The Young Turks

There is a wide disparity between the similarities in genetics between races and between dog species. Sorry dude, but the genetic difference between races varies about as much as the genetic difference between hair colour. There's pretty much none.

 And whats with people who're wrong chastizing those who call them out on it for being "politically correct"? Just because I'm reality correct, not politically correct, doesn't mean you should disparage me. This is something guys like Glenn Beck do....say he's not going to be politically correct for a second, thinking it gives him license to be a bonehead.

I think political correctness is as gay as the next fella, but come on now 

it has become impossible to have an intelligent discussion on race in the u.s. because:

(a) [the scientifically ignorant position] some people deny the very existence of race as a biological category. never mind that tay-sachs affects the ashkenazim, and sickle-cell anemia affects africans (and african descendents) far more than the general population. or the fact that almost all the top 3 olympic medals in the 100m dash in almost all the recent games over the past 30years have been won by runners of west african descent while there is a similar overwhelming dominance in the 10km-marathon categories by runners of east african descent.

(b) [the dumb position] some people think that it is okay to accept the reality of race as long as one attributes only good qualities to different races, and avoids anything that might be deemed derogatory, or use race as a purely cultural self-identification mechanism (you wouldn't want to lose affirmative action benefits).

(c) [the most insidious position of all] some people accept, in their minds, the reality of races and the different average physical and intellectual endowments this confers on different racial groups, but feel that any frank talk on the subject will only lead to the abuse of such information to suppress and discriminate against specific groups. in other words, these people consider themselves to be so enlightened that they are doing their best to save the unwashed masses from mob bias through enforced ignorance. 

mixed in with all this is the classic "naturalistic fallacy"---confusing an "is" with an "ought", and thinking that scientific facts (human races represent systematic variations in genetic loci) should be used as a basis for designing a just and fair legal and moral code for society.

there is also a deep distrust of any form of genetics (quite independent of race-talk) because some people insist on confusing causation with pre-determination and complete inflexibility (as if it is somehow impossible to ever transcend the tendencies and soft-limits imposed on one by their genes, regardless of countervailing influences of environment, education, training, or wealth).

it is extremely unfortunate (but not surprising) that almost all of the suppression of race-talk has come from the left, and the desire to go on witch-hunts is so out of control that even legitimate opinions (recent examples of larry summers or james watson) get ruthlessly suppressed. it is not just the right that engages in an assault on reason or takes leave of the reality-based community---the left is equally capable of being as detached from science and sense when it comes to its own sacred cows.

A lot of the differences attributed to genetics are actually cultural.  It's obvious when you see children of different races adopted by families of another race who then grow up with the attributes of their adoptive families.  Our problem is a cultural one.  The African sub-culture in America is a direct descendent of the slave sub-culture created by Europeans in early American history.  The two probably could have merged much more quickly if open discrimination had been discarded officially after the  civil war, but it wasn't.  It didn't really happen until 1968.  That's made things much, much tougher.  I do know that it has improved greatly over the last 40 years but there is obviously still a ways to go.  I don't see how creating new divisions is the answer.  If you start with this "genetically different" stuff you start to emphasize unimportant differences and create new artificial bounderies that you damn well know certain assholes are going to seize as an excuse to create a new class of "us" and "them". 

There's already "us" Christians and "them" Muslims, "us" whites and "them" blacks (latinos, asians, arabs, etc), there's "us" rich folks and "them" poor folks, "us" Democrats and "them" Republicans, "us" Americans and "them" Europeans (Arabs, Asians, Russians, Mexicans), "us" capitalists and them "communists",&nbs p; "us" southerners and "them" northerners, "us" athiests and "them" believers, "us" eggheads and "them" laborers.  How many times can we divide our loyalties before we start to get schizophrenic about who we are?

You write "This common wisdom claims that every race is the same and there are no real differences in the capabilities of the races."

I can't claim to speak for everyone, but does anyone really believe that there are no differences in the capabilities, taken as an average, between the races? Studies certainly have not borne this claim out. There do appear to be differences that break down among racial lines, apart from those used to define the races, of course.

The right claim to make in the face of this is that such differences are not relevant to questions of value, or to questions about the capabilities of individuals. Because a group of people may be stronger, taller, smarter, more artistic, or whatever, should have no bearing on the moral worth of that group or of the individuals composing that group.