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Is racism morally wrong?

Arcade22

Philosopher
Arcade22
Joined
Aug 8, 2007
Messages
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Location
Sweden
Well is it?

For simplicity's sake, let's define racism as 'valuing people differently based on their ethnicity or race'.

As a thought experiment, imagine that i am walking along a river. I stop for a second and hear two people screaming for help.
Seeing two people struggling for their lives, one of them a Swede and the other being an Arab, and noticing that i only have time to save one of them.

I instinctively rush to save the Swede, and in the process allowing the Arab to drown.

Would i be acting immorally in saving the Swede's life by the single fact that he is Swedish?

No i say, in fact i would argue that i acted an extremely moral way.
In the same way that i am willing to save my family from a burning house while letting yours burn to cinders,
i am willing to save a stranger from death while letting someone else perish simply because he was of the same ethnicity as my self.

Am i wrong? Is racism really immoral?
What do you think?
 
When you cannot save everybody but at least save those you can is not morally wrong, I reckon, in spite of any predjudice that had influenced your decision. That said, racism based on skin colour or ethnicity is not a reliable moral compass, more likely to be wrong overall.
 
Arcade22 said:
Well is it? http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/vbimghost.php?do=displayimg&imgid=18524http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/imagehosting/188094b300a2915bb7.gif

For simplicity's sake, let's define racism as 'valuing people differently based on their ethnicity or race'.

As a thought experiment, imagine that i am walking along a river. I stop for a second and hear two people screaming for help.
Seeing two people struggling for their lives, one of them a Swede and the other being an Arab, and noticing that i only have time to save one of them.

I instinctively rush to save the Swede, and in the process allowing the Arab to drown.

Would i be acting immorally in saving the Swede's life by the single fact that he is Swedish?

No i say, in fact i would argue that i acted an extremely moral way.
In the same way that i am willing to save my family from a burning house while letting yours burn to cinders,
i am willing to save a stranger from death while letting someone else perish simply because he was of the same ethnicity as my self.

Am i wrong? Is racism really immoral?
What do you think?
Click to expand...

Depends... How would you feel if after they pulled the Arab from the water you found he was an eccentric billionaire tycoon that had just founded his own country and was in the process of removing all non-swedes from Sweden?
 
Redtail said:
Depends... How would you feel if after they pulled the Arab from the water you found he was an eccentric billionaire tycoon that had just founded his own country and was in the process of removing all non-swedes from Sweden?
Click to expand...



Let's try to keep this thread a little closer to reality.
 
I think that in some cases it is not wrong to discriminate if the goal is to fix social disparities - see affirmative action. It seems to me this falls under your definition of racism. So my answer is that it is not always wrong, due to this specific example.
 
Anything prejudicial based on circumstances beyond the control of the individual is immoral.
None of us chose our parents, or where we would born.
Once a person has matured, and decides to practice flaming a**holism, then there's a reason to wonder about that person's motives, but not what his color or ethnicity is.
Taking pride in one's origins is one of the stupider things people do.
 
It's somewhat immoral, but I don't think anyone would blame you (perhaps anyone but the arab family). Obviously anyone who is family/friends has a higher value for you, and a random swedish person probably reminds you of your family more than a random arab (not to mention it might be more difficult to communicate with a foreigner, thus lowering the survival chances anyway).
 
all things being equal, the two folks being the same age, it would indeed be highly racist and highly immoral to save the Swede just because he is a Swede, and you wanted to NOT save the Arab.

if i had to choose, with all things being equal, I'd have to flip a coin.
 
parky76 said:
Would it be anti-Semitic if I chose to save the Swede instead of a Jew?
Click to expand...
Not if it was a Swedish Jew. ;-)

I think the decision would be racist if it was indeed based on the race of the person involved. However, there are different shades of racism, and it could likely be a very mild form of racism.

Such mild racism still has severe consequences though. For example, it is known that Arabs in Sweden have a much harder time to get job interviews. This is pretty much the same situation although less dramatic. The employer can only 'save' so many people, and given that there are many qualified candidates, they are less likely to select someone with Arabic heritage. This is probably not conscious racism except in very few cases, but the effect is quite serious.


I don't think it is meaningful to say that racism is 'morally wrong' though, as I don't see what that would mean except a judgement that racism is detrimental to society and therefore something we should strive to remove. And I think that case is better argued by actually giving an argument, rather than just repeating the claim.
 
Doctor Evil said:
I think that in some cases it is not wrong to discriminate if the goal is to fix social disparities - see affirmative action. It seems to me this falls under your definition of racism. So my answer is that it is not always wrong, due to this specific example.
Click to expand...

Yes, asking about moral content of an 'ism that is quite loaded terminology, having a shared but still plethoric meaning for different people, is hard if begged to give a simple 'yes or no' answer.
 
Arcade22 said:
As a thought experiment, imagine that i am walking along a river. I stop for a second and hear two people screaming for help.
Seeing two people struggling for their lives, one of them a Swede and the other being an Arab, and noticing that i only have time to save one of them.

I instinctively rush to save the Swede, and in the process allowing the Arab to drown.

Would i be acting immorally in saving the Swede's life by the single fact that he is Swedish?
Click to expand...
You're telling me you saved a stranger's life and you're asking me if that was immoral? You get a stamp of nobility, friend. Good job. :)
 
Lately in discussing issues of right and wrong I keep coming back to the opinion that there is no such thing as right and wrong as far as morality. What is is and what isn't isn't. Right and wrong are labels made up by people to justify whatever actions/beliefs they prefer.

So if I were to say I hate black people there is nothing morally right or wrong about that. If it were true that I hate black people, then the statement is factually right. If I said I hate black people because they cast evil curses upon the innocent then I would be ignorant and factually wrong.
 
Last edited:
Yes, in response to the initial question.

However, if you saved the Arab just because he was Arab, that would also be racist. In sum, let them both drown and save yourself the moral conundrum.
 
I say it would be morally wrong for them to both be drowning at the same time and make you have to decide..so the ethical thing to do would be to just let them both drown.

:)
 
Arcade22 said:


Let's try to keep this thread a little closer to reality.
Click to expand...

Your entire scenario is not based on reality.
If someone is willing to jump into the water and save a drowning person then they would always go for the nearest person they could reach.
Then if they had any energy left they may try to save the other person if that person was still above water.
The chances of 2 people drowning at the exact same distance from the rescuer is highly unlikely.

Now after the rescue if the hero felt bad about who they had saved based on the persons skin color then yes that would be wrong.
So if after a black person saved a white person and the other person they could not save was black.
The black person turns to the white person and says "Why did I save whitey? I should of saved my black brother".
In my opinion that would be immoral behavior.
 
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