Dear Racists and White Nationalists
Here’s the deal. The world at large is feeling the effects and tremors of the last, feeble attempts of white nationalism grasping its old, veiny hands around the concept of racial superiority.
They know that separate is not equal, yet they yearn for the days when we were separated. They feel more comfortable with their “own” kind. Maybe they wouldn’t publicly speak out about it, even, but surely they would disown their daughters and sons for marrying outside of their race.
Unfortunately for white nationalists all over this colorful, beautiful planet, you have been believing in a fiction that has never, in fact, existed at all.
The realization of the fact that there never has been a “superior” race on this planet is the root of most civil unrest on our planet. While we are here, wondering on if we agree with the statement I just made, let us pause on this mental image of earth. Zoom out for a moment. Humor me.
Let’s momentarily root our thinking in the Middle Paleolithic era (300,000 to 30,000 years ago) and the following three anthropological facts:
1. Homo sapiens, the first modern humans, evolved from their early hominid predecessors between 200,000 and 300,000 years ago. They developed a capacity for language about 50,000 years ago.
2. The first modern humans began moving outside of Africa starting about 70,000–100,000 years ago.
3. Humans are the only known species to have successfully populated, adapted to, and significantly altered a wide variety of land regions across the world, resulting in profound historical and environmental impacts.
Now, let’s take a look, briefly, at an animation of how our species migrated (due to changing climate) since that time:
In a purposefully reductionist manner, allow me to paraphrase the anthropological trajectory that leads to my point: We all came from the same place; the same original climate. Because of that, we all had the same physical traits and characteristics as Human Beings, Version 1.0.
Remember Darwin’s Finches? The little birds on the Galapagos Islands that evolved larger, stronger beaks because seeds on their little plot of land became increasingly tougher and harder to crack? Just like those finches adapted, humans evolved new physical traits as the climate and conditions around us made migratory travel to other areas possible.
Slowly, we spread out across the continents. Some settled in places we liked, and others moved on to explore, settling new frontiers. Our eye shapes adapted to settlements with more wind, making them narrower to protect our precious vision. Our height and muscle mass adapted to how and where we hunted for food. Our skin color adapted to the seasons and how much (or how little) sun we were exposed to, triggering melanin for protection.
Brief historical detour over.
We are back in present day, dear reader, and focusing on the matter at hand: race.
“Race” is a social construct based on physical traits and characteristics, and isn’t something that distinguishes us on a genetic level. Race is not in our DNA.
Here’s the rub. The through line that I hope to impart on even just a few of you reading this:
Human beings fall in love. And then we procreate.
That is in our DNA.
No matter where we are, no matter how inconvenient or messy or perfect it is. We fall in love. The moment that the land barriers shifted and allowed us the glorious freedom of travel, we expanded and continued to fall in love and find mates wherever we went. That is a genie you can never put back in the bottle. We can’t go back to isolated settlements that know nothing of one another. We can’t unlearn the global knowledge and instant connection at our fingertips that the internet provides. And we sure as hell can’t stop our primal instincts of falling in love.
So stop fighting it.
National Geographic did a beautiful feature in 2014. They visualized what humans will look like in 2050. And it is stunning. The beauty of all of our ancestral migrations swirled together in a mix.
And that’s just it. We’re a mix of features and colors, but we’re all the same “race”.
Think of how much time you’ll save yourself, and how many relationships you could mend in your life if you stopped seeing our natural evolution as wrong. You can’t fight nature; it always wins.
Think about how much more peaceful our planet could be if everyone just remembered the facts of our history and what they say about our collective future. This is us. We are one.
And nothing — no one — can stop us.
