Editor's Note: Mickey Z (Michael Zezima) is the author of Saving Private Power: The Hidden History of "The Good War" (Soft Skull Press, 2000). He also contributed a chapter called "Saving Private Power" to You Are Being Lied To (New York: Disinfo Books, 2001), edited by Russ Kick.

The concept of race has no biological meaning.

Ideally, this essay should begin and end with that very fundamental and well-documented scientific fact, but in our illusionary world of "racism," "color lines," and The Bell Curve, scientific veracity is losing its struggle against television sound bites and magazine cover lines. We should proceed in the interest of provoking a debate rooted in reality.

Categories such as "Italian-American", "Jew", "gay", or "socialist" are cultural and/or political constructs with no biological basis. The supposedly vast differences between blacks and whites (or males and females for that matter) are more the result of misguided men than any relevant genetic factors. Human beings fit into a species called Homo sapiens and, as any post-1960s biologist or anthropologist could tell you, we have no objective subspecies or races.

Biologist Ruth Hubbard has explained quite eloquently that Homo sapiens are a relatively homogeneous species (genetically speaking). "About 75 percent of known genes are the same in all humans," Hubbard says. The other 25 percent are known to exist in more than one form, but all the forms can be found in all groups, though sometimes in different proportions. Dr. William Haseltine, the head of Human Genome Sciences, Inc., also stated that ". . . only one-quarter of one percent of our basic genetic information can be ascribed to what we call 'racial' differences."

To make this point simpler, ponder the actuality that if all Europeans disappeared overnight, the genetic composition of our species would hardly change. Why then, in the face of such unambiguous evidence, do we persist on categorizing humans into false classifications like ethnic groups, nationalities, and races?

Perhaps the first task is to explore precisely what is meant by "race." Even when the term is meant to define an objective biological category, it is false. As anthropologist and geneticist Jonathan Marks says, "You may group humans into a small number of races if you want to, but you are denied biology as a support for it." The wayward concept of race can be distinguished from from other cultural labels like "liberal" or "Muslim" or "lesbian" or "Yankee fan", however, it is equally erroneous in terms of biology. What we call race is usually just someone who is exactly like us physiologically, but looks a little different.

The problems arise when those minor outward differences lead to war, violence, and oppression, and this usually coincides with the presence of cultural and social distinctions. This helps to explain why violence can occur between Turks and Kurds, but not between blondes and brunettes (except on The Jerry Springer Show). Rather than "race," it is the combination of physical appearance and cultural conflicts that leads to what is termed "racism."

This particular point seems to be easily dismissed by "facts" like the infamous 15-point IQ differential between blacks and whites. However, what these so-called facts do not acknowledge is how the above-described "racism" can directly lead to political, social, cultural, and economic conditions that will invariably alter the results of even something as frivolous as an IQ test.

US health statistics are incessantly trumpeting some "newly discovered trend" about a certain grouping of black men being twice as likely to get this or that disease than this certain group of white men. On the surface, such a finding appears to be evidence of genetically-rooted racial differences. Yet without data on housing, employment, income, education, exposure to pollutants, and access to health care, this "evidence" is a quantum leap from reality. As Ruth Hubbard explains, "Skin color is no more likely to be biologically related to the tendency to develop high blood pressure than eye color is."

Also, when discussing health or IQ statistics for so-called "blacks," simple logic begs the question: Who is black? For example, as Jonathan Marks points out, some inhabitants of India are darkly pigmented like "blacks" but have Caucasoid facial features like "whites", yet they live on a continent that categorizes them as "Asians". So, one might understandably ponder, what makes their blood pressure rise?

Ultimately, the use of science to investigate sex or race differences is usually an ideological venture pre-designed to justify a current social policy and herein lies the deepest roots of so-called racism. Justification is needed for those in power. Hence, rather than being born with "racism" in our genes, it is far more likely that we inherit the compulsion to protect our self-image. To do so, we often recast our actions in a new light in order to make it easier to live with them.

A frequent example of such "recasting" is the dehumanization of a class of people in order to vindicate the imperialist oppression or even slaughter of that class. This has been the ostensible justification of nearly every genocidal act from the African slave trade to the extermination of the Native Americans to the Nazi Holocaust. It becomes necessary for those in power to create false differences where none exist in order to rationalize their actions. Hence, the societal myths of Manifest Destiny, the "Final Solution", and the White Man's Burden. The legacy of such deception and mythology is often a near-permanent stigmatization of a people: Jew, Indian, black etc. Thus, "racism" grows from the spurious foundation of justifying class-based violence and subjugation.

Reinhold Niebuhr, called "theologian of the establishment", has often been engaged to retrospectively construct a moral framework for the actions of modern day elites. Paraphrasing Niebuhr's "paradox of grace" theory, Noam Chomsky sums up such moral hindsight as: "No matter how much you try to do good, you're always going to do harm," adding: "That's very appealing advice for people who are planning to enter a life of crime."

It is also welcome advice for anyone seeking to lump human beings into convenient ideological categories through legislation, social policies, or even cultural control. The reduction of a peoples' culture to a mere educational footnote is often more effectual than violence or coercion when it comes to targeting a group of different-looking Homo sapiens for purported racism.

"One cannot postpone discussions of slavery, colonialism, or racism in any serious investigations of modern Indian, African, Latin and North American, Arabic, Caribbean, and Commonwealth literature," declares Edward W. Said.

"Nor is it intellectually responsible to discuss them without referring to their embattled circumstances either in post-colonial societies or as marginalized and/or subjugated subjects confined to secondary spots in the curricula in metropolitan centers . . . The notion of black skin in a white mask is no more serviceable and dignified in literary study than it is in politics."

Like the incognizant leaders of a Medieval Catholic Church choosing to ignore the new realities that were discovered by Copernicus and Galileo, today's "family values" crowd conveniently evades scientific scrutiny. While some will exploit the progress of genetic research to substantiate their claims about human differences, not a word is spoken about those same researchers proving there is only one race: the human race. However, in a society that emotionally clings to the illusion of differences between Democrats and Republicans, it shouldn't be a shock that we manage to produce "racists" in a one-race world.

The discoveries of geneticists can ultimately expedite our cultural evolution. Dr. Haseltine, while finding little to validate even the most minute claims of racial differences, did confirm that "there are almost fifteen million changes in genetic code between one human and another." Hence, while we are all of one race, the complexity of our individuality is staggering. Perhaps, if urged to act upon such uniqueness, human beings will eventually shun the cowardly refuge of the hateful crowd.

Human beings must consciously seek enlightenment and advancement. Just as a corrupter can be rendered impotent if we refuse to be corrupted, so-called racism holds no appeal to those who choose not to indulge in illusion. Every time a member of the Homo sapiens species defines his or her own needs, fears, desires, and so on, the system of exploitation and oppression is dealt a powerful blow. This individuality is a step in the right direction and is also consistent with our biological nature.