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Originally Posted by Lauxa  Yes, but if you are in a group of people and you are being judged for being different, and then you see a few other people who are similarly different, isn't it natural to seek each other out? |
Yes, I think it probably is natural to do so. We can't really expect people to not seek out others similar to them until the majority stops treating people differently based on skin color or other inconsequential attributes.
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Originally Posted by Lauxa There's also the fact that there are so many different facets of American culture, cliques, groups, etc. Political groups, hobbiest groups, religious groups, socioeconomic groups, professional groups... all have their own sub-culture, their own jargon, their own styles of dress. Is that different than a sub-culture based on skin color? |
On one hand, I think that that is different, as the people in the groups you mentioned choose to be a part of those groups, and therefore should accept the responsibility for being treated differently by society. However, if we consider that minorities who choose to group together based on skin color are in a way creating the same sort of artificial separation from the majority as those who choose to be a part of a specific group, religion, etc, then there really is no difference.
Obviously this would never be feasible, but it would be very interesting to do an experiment using people never exposed to racism, or any sort of societal conditioning. It would be very interesting to see people of different genders, skin color, hair color, fitness levels, intelligence levels, interests, etc combined into a single group and see what sub-groups are formed. I see no reason to expect that groups would be more likely to form based on skin color than some of the other differences. I think I would expect interests and intelligence level to be the top 2 determining factors, with physical attributes such as hair and skin color being of little or no impact.