Introduction
Race is a broad concept with different meanings and implications in society. Race can be defined as the mass competition between people and other groups to attain a particular fundamental objective in society. Philosophically, race is a social grouping of individuals with a shared ethnicity and identity aligned with a common socio-psychological grouping. In society, the topic of race and racism has become controversial because of how certain groups of people are treated. For instance, examples of particular groups that have suffered from many injustices in society are Asian Americans and African Americans. This implies that race is significant to legal, political, social, and moral philosophy. At the same time, the popularity of race has grown because of its relation to critical issues such as status, health differences, social justice, and even ethnicity. Therefore, the prevalence of these issues in society raises important philosophical questions about humanity, including “Has race been used to classify humans appropriately?” In Blackness Visible, Mills introduces a compelling argument for incorporating race as a philosophical category, challenging the traditional boundaries of intellectual inquiry. In this essay, I will support race as a philosophical category, as including race is critical for a more holistic and comprehensive context of experience and reality.
Historically, the concept of race has experienced many successive ages, which have signified humanity’s division into different sections, including biological foundation and genealogical investigation. Based on these two common approaches, it is evident that racism has been largely excluded from its philosophical category historically. For many decades, race has been approached from its biological foundation, which in turn has helped create discrete racial groupings. The biological foundation is inherited generationally, enabling people to identify a particular group quickly via their genealogy and ancestry. Geologically, every race is divided according to one’s specific geography, including South and North America, Asia, Europe, and Africa. This implies that people of different races can be understood through their manifestation of phenotypes, including bone structure, hair structure, eye shape, and skin color. Hence, the concept of race has undergone significant historical change, with the field of philosophy receiving little attention. This has led to the emergence of a Eurocentric perspective on racism to further the cause of the Western world and promote a racial inequality agenda. According to Mills, blacks predominantly suffer from underrepresentation in the Western world, leading to the silencing of their cultural identity and existence, even from fundamental philosophical abstractions. Hence, the decisive act to incorporate racial discussion in the broader philosophical field will promote greater inclusivity of these races and diversity.
Race is a philosophical category that requires a fundamental understanding of society’s cultural, political, economic, and social structures and their toll on individuals’ lives. According to social constructionists, race is externally defined by an individual’s skin color, hair style, body shape, and even other skin properties. However, this is a pseudo-biological approach because it advocates for the social construct of race without delving into other important issues. Philosophically, the absence of such narratives that stress the importance of race shapes the general whole being of a person simply because they need to categorize humans properly. For instance, when race is socially constructed, a significant gap is left between one particular group of ethnic people and another. This leads to the conception of the idea of’ survival of the fittest race,’ strongly suggesting that one specific race should fight over resources to ensure its existence in society, thus influencing both its social and political destiny. Hence, Mills explicitly commends that reconceptualization is vital to balancing these societal issues. For quite a while, Euro-Americans have overlooked the universal human equality principle when dealing with groups such as African Americans. Mills argues, “They know that what is in the books is largely mythical as a general statement of principles, that it was never intended to be applicable to them in the first place.” In this account, race should be approached differently as a relational philosophical entity, not simply monologic, dialogic, or monadic. Including race is a good thing that insists on contesting and speaking status. It is a historical moment for Western philosophy to include all the central features of all people’s existence and give them a voice for championing their will and humanity.
Mills believes that when race is incorporated mainly as a critical philosophical category, the common issues experienced by both sub-persons and persons will radically differ. This will allow people to broadly speak with quality assurance about their particular problems, which will be necessary for other groups. Therefore, this implies that changing the traditional hierarchies of centrality is the key to revitalizing various disciplines. Zack argues that some biological sciences, such as medicine, evolutionary biology, physiology, genetics, and anthropology, considerably revised their content on racial matters in the 20th century. For instance, inherited culture was separated from inherited physical race, later understood as historical events. The realities would then be familiar when the racial discussion is approached philosophically, both for whites and nonwhites. Ideally speaking, it is evident that white students will most likely be skeptical and bewildered in a defector-segregated society because of the racial structuring of knowledge and experience. Based on this speculation, the inclusion of race will follow a pedagogical approach to offer a concise and comprehensive account of the sociological and historical background of all races.
Including race as a philosophical category is essential, and that particularly promotes intersectionality in society. Generally speaking, Zack argues that many aspects of culture affect the conceptualization of race and its understanding. This form of intersectionality explains the common gendered experience difference, contributing to tensions among race, gender, and feminism. For instance, the element of politics has failed in its objective to unite people but instead promoted discrimination against poor white people, LGBTQ people, black women, and women. Economically, however, primarily oppressed individuals will be paid lower wages to prevent them from being productive. Therefore, addressing these issues is essential to attaining positive, peaceful co-existence and experience, irrespective of ability, age, social class, sex, and even race. This implies that when race is overlooked at these intersections, different people will continue to suffer from harm and injustice because of a lack of opportunities and resources. Thus, the inclusion of race will serve as a significant milestone for addressing such existing complexities, which remain suppressed in almost every corner of the world. According to Roberts & Rizzo, this can be done by establishing the link between essentialism and category labels. Through category labels, philosophy will stress the significance of numbers in sharing a fundamental common essence for enhancing people’s identities. This approach also helps change meaningful discussions regarding discrimination, prejudice, and racial stereotyping.
A more holistic and comprehensive culture will be created in society based on a precise understanding of the ethical implications of race. Often, political and social philosophy and ethics regard racism distinctively as a topic of its own. However, nothing can be further from the truth. Racism, at its core, is about ethics and principles. It is the ethics of racism that define how a person treats another person. In fact, Mills argues that if race is real, people ought to change their behaviors toward others. Moreover, Mills believes that recognizing such a philosophy opens up a panorama of morality. Thus, “racial self-identification has a moral as well as a metaphysical aspect in that, rightly or wrongly, people have been taken to have an obligation to identify themselves one way rather than another.” This statement means that ethics, for the most part, plays a fundamental role in the identity of people of different races. Thinking about the ethics of race is what unlocks the key to the inclusion of race. Hence, this is why the idea that race is socially constructed should be eliminated from the broad lens of society to limit its perpetuation. The formalist inclusion of race will bring to life certain moral ideals and promote holistic representation of all races on equal grounds.
In conclusion, race is a broad concept that should be considered a philosophical category critical for promoting a holistic and comprehensive context of experience and reality. Ideally, the topic of race and racism has become controversial because of how certain groups of people are treated in society. Accordingly, race’s popularity has grown because of its relation to critical issues such as status, health differences, social justice, and even ethnicity. For instance, blacks predominantly suffer from underrepresentation in the Western world, leading to the silencing of their cultural identity and existence. Therefore, race should be approached from a different picture as a relational philosophical entity. Also, this approach will follow a pedagogical approach to offer a concise and comprehensive account of the sociological and historical background of all races. Including race will also serve as a significant milestone for addressing existing complexities, bringing to life certain moral ideals, and promoting a holistic representation of all races.
Bibliography
Mills, C.W. Blackness Visible: Essays on Philosophy and Race. Blackness Visible: Essays on Philosophy and Race, 2015.
Roberts, Steven O., and Michael T. Rizzo. “The Psychology of American Racism.” American Psychologist 76, no. 3 (2021): 475.
Zack, Naomi. Philosophy of Race: An Introduction. Palgrave Philosophy Today. Cham: Springer International Publishing, 2023. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-27374-2.
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