Racism has become an increasingly salient issue around the world.
Some say racism is everywhere – well everywhere in Western societies. Others confine it to certain sections of those societies, such as, for example, conservatives or ‘the South’. Some, like Steven Pinker and the British government’s Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities concluded a few years ago that it no longer existed in the United Kingdom – at least not in a structural sense.
I wanted to take a closer look at who is racist at a personal level and why that may be.
The United States runs the useful and large General Social Survey (GSS) every second year. It includes a large number of relevant questions, demographic data on respondents and a short IQ test. I took a comprehensive look at the GSS for whites born in the US. (Although the GSS is large the non-white groups are not large enough. Plus, the racism-related questions asked are almost always framed with whites as perpetrators rather than victims of racism, so it was not possible to analyse the possibility of black racists.)
I looked at both simple rates of racism and multiple regressions of IQ plus various demographic variables on all the racism questions. Multiple regressions tell you about the association of each variable with racism independently of the others.
Right off the bat I want to say that racism is strongly associated with lower IQ among whites (when not controlled for other factors.) However, that relationship could be spurious, due to the association of either IQ or racism with other factors. One must look at the regression findings with that in mind.
Other than IQ, I included self-identified socio-economic class, gender, age, political ideology (liberalism to conservatism), political party allegiance and years of education in the regressions. I included both political ideology and party because they often don’t align as expected.
Quite a lot of American whites have racist feelings toward, and opinions of, blacks.
More than 90% expect interracial marriages to have problems. More than half are uneasy about a close family member marrying a black person. Almost two thirds deny that racial differences in outcomes are due to discrimination, and more than half deny it is due to lack of education.
About 60% think blacks are violent and live on welfare. Just over half consider them lazy and lacking in will. Most would hire teachers opposed to integration and not resign if a social club failed to integrate. Over 90% oppose affirmative action in jobs, 80%, the government integrating suburbs, with 62% opposing suburban integration in principle. 55% oppose helping blacks.
50/50
US whites are 50/50 on whether or not blacks are committed to strong families or make a positive contribution to the US.
In spite of their anti-integration and anti-affirmative action attitudes, half think a neighbourhood that is half black is OK, that blacks face discrimination in jobs and whites don’t suffer because of affirmative action. Exactly half of US whites think they differ from minorities or consider whiteness important to their identity.
On the other hand, most think blacks are intelligent and 90% don’t think racial differences in outcome are due toa lack of intelligence. Most are OK with black supervisors and over 60% would drive through a black neighbourhood at night. Most feel positive or warm towards blacks on the whole.
Almost 60% do think social clubs should integrate. Most lean toward thinking blacks face discrimination in housing and have too little influence. That said, those who have the opposite view are still a sizeable minority – usually more than 40%. Though most profess warm feelings toward blacks, they have warmer feelings toward whites.
Increased years of education in the US is associated with a marked and pervasive decrease in racism.
The more educated are convinced different outcomes by race are the result of discrimination and lack of education rather than lack of intelligence or will. They believe blacks are hard-working and self-supporting and deserve help beating discrimination. They are more in favour of integration, interracial marriage, feel positively toward blacks and don’t think race matters much.
It isn’t clear if that is because racists avoid modern education, or because education changes minds. It isn’t because of higher intelligence because I have teased out the effects of education and intelligence independently.
Higher intelligence is associated with the view that racial differences in outcome are due to discrimination and lack of education and not lack of intelligence and effort. Intelligence is also associated with a pro-helping-blacks attitude.
This is independently of more education; that is, it is a smart view as well as an educated view.
Intelligent view
On the other hand, intelligence is not independently associated with being pro-integration, comfort with intermarriage or warmer feelings. Those are to do with education alone. The intelligent view is that racial differences are due to denied opportunities but are neutral with respect to diversity and integration.
Many of the simple associations between low IQ and racism are really due to lack of exposure to education.
Age, like education, has widespread associations with racism. Older white Americans are more racist than young Americans on every question. They have a very poor views of black ability, effort, behaviour and contributions. They don’t believe discrimination plays a role in differential outcomes. They dislike the idea of intermarriage and integration. They certainly are less in favour of helping blacks.
Women are less racist on a few issues. They are more likely than men to attribute differences in racial outcomes to circumstances like lack of opportunity, than the qualities of black people themselves. They are also more in favour of integration (though not intermarriage), and helping blacks, than men.
Higher socio-economic status is mostly associated with a resistance to integration. This is probably entirely due to the association of blacks with poverty and welfare.
Finally, the political associations. Conservatism and Republican party alignment share the view that differences in racial outcome are due to lack of effort. Liberals and Democrats believe it is due to discrimination and lack of education.
Conservatives tend to have a dim view of black commitments and contributions, but for Republicans this is not an issue. Conservatives are also inclined to believe that lack of ability plays a role, whereas Republicans are agnostic.
Conservatives don’t like integration and interracial marriage, while Republicans are actually even more likely than Democrats to support interracial marriage. Racism is more about political ideology than party membership. I guess those in politics have to worry about not offending voters if they can help it.
Declining over generations
So, racist views are still common among white Americans but are declining over generations. Education may contribute to the decline too. Conservatives are, well conservative, but party alignment says little about racism. Women are unsurprisingly more empathic than men, and the higher classes just want to avoid the poor.
Intelligence emphasises the need to ensure equal opportunity to all but does not indicate whether diversity or integration goals are wise.
In sum, strive to provide more opportunities, provide more education and wait for the racists to die off.
[Image: by LightFieldStudios]
The views of the writer are not necessarily the views of the Daily Friend or the IRR.
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