Racism’s universality rests on instinctive fear of the unknown from species history.

Evidence

Albert Memmi, Le racisme (Paris: Gallimard, 1982) maintains that ‘racism, not anti-racism, is truly universal’ (p. 157), and explains the mystery of its alleged universality by reference to another mystery: the instinctive fear invariably inspired by all difference. One does not understand the different, which by the same token turns into the unknown and the unknown is a source of terror. In Memmi’s view, the horror of the unknown ‘stems from the history of our species, in the course of which the unknown was the source of danger’ (p. 208). It is suggested therefore that the putative universality of racism is a product of species learning. Having thus acquired a pre-cultural foundation, it is essentially immune to the impact of individual training. — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 781

Categorization

• QUESTION: Memmi’s species-learning account of racism conflicts with Bauman’s own social-constructionist stance — worth verifying how Bauman then dismantles it.
• XREF: connects to: Fear of racism harms mental health more than direct experiences of it do. — A. Hussain, N. Meer, Framing Muslim Integration, 328; Negrophobia operates on the biological and instinctual level. — Frantz Fanon, Constance Farrington, Black skin, white masks, 601; Racism has no universal structure but only historically specific forms (+4 more)

Related

• Every existing species survives because its ancestors’ evolutionary experiments were thwarted by fear (similarity 0.82)
• Racism develops from elemental antipathy through theorized levels (similarity 0.80)
• Racism shows natural affinity with anti-modern emotions (similarity 0.80)
• Racisms are only intelligible through their specific historical context, not a universal essence. (similarity 0.79)

Broader Connections

• Racism has no universal structure but only historically specific forms #contradicts (0.85)
• Analysis must treat racisms in their historical specificity, not as one universal form #contradicts (0.85) — Hall, Stuart, Essential Essays, Volume 1, 632
• Negrophobia operates on the biological and instinctual level. #corroborates (0.82) — Frantz Fanon, Constance Farrington, Black skin, white masks, 601
• Racism exists as a variable spectrum, not a single invariant form #contradicts (0.80)
• Communities rationally distrust outsiders for lack of knowledge, not just prejudice #contradicts (0.75)