Unpopular opinion: the uptake of epigenetics in popular science sounds way too much like eugenics even in social justice circles.

Are there heritable phenotypic changes that can occur as a result of physical-psychological trauma of anti-blackness? Yes. Do white people analogously “inherit” some kind of predisposition to violence or desire to domination? NO.

I’m seeing this tweet go viral on Instagram and it’s just wrong. The first part is in the ballpark of epigenetics, but the second part is trying to make heritable a violence that is socialized and structurally enforced.

I am begging you, stop reclaiming race science. We know it’s obviously wrong and racist to say that someone is genetically predisposed to criminality; but also you don’t genetically inherit trauma and you don’t inherit race-hate.