Just to beat my head against a wall one more time, yes, bigotry against Islam is racism.

[LuvNewcastle]

10. I think the reason we're seeing such

an argument on the topic of race is that 'race' means different things in different parts of the world.

Most of us on DU have a view of race that is more dependent upon skin color than culture or religion. The reason Americans see things that way is because of our history of black slavery and eugenics. Race, as in color, is still important as to how we view people's socioeconomic status, as well as a host of other things.

Many scientists used to divide humans into Negroid, Caucasoid, and Mongoloid races. Of course, there are huge numbers of people who don't fit into any of those categories, but that did not stop those scientists from trying to pigeonhole people.

Undoubtedly, one reason for those classifications is the biblical story of Noah and his three sons who re-populated the world after the great flood. The racial divisions of the eugenicists were seen as having validity because they seemed to coincide with ancient myths.

'Race' means different things depending upon which area of the world you happen to be. Since race is really an artificial construct, no one is truly right or wrong about what it means.

Dividing people into races is a destructive tendency among humans, but I don't think it's going away anytime soon. In the meantime, I'll just accept whatever classifications people want to choose for themselves. If someone wants to call himself this race or that, it's no skin off my nose.