by Christyl Rivers

Created on: December 08, 2010   Last Updated: September 23, 2011

Do you think you are racist?  If you say no, you probably just don't realize how unconscious racism is. If you say yes, you may know that indeed, since we are almost all unaware of many of our motivations, we are prone to some racism. And that creates oppression.

Dogs are not racist. A Cocker spaniel does not consider herself a different "race" than a "Master race", German Shepard. The very concept of race existing is racist, and is unique to human beings.

Racism exists and oppression is the result. Think about it, there is only one human race, and yet we are divided by extremely shallow phenotype differences.

These differences grow and intensify because we include some, and exclude others who may seem “different.” Therefore, our cultural ties, food, music, clothing and so forth becomes influenced by those factors all around us that in part at least, define who we are.

Race is dynamic and every changing. Just as food, music, and cultures assimilate and cross over, so do people of other “races.”

Why do we have divisive racism?  The reason is clear in nature. When we belong, we are in balance, cooperating with all organisms, competing with some, but also in the larger scheme, contributing through living, to the great Belonging. That belonging is known by many names, creation, God, Nature, Divinity, and so on.

Some of us, when we feel insecure, sense a disconnection.  When there is an imbalance, we seek our belonging, our security.  When fears arise, we look for a scapegoat.

Caucasian people dominated by complete accident of climate, agriculture, and abundance of natural resources. Coal, for example fueled the industrial revolution and weaponry, directly resulting from our ability to burn things and forge steel, led to the exploitation of other “races” in other parts of the globe.

We found it is easy to go contrary to what common sense and senses tell us, and convince ourselves that these others are less human than we.

Our bigger brains and our ability to store and retrieve memory allow us to do this. We can distort all information into what we need it to be, to justify our plundering, or in some cases, completely exterminating other beings.  This intolerance always leads to destructiveness, not just for people of course, but for all cooperative life systems.

To put it simply, if someone or something, can yield immediate profit to us by our exploitation of them, or it, we will deny any other value of

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