The replies to John Boyega’s (simple, sensible) tweets on racism indicate the need for a refresher on what racism even is, and why you can’t be racist to white people, and why worrying about “reverse racism” is insipid.

The concept of race was created by white supremacists.

The dictionary definition in recent years/decades has been flattened to mean “discrimination based on skin colour” without any actual context, but it’s not just about “skin colour” exactly, though colourism is absolutely a major factor.

“Race” isn’t real in a biological sense — phenotypes are real, but the categorization of people into boxes of “black,” “white” etc. with their own defined set of characteristics is a colonial concept dating back to around the 16th century.

When people say “race is a social construct” this is what they’re really getting at. Race, as we understand it today, was created by Europeans as a means to justify colonialism; if you could “scientifically” group, say, black people as lesser people, you could justify slavery.

White supremacy isn’t a byproduct of “race,” it’s the whole point. The hierarchy and language surrounding race stems from a “white = good, pure, virtuous“ and “black = the opposite” starting point, ingrained over centuries. This is what people mean when they say that in order...

...to be racist, there need to be power dynamics. These aren’t just immediate circumstances, they’re *the modern world* over 500+ years. Race isn’t an anything-goes concept that just happens to affect black people the most, white people the least. It was designed to subjugate.

“Then what do you call it when someone discriminates against a white person?” Honestly? I don’t give a shit. “Name-calling.” Make something up. “Racism against white people“ is a nonsense idea that only serves to distract from (and re-enforce) systems of dehumanization and abuse.