Social Injustice of
Interracial
Relationships
By Ilein14, Hartland, WI
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Image Credit: Ashley D., Philadelphia, PA
We can not chose who we are attracted to, can we? Americans
have been bias and discriminatory towards others decisions ever
since other races started mingling and mixing with the majority’s
“pure blood”. The civil rights was the peak of this mindless
prejudice, but in our era scientists and other leaders in society
have claimed that these interactions are against nature or wrong.
The truth is that interracial relationships are just a part of
humans’ animal impulses or instinctive natures. The civil rights
era that created prejudice against interracial relationships has
prolonged through time by being taught as a “counter-nature”
phenomenon but can be fought through biologistic thinking, like
instinctive nature or animal impulses.
The civil rights of Africans were first put in jeopardy when they
were forced out of their land and taken to America against their
wills. Ever since that time in history the “purebloods” looked
down upon those of other skin colors, which caused prejudice
against the ones that strayed from the norms of marriage within
their own race. These prejudices can be dated all the way to
colonial times when the first settlers came to America, but these
strays didn’t last for long. In the 1600’s laws declared these
mixed interactions illegal. “"To focus on the issue of race, an
illustration of the institutionalzation of these marriage practices
agathogamy or conformity to rules, and cacogamy or
unconformity may be found in the history of legislation about
relations between Europeans and Africans in the New World.
Thus, for example, half a century after colonization began, the
first anti-miscegenation laws between whites and blacks came
into force in Maryland in 1661, later also extending to other
states. Afterwards, mixed-race marriages were prohibited in the
United States in 30 out of 49 states until, in 1967, the Supreme
Court declared this to be unconstitutional”, (Ronacarti 13). Even
considering that the prohibitions on interracial relationships were
declared unconstitutional doesn’t mean that prejudice stopped
there. Americans tried to find ways around it by implementing
systems to prevent the mixing of races. An example of these
systems is the famous slogan from that era “separate but equal”,
which basically told the other races that they shouldn’t involve
themselves with the “purebloods”. This saying sums up both the
political and biological viewpoints on the situations happening, as
it is obviously noted both sides are very one-sided. After the
twentieth century rolled in these views created a standard called
the one drop rule, this rule was that if you even have one drop of
African-American in you then you are still considered to be black.
"Perhaps nobody has insisted as clearly as Myrdal (1944) that
when racial segregation was abolished and equality between
whites and blacks was recognized politically, the question of
racial purity-if the whites, of course-would also be more at stake.
The famous slogan 'equal but seperate' perfectly sums up the
two social representations, the polotical and the biological, by the
means of which relations between whites and blacks were-and
continue to be-defined. It was only after colonization, towards
the end of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the
twentieth, that the 'one drop' rule (the belief that one drop of
black blood made you black) started to have major influence",
(Ronacarti 13). Even though these prejudices calmed down they
continued through history by the “counter-nature” phenomenon.
Nature works in mysterious ways, but these mysterious ways
wouldn’t explain why it would be unnatural for two different
colored human beings to be in a relationship. Scientists teach
Americans that mingling with people of other races and skin
colors will counteract against the superiority of their race. These
scientists say that the superior race’s heightened abilities or
talents will decline with the amount of offspring they accumulate
over time with the other races, ultimately ending negatively for
superiority and positively for the minority. "These sterotypical
and prejudiced beliefs about interracial relations have also been
propagated by science. As is well known, 'science' has biologized
the representation of the human species, put forward racist
theories, and applied the principals of eugenics to humans. As
well as the belief that humans belonged to different races, there
were soon other beliefs that considered certain races to be
genetically more talented or more developed than other. It was
also thought that just as the mixing of races could be a factor in
improvement of inferior races, it could also be degenerative for
the superior races. These beliefs formed the basis for a number
of 'assumilationist' policies in which it was proposed that the
'superior' race should fertilize the 'inferior' race, whereas
segregationist policies prohibited the superior race from mingling
with the inferior”, (Ronacarti 13-14). Racial prejudice may have
diminished over time, but there is still a lesser occurrence of
interracial marriages rather than, for example, interreligious
relationships or internationality relationship. Even though the
involvement of whites and blacks being together was still alive,
biologists put forth racist theories and policies to prevent what
their thoughts of taboo was. "In order to further explore this
biologistic thinking, we will focus on interracial sexual
relationships. Myrdal (1944 p.606) claims that 'sexual
segregation is the most persuasive form of segregation and the
concern about 'race purity' is in a sense, basic.' He adds: 'no
other way of crossing the colour line is attended by the emotion
commonly associated with violating a social taboo as
intermarriage and extra-marital relations between a Negro man
and a white woman.' At present, the data about the number of
mixed marriages confirm Myrdal's hypothesis. Studies in the
United States (Kalmijn 1998) show that despite the weakening of
the norms of racial segregation and the abolition of the
miscegenation laws, interracial marriages are increasingly less
frequent than those between different nationalities and different
relegions. The stigmatization of marriages between whites and
blacks is still alive. According to Kalmijn (1998), relationships
between blacks and whites are troublesome in the social sphere.
Kalmijn does not go into detail about this but, according to our
hypothesis, what is troublesome is a biologistic representation
that makes people perceive interracial mixing as something
against nature,” (Ronacarti 14). Biologists may have produced
racist theories that demonized interracial interactions, but if we
are to overcome prejudice against interracial relationships we
have to understand biologistic thinking in terms of animal
impulses and instinctive natures.
The basis for many human behaviours come from wild and
unstoppable impulses, even if the action is looked down upon or
despised. Studies show that people who start relationships start
them based on quality preferences or similarities, not on race.
Meaning there’s no reason that others should label a relationship
as taboo just based on upon race when they don’t even know the
quality of the individuals in it. People who aren’t in a interracial
relationship cannot respect the aspects of one like a person who
is in a interracial relationship. "Furthermore, studies on marriage
or couples show that monogamy just as much as homogamy are
two highly frequent norms. Partners usually present a
homogeneity or similarity in variables such as age, social,
religion, ethnic group, level of education, neighbourhood, and
similarities of opinions. Our hypothesis is that an interracial
sexual relationship. The ontologization here lies in explaining this
type of behaviour on the basis of a wild and irrepressible
impulse, considering the interracial relationship as something
monstrous that stigmatizes the people involved,” (Ronacarti 1415). People who can’t respect interracial relationships often have
to “self-regulate” themselves. Self-regulation is a process where
a person is caught in a interracial interaction and they have to
control how they think and behave to try and fight off the
feelings of stereotypes and prejudice. These feelings are
uncontrollable though; the thoughts and behaviours of
stereotypes are automatically induced. The individuals that have
these automatically induced feelings have a very high level of
racial bias. If all people with high levels of racial bias selfregulated themselves it would cause successful negotiation
between a prejudice person and a person of different race. Selfregulation is another way of biologistic thinking that can help
stop prejudice against interracial interactions. "For instance,
during interracial interactions, individuals monitor and control
their thoughts and behaviors in order to combat the expression
of stereotypes and negative attitudes that are often activated
automatically and unintentionally. Engaging in self-regulation to
combat the expression of prejudice may be especially critical to
the successful negotiation of interracial interactions by individuals
with relatively high levels of racial bias. Indeed, recent research
suggests that the extent to which individuals engage in selfregulation during interracial interactions varies as a function of
racial bias,” (Shelton 397). So biologistic thinking will help stop
prejudice against the other race and any interracial interaction.
Biologistic thinking, like instinctive nature or animal impulses,
can fight prejudice against interracial relationships that has
prolonged through time by being taught as a “counter-nature”
phenomenon, but was created by the civil rights era. Prejudice
against interracial relationships should be stopped, it is a result
of natural happenings and impulses so it cannot be controlled.
It’s important that this happens because our social development
is highly affected by interracial interactions, so very bias people
could control their prejudice then the amount of social
development would increase. Just imagine how far the human
race could advance if the amount of prejudice between interracial
individuals was decreased.