Why is racism wrong?

[David Sims]

But I have not, so far, made any assertions.

This:

"First, racists often rely far more extensively on empirically derived facts than their opponents do. That is, racists don't "just make it up" and then rantingly insist upon their narrative. Instead, they do quite a bit of research before they write."

is an assertion. You're not off to a very good start.

Edit: Of course, I see I wasn't the first to note this.

If you will carefully examine some of my other posts, you will see that I give examples of racist/egalitarian debates in which my claim is illustrated. When I tell you that "racists don't 'just make it up' and then rantingly insist upon their narrative," I'm reporting what I have seen.

Besides the examples I've already given, I have others. A great many, in fact. I'll provide them hereafter as seems proper.

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But I have not, so far, made any assertions.

If one is going to logically deduce your position from what you have already mentioned in your original post, it is that you seemingly have no problem with racism due to the egalitarian position.

When I was younger, I was an egalitarian. All the way through college, where I majored in physics and in astronomy, I held egalitarian views on race. Mostly because, I think, I just didn't have any reason to think much about the subject. The significance of the fact that my college was in southern Georgia, where about a third of the population is black, and yet not one black student majored in astronomy or in physics during my four years there, just didn't light any bulbs in my brain.

And I stayed like that, more or less, for about 12 years following my graduation from college. I was a liberal in general political opinions, and I was a egalitarian on race. But, most of all, I was unusually honest in the sense that I'd not intentionally cheat to win a debate.

So when in 1995 - or thereabout - I entered a debate on the subject of racial equality, on the egalitarian side, against a racist opponent, with the Microsoft Network's early intranet being an unwitting host to the discussion, I was sure that I would win. I was smart. I was articulate.

But I was wrong. And my racist opponent made sure that I knew that I was wrong.

So I had a choice to make. Would I retreat under a cloud of ad hominems and misdirection in order to save face, and then forget that the entire debate ever happened so that I could remain egalitarian? Or would I change sides in order to pursue the truth wherever it might take me? I did the latter. Just as I'd done it 20 years previously when, at the age of 15, I decided that the truth wasn't to be found in Christianity and became an atheist.

What self-respect would I have, if I would not acknowledge having been persuaded by the side with the better arguments and the claims more likely to be true?