Racism’s Founding Fathers: Emotionalism and Collectivism

Watching the world from quarantine, it is difficult not to feel as if civilisation is hurtling towards collapse. The power of the government is increasing by the day, the economy has seemingly detached itself from reality, and the media’s shrieking is only increasing in its absurdity, fanning the flames of public anger. Now, America is burning – and fittingly so, for the nihilistic destruction of the riots is nothing more than a cashing in on the infection at the core of America’s soul. To many, these events must just seem like chaos, but they are actually as lucidly logical as the plot of a good novel; the actions, reactions and responses are just as should have been expected given the ideas present in the Western world today.

The spark that started the flames was the death of George Floyd, an unarmed black man, who was killed by a white police officer who knelt on his neck for almost nine minutes. The act – captured on smartphone camera – was a sickening example of police brutality, and the world was rightly outraged at the killing. In response, the jury of public opinion was unanimous – the ultimate cause of George Floyd’s death was racism.

It is true that genuine racism is on the rise, and it may well be the case that the white police officer was racist, and this racism lead him to ignore Floyd’s desperate cries for air. Racism, however, is merely one example of a more fundamental sickness, as Ayn Rand explained many decades ago:

“Racism is the lowest, most crudely primitive form of collectivism. It is the notion of ascribing moral, social or political significance to a man’s genetic lineage—the notion that a man’s intellectual and characterological traits are produced and transmitted by his internal body chemistry. Which means, in practice, that a man is to be judged, not by his own character and actions, but by the characters and actions of a collective of ancestors.”

Racism is truly evil and must be defeated, but the tragic fact facing us today is that the loudest voices opposing racism are completely infected with collectivism. The so called ‘woke’ left are obsessed with identity politics, placing everyone in groups based on their privilege or victimhood; many sub-groups and supporters of ‘woke-ness’ – such as Antifa – are explicitly socialist or communist, blaming capitalism for ‘systemic’ racism; and Black Lives Matter, now propelled to centre-stage in this political drama, claim to be against the “Western-prescribed nuclear family structure”, instead favouring “supporting each other as extended families and ‘villages’ that collectively care for one another”. It should be no surprise that these groups, who are supposedly against racism, support such racist policies as affirmative action and reparations for slavery; as collectivists, the fact that an individual white person isn’t racist and hasn’t any slave-owning ancestors means nothing – it’s his group that is guilty.

With this kind of collectivist mindset, emotionalism reigns supreme. In emphasising the group, collectivism negates the individual – and there is no more individual a faculty than man’s rationality. If a man rejects reason, emotions become his only guide to action, and in the case of a collectivist this feeling amounts to hatred of the ‘enemy’ tribe. This cocktail of group-identity and emotionalism is what fuels the rioter who attacks an innocent police officer, the Antifa thug who destroys the business of an innocent minority, and the police-officer who brutalises an obviously peaceful bystander. These people don’t see individuals, they see only instances of a hated group – a ‘complicit’ police officer, an ‘oppressive’ capitalist store, an ‘anti-police’ trouble-maker – and they strike out in unthinking rage.

The left are particularly infected with emotionalism and collectivism, but the right are certainly not innocent either. Observe how many commentators on the alt-right focus entirely on the violence of protestors, ignoring the genuinely horrific police brutality captured on smartphone cameras, and notice how President Trump is exclusively concerned with ‘Law and Order’, not the issues which lead to its breakdown. The one thing that the left and right should agree on – that police brutality is a massive problem in America – is minimised by the alt-right in favour of scoring points against the left, their opposing tribe. Meanwhile, many members of the mainstream right proclaim their support for Black Lives Matter, denounce ‘white privilege’, and encourage ‘unity’. All of this only serves to swell the ranks of the white nationalists, who are only too happy to welcome in bewildered white collectivists in need of a group.

It is difficult to tell whether racism is fuelling police brutality in America, or whether racism was the cause of George Floyd’s death specifically. Regardless of these questions, to fight racism one must fight against emotionalism and collectivism – the founding fathers of racism – and to do that one must fight for reason and individualism. Racism is a real, growing malignancy in the Western world, and a rational, individualist mindset that refuses to see things in terms of ‘groups’ is the only antidote. To an individualist races literally don’t matter; even if it were somehow proved that different races had different levels of intelligence and different character traits, this information is completely irrelevant to him. An individualist only cares about the intelligence and character traits of himself and the individuals he deals with, not the averages of the groups they can be placed into. He understands that, even if his ancestors experienced discrimination and violence due to their race, the descendants of the perpetrators are innocent and cannot be blamed for the actions of their ancestors. He realises that no amount of racism in the police force can justify attacks on innocent police officers, and no amount of violence against police officers can justify random beatings of innocent protestors. He knows that what matters are the thoughts and actions of individuals.

Many commentators are comparing the violence and rioting in America with the Boston Tea Party, the violence that sparked the American revolution. Such a comparison is riddled with logical holes, but perhaps the most blatant is the equivocation between the rational individualism behind the Boston Tea Party, with its clear positions and explicit target, and the emotional collectivism driving the current rioters, who’s clearest goal is the nonsensical demand to ‘defund the police’, and whose target is the nearest smashable window. Whatever revolution this has the potential to create would be nothing but blind chaos and mindless destruction, and as long as emotionalism and collectivism reign this is what awaits us. To stop this descent into chaos, along with racism, emotionalism and collectivism must be fought – and championing reason and individualism is the only way such a fight can be won.

Racism: What Must be Explained to Stop its Revival

It now seems that a day cannot pass without some celebrity, politician or over-zealous twitter user stepping on the ant’s nest that is the topic of race – and, invariably, the ants are ready to sting and bite, whatever the context, seriousness or facts of the issue. The hysterical screaming of the Black Lives Matter protesters and their surrounding allies increases daily in its extremity, yet the ranks of genuine racists continue to swell, now rallying under the banner of the ‘alt-right’. This begs the question: why?

The fault is entirely in the hands of progressives. They have long since abandoned rationality, especially in regards to race, and subsequently they tar anti-racism with irrationality.

There are a number of unacceptable truths that progressives bury their heads in the sand in regards to – things like the fact that violence in America is overwhelmingly initiated by minorities; that the entire continent of Africa is a savage hell-hole, despite its abundance of natural resources; that the refugees flooding Europe are disposed towards rape and suicide bombing – and in pretending these truths do not exist, progressives unwittingly hand the appearance of rationality to those who acknowledge them. These people need an answer, and, overwhelmingly, they choose racism.

To an extent, who can blame them?

Until rational, non-racist explanations of these unacceptable truths arise, those young people smart enough to turn away from the insanity of the progressive left will find refuge in the alt-right. It is these people this article hopes to address, because these people are rational, and will not close their ears to opposing opinions.

The answer the alt-right needs is simple: culture.

It is not the genetic make-up of minorities that disposes them to violence – it is their invariably mystic, irrational culture that does so. It is the gang-culture of the hood that glorifies violence, breaking the law and taking drugs, while blaming every injustice on the white man. It is the Islamic culture of the middle east that pines for an all-powerful state to enforce the rule of Allah, and calls for the destruction of the west on mystic grounds. It is the myriad cultures of savagery that fester in every corner of Africa – and, being unable to look beyond the immediate moment, slaughter each other in the name of almost nothing.

The culture of the western world has been entirely similar for most of mankind’s history – it is only the ideas behind the renaissance, and ultimately Ancient Greece, that separate white from black. Ideas do not belong to any race, and as such can and must be criticised for their irrationalities, regardless of how oppressed, poor, enslaved or mistreated their proponents might be.

Progressives will never accept this – cultural relativism has already infected the very centres of their brains. Observe, however, how happily they criticise the culture of the western world, and with what shrieking hatred they denounce the smallest drop of racism, xenophobia or sexism within white communities. Then observe the eerie silence they adopt in regards to cultures that still stone women to death for adultery and execute homosexuals.

There is only one answer: stand against racism rationally, in every form, while robustly criticising the cultures that deserve it – and try to ignore the bile that is sure to spew from the mouth of every progressive when you do so.