Whoopi Goldberg Was Right, Jews Aren’t a Race
Published
by
Richard Kuper
JVL Introduction
In this opinion piece in Ha’aretz, veteran satirical journalist B. Michael takes a caustic look at the recent campaign to condemn Whoopi Goldberg for remarks about the Holocaust.
When she said the Holocaust wasn’t about race she was right, affirms Michael. It was a rejection of Nazi theories about “race”; the Holocaust was about “vicious, unbridled antisemitism”.
Goldberg’s real crime? “[She dares to] touch our Holocaust! That’s unacceptable. Only we can do that,” affirms Michael.
This article was originally published by Ha'aretz on Tue 8 Feb 2022. Read the original here.
Whoopi Goldberg Was Right, Jews Aren't a Race
Loading article text…
I used to regard the term ‘race’ as relating to distinctive inherited physical characteristics like skin colour in humans, or plumage variations within bird species. Nowadays the term seems to have acquired a much broader application, more like ‘ethnicity’ or ‘ethnic group’, so that language or religion or even way of life can be the distinctive feature of a ‘race’. Am I alone in thinking that the term has almost lost its usefulness?
Hugh Roper, I have always been of the view, after looking the term up in Encyclopedia Brittanica, that the “race” term was invented by racists to justify the exploitation and abuse of groups of people. “Race” was a term helpful in justifying the kidnapping, murder and abuse of millions of Africans.
Brilliant phrase, that: ‘another embarrassing outburst of historical possessiveness’! So true.
How can we express our support and solidarity to Whoopi Goldberg?
We also need to watch out for reactionary ethnonationalist uses of the term ‘a people’ as well as ‘race’.
Reply to Hugh Roper:
“Race” is not about skin colour. Unsurprisingly, since human evolution had had its longest span on that continent, there is much more genetic variation amongst black Africans than any other peoples. This was shown by Richard Lewontin in 1972. He made a really important contribution in the effort to combat biological determinism and reductionism and died last year aged 92. You can get an idea of his views from the web site below, including what he thinks about whether there is a “Jewish Gene”: https://www.nybooks.com/contributors/richard-c-lewontin/
To say that races do not exist is not the same as saying racism doesn’t. Racism is practised by those who think races do exist and of course is very real. You can see the point when you look at Islamophobia, which is a form of racism, as people who racists consider “look like a Muslim” often experience Islamophobia, irrespective of whether they are Muslim, or another religion or non-religious.
I think this article misses the point. The Nazis were undeniably racist, in that they applied racial doctrines to persecute and murder Jews, Roma, to a lesser extent Slavs etc. Even if races do not exist, racism does. Whoopi Goldberg was wrong to say that white people cannot be racist against other whites (people of colour can also be racist against other people of colour).
She has apologised, and honestly I would not want her ‘cancelled’, but her remarks managed to show ignorance of the specific and horrible racism of the Holocaust. ‘Man’s inhumanity to man’ is a more anodyne term.