Biology versus Social Construction of Race and Ethics
The value of approaching race through virtue ethics
The influence of society on phenotypic uniqueness has long negated the biological study surrounding the similarities amongst races. Humanity itself has constructed the misguided notion that as one’s observable characteristics may differ, it necessarily follows that their whole genetic make-up must also be inconsistent. As this belief has evolved alongside humanity, it has developed into what is known as the social construction of race; that is, the artificial categorization of one’s counterparts based upon their visible character traits founded on inaccurate biological assumptions (McAfee).
What can be seen as a result of this social construction of race is a myriad of irrationally calculated, immoral behaviors consisting of ethnocentric and hierarchical ideology. These take the shapes of continued racially-based stereotyping and/or profiling, to Executive Order 9066 and the internment of Japanese Americans. The ability to shift from this fallacious social construction to the biological recognition of a singular genetically related human race lies in society’s capacity towards accepting virtue theory, or the belief that it is important not only to do the right thing, but to have the proper motivations, intentions, and emotions while doing it (Pojman and Fieser). Particularly, by accepting virtue theory, one aims at not only ending the behavior of phenotypic classification of races that action-based ethics may too conclude, but it furthers in an attempt to eliminate the racist, ethnocentric, and hierarchical ways of thinking, the root of the classification itself.
To fully develop and understand the argument put forth, one must first understand the biological contention. That is, there is no significant genetic difference between any currently established race, such that, for instance, two individuals of European descent may in fact be more genetically similar to an Asian individual than to each other (Chou). To arrive at this assertion, there are key biological components, such as epigenetics, alleles and the study of the geographical distribution of genetic variation, one must understand. Epigenetics are biochemical markers that, in short, have the ability to shut on or off genes. They can change the ways in which one’s genes are expressed, or shown, without making any true physical changes to one’s genetic code (McAfee). Alleles, on the other hand, are the different variations in a gene and are often determined by one’s epigenome. Alleles are the reason why humans all have different hair colors and textures while all of humanity has the same genetic code for hair (Chou). Now, as for the geographical distribution of genetic variation, found in a 2002 Stanford University study, only 7% of humanity’s alleles were specific to one region; and of this 7%, the median relative-frequency of these region-specific alleles were found only in about 1% of the population (Rosenberg et al.) Thus, while races may tend to look different on the outside, it is clear that there is little – if any – genetic uniqueness amongst them.
Now, as race can be scientifically shown not to be determined biologically, this must mean that it is the development of a social construction and the result of geographic and environmental uniqueness. Accordingly, there now comes the need to unpack its concomitant effects. Less than two centuries ago, Mr. Aarons-Young, a slave, was awoken as his ‘master’ barged in the door. He was told he and his fellow slaves had not been productive enough the previous day, for which they were all whipped, one-by-one. Grieving in pain, clenching his teeth and his jaws shaking, Mr. Aarons-Young fought to stay upright. Before losing consciousness, the last thing he remembered was his ‘master’ yelling, “What’s de matter wid you, n*****, don't it hurt?” (Aarons-Young). What happened to Mr. Aarons-Young is a direct result of society’s hierarchical and ethnocentric ideology gained as a result of phenotypic racial classification.
It is more necessary now than ever to remedy this unethical behavior as a result of the social construction of race. That is, although in Mr. Aarons-Young’s case slavery itself may not be legal anymore in the United States (US), there is one aspect that remains lingering within the US population: racism, the root of slavery itself. For many decades after the abolishment of slavery, segregation and the Jim Crow era took place; however, society, or at least a significant population of it, felt they had already remedied the problem by ending slavery. This is because of following, or the indirect influence of action-based ethics, such as Utilitarianism and Kantian Deontology. A utilitarian in response to the end of slavery would claim that they provided the greatest good for the largest number of people by ending slavery, and thus could stop there – or they would have deemed slavery ethical in the first place. A deontologist would say they universalized and followed the maxim that “one ought not to own humans,” because it violates their dignity as rational beings, and would too stop at this ethical notion. Thus, only the virtue ethicist would continue past the abolishment of slavery in their search for ethicality. They must necessarily seek the equality of others out of their desire for proper motivations, just intentions, and to rid themselves of emotions of unfairness; that is, they desire good at its root.
Considering the virtue ethicics’s argument, in the first section of Book II of Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle describes what it means to be virtuous. Focusing on character virtue, he believes that it is unnatural and no one is born with any inclination to act virtuously; rather, one becomes virtuous by habitual and repetitive behavior of virtue (Aristotle 1744). Focusing on historic human behavior, what this means is that humans have simply formed the wrong ethical habits, such that they do not focus on anything but the consequences of their actions, or their duty to act, or in the case of this essay, simply allowing the passive acceptance of biologically unique races to exist within their minds. Now, the remedy to this social construction lies in inward reflection; and such, this is why racism still exists today. This is why the social construction of race exists; why people become ethnocentric and hierarchical thinkers; why one develops dogma. The greater society does not give serious thought to their own habits. If we continue to fail as a society to reflect inward on ourselves, more unethical behavior, such as underlying forms of racism, will necessarily result from the social construction of race.
In the fourth section of Book II in Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle further asserts that individuals must not simply seek to behave virtuously, but to behave in matters as virtuous individuals (Aristotle 1507). That is, one who does an act must not do it because it is right, they must do it because they desire to do what is right. Consider the example of Mr. Aarons-Young, and imagine there is a twist to the story; imagine there was a passerby who witnessed his ‘master’ whipping him and his fellow slaves. While if the passerby was a utilitarian or deontologist and viewed this as unethical treatment, they may hesitate for a variety of reasons to stop it, but in the end, may well choose to intervene. This is what Aristotle would claim is behaving virtuously. On the other hand, if the passerby was a virtue ethicist, they would immediately see the immorality and step in to stop the behavior without a second thought. Thus, the passerby would have the pure intention to stop the behavior, not just to do what is morally correct. This is what Aristotle would describe as behaving as virtuous individuals. Accordingly, society needs the unalloyed intention of the passerby who follows virtue ethics to combat ethical dilemmas, such as those that develop as a result of the social construction of race.
In the large majority of cases, though, action based ethics has come to the right decision surrounding race in the end. As mentioned earlier, slavery did end. In addition, Japanese Americans did get released and compensated by the US government; the Nazis in World War II were stopped; the US civil war ended up reuniting the nation and produced a nation perhaps more ethically sound afterwards. However, following virtue ethics these events never would have happened in the first place. Yes, slavery ended, but why did it need to happen in the first place for our society to believe it was wrong to own human beings? Why did we need to experience the detrimental effects of World War II to recognize the value of Jewish lives? Was there no other way to fix the problem of racism and slavery in the US than to have a civil war killing millions of citizens? Again, we fall back to the failure to reflect on our own habits that have led to the social construction of race and its destructive behaviors, the core focus of virtue ethics by Aristotle. Thus, the effects of the social construction of race may end in time too, but new ones will continue to arise until we look at our own habits. One must ask themselves if they want to continue to harm lives, or focus on the root of the problem itself and prevent them from occurring to begin with by following virtue ethics.
The continuation of phenotypic racial classification is thus embedded in both biological ignorance and self ignorance. One must question how many more global wars on ‘race,’ how many more killings, or how many more times individual ‘races’ will be the target of oppression before society will look back at itself. By following virtue ethics, society could have prevented past and present atrocities that have taken place as a result of the social construction of ‘race,’ such as described by Mr. Aarons-Young. What is most important, however, is stopping further harm in the future. As such, society must now separate from action-based ethics, and accept virtue ethics and its attempt to eliminate the root of today’s injustices surrounding established ‘races,’ ethnocentrism, hierarchical racial ideology, and racism itself.
Works Cited
Aarons-Young, Charlie. “Image 88 of Federal Writers’ Project: Slave Narrative Project, Vol. 1, Alabama, Aarons-Young. Library of Congress.” Library of Congress, www.loc.gov/resource/mesn.010/?sp=52.
Aristotle. The Complete Works of Aristotle, Volume Two : The Revised Oxford Translation, edited by Jonathan Barnes, Princeton University Press, 1984. ProQuest Ebook Central, https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/uis/detail.action?docID=1632631.*
Chou, Vivian. “How Science and Genetics Are Reshaping the Race Debate of the 21st Century.” Figures by Daniel Utter, Science in the News, Harvard Kenneth C. Griffin Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, 27 Feb. 2019, sitn.hms.harvard.edu/flash/2017/science-genetics-reshaping-race-debate-21st-century/.
Guerrero-Bosagna, Carlos. “What Is Epigenetics? .” TED-Ed, Youtube, 27 June 2016, www.youtube.com/watch?v=_aAhcNjmvhc.
McAfee, Sarah. “Race Is a Social Construct.” Center for Health Progress, 19 July 2021, centerforhealthprogress.org/race-social-construct/#:~:text=That’s%20why%20we%20say%20race,tool%20for%20oppression%20and%20violence.
Pojman, Louis P. & Fieser, James (2017). Ethics: Discovering Right and Wrong, 8th edition. Boston: Cengage.
Rosenberg, Noah A., et al. “Genetic Structure of Human Populations.” Science, vol. 298, no. 5602, 20 Dec. 2002, pp. 2381–2385, https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1078311.