The world is a big structure composed by complex interconnected systems. Sometimes benefic ones, sometimes hurtful ones. We call these the domination systems.
The presence of domination systems make it so that people who have power will constantly seek to find a
justification of their dominations over others in the natural order of the world.
This is why you will see rightists always rely on nature to justify their bigotry. It's a form of seeking of validation for what they believe to be "natural".
As such, if you give people the tool of "races", you will most likely give people a reason to compare the attribute of those deemed inferior and those deemed superior based on the prerequisite of people in power, those who are in position of domination.
When the concept of humans races (through scientific racism) was invented, it was used as a justification of all the atrocities of the western world and the colonizations.
This systems was not only used as a justification for the superiority of some people over others, but as a tool of domination, categorization and exploitation.
And all of this was linked to a special status :
whiteness.
This special status implied that no matter how high or low you are in the chain of domination and exploitation, if you are
CONSIDERED white, you will be given a special
social salary (
forms of social implied benefits) that will not be accessible to people who are non-white.
I want to emphazised one word here: "Considered"
This is the tricky part of racism that most people don't know : Whiteness is a social status. Meaning that
you can technically lose it. Being considered white doesn't necessarily mean that you are white, it means that the system in power consider you and people like you .. white. And thus deservable of a special social status and benefits.
The Irish, for ex, while being white, were NOT considered as white people for a long time. Whiteness is a social status that can evolves based off contextual interests. Another exemple are people converting to Islam in France, who lose their whiteness through this conversion the more they adopt religious signs. These people will then be considered as stranger or suspect. (
cf this explanation for the french here)
And this result in difference social process :
Racialization first (
people who are not considered white are assigned a race),
white supremacy, which is the overall social system that seek to maintain the social status of domination that is whiteness and overall social and economic order around this, and what Charles W. Mills named the
Racial contract : Which is a form of implied social contract that define who is human and who is not and give every white people the knowledge that they have a special political and social status of people outside of whiteness. > This is the reason why you will see white working people vote AGAINST their own interest for conservatist just because to them, the racial order of whiteness will feel more important. And they know that before they go down, people outside of whiteness will go down first. (
all of this is of course not always conscientized).
Finally there is one special social process results of whiteness and create the conditions for its maintenance :
The seeking of whiteness.
> If whiteness is a social status and create an implied social and racial contract that can be gained or lose.. it means that the power can use this to its advantage.
Frantz Fanon described this process as the colonial power which will create the made up implied belief that whiteness can be obtaine. Thus creating a system where the power will constantly pushes subjugated population to seek this social status and identity without NEVER giving it to them. This, as a way to maintain the colonial order and perpetuate the exploitation of people through the alliances within the subgjugated groups.
In our current world, this works the same way but with racialization. Through racialization, the white power creates the conditions for racialized people to SEEK the social status of whiteness. In response, the power will creates a form of
social gratification system through exemplarity to maintain the social order:
- Jewish will be considered as ally of whiteness
- Asian will be mostly considered as exemplary
- Brown and black people will be considered as noisy and dangerous
- Muslim and Arabs will be considered as hostile
The more a people will seek an “exemplary” statusin whiteness by assimilating, negating their own cultures, beliefs and practice and "
blend in", the more they will be rewarded by the power (
depending on its own interest > For ex, the current whiteness status of zionist jews is linked to the imperial interests of the west in the middle east)
But they will NEVER obtain the status of whiteness. Which means that no matter if they are a president, they will STILL face the domination, racialization and the dehumanization of whitesupremacy.
It is not in the interests of the west to consider black and brown people as white.
So racialized people will seek to blend in. They will even go against other racialized people in order to obtain this status, but at the end of the day. They will always face the same domination that is whitesupremacy. On small.. or bigger scales.
This is why races in humans is a dangerous concept.
It's a tool of domination.