Charles Hixson wrote
<There are certainly senses in which that's true. But there are also
senses in which that's ... beside the point. If people can use viral
surgery to change their skin color (etc.) instead of cosmetics...then
the old basis of race disappears. If genetic characteristics remain
fixed from the time of conception (or at least from birth) then I guess
that it continues relevant. Or at least as relevant as tatoos, scars,
and other hard to change features. And cosmetic surgery can also be
expected to improve... or at least become more extensive in what it can
handle. Just consider the possibilities inherent in self-cloned skin
grafts (i.e., skin grafts of pieces of skin whose DNA matches your own).>
For the record...I am one of those people that can get called "racist"
if I don't passively lie about how I feel on this issue.
And in response to this statement... my feelings on the race issue have
very little to do with "skin color" per say. Race in general has almost
nothing
to do with skin color. It's just a "marker" or an advertisement for an
individual who (more often than not) belongs to a certain cultural group,
acts and thinks in certain ways. Making skin color elective in the medical
sense will be a great boon towards merit-based "racists" like myself, as
it will flense much of the "dead weight" from our intellectual constituency.
It's not the "skin color" of certain types I object to associating with,
it's
the mindset, the willful ignorance and lack of mental flexability, the
victim mentality, the culture, music etc. Most of the newer generation of
"racially aware" types fall into this category. Moreover making the
cosmetic truly optional makes it much easier to "advertise" one's
allegiance to certain memes. I expect that this sort of technology
(assuming that the future doesn't make this entire discussion hilariously
irrelevant, which it just might!) will change racial awareness into
memetic awareness by another name. Which will be a good thing. IMHO.
Simply put..it's not the skin color that's repulsive...it's the "ghetto"
(as
in ghetto the adjective!).
<So it seems to me that as more features are subject to voluntary choice,
the concept of race will decline in importance, becoming more similar to
other voluntary social groupings. (I.e., it is implicitly acknowledged
that if you press people hard enough, they will slide from one group to
another.) I'm not totally convinced that this is good. There may come
to be a strong pressure for everyone to slide into the same mold. But
it's certainly a different problem than what current racism is.>
Trust me.. most racialists look forward to this. It achieves multiple
ends.. it lets people go where their hearts are. It lets those who
have certain aesthetic tastes (but lack those traits themselves) fix
matters appropriately, it takes away ammo for egalitarians who
are devoid of substantial thought. The more things about someone
that are subject to volition, the closer we get to TRUE meritocracy...
which is the point behind intelligent ethnic thought! Will be a very
good thing all around... assuming we still have bodies or a society
anything like today's in
50 years.
regards,
brian
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