has to find ways to eradicate
the cruel 'racism' that it collectively practices against the 'animal race' and
the green vegetation. That will be another topic reserved for the next stage
and for a different forum.