The most blatant article last week was a report about Americans losing their rank as tallest nation. The Washington Post created a graphic to show how America slipped from being the tallest nation in 1850 compared to Canada and nine European nations to a lower ranking by 2000. The graphic used 12 shaded images superimposed on a height chart to represent the relative average heights of the 11 nations.

You probably question why the graphic needed 12 images to compare the heights of 11 nations. It needed an addition image because they represented the United States twice. They labeled one image United States (White) and the other United States (Black). Now, anybody who fails to see the symbolism in this graphic isn’t trying.

Perhaps I could give them a pass if they included images and statistics for some western African nations and some images for French Americans, German Americans and Danish Americans. Then, I might presume they included those images to compare their height as Americans with the average height of their ancestors’ homeland. But, I cannot make this presumption, because the graphic did not include those images. Therefore, I conclude their intention was to show Black Americans are not part of American society.

It is frightening how willingly Americans accept this type contrived statistical support for racial difference and exclusion. Often, the alleged scientific studies are so contradictory they should insult the intelligence of the people reading them. But, seemingly they do not. This so-called study about Americans decreasing relative average height is one of the worse I’ve read.

The results of the study contradicted their racial presumptions about innate racial difference, racial genetics. They studied and reported a white United States and a black United States presumably because combining the results from two genetically different racial groups would distort the results.

However, the graphic shows United States (white), Canada and United States (black) ranked 1, 2 and 3 in average height in 1850. This means those people label white living in the America’s had more in common physically with those people labeled black in America than they did with Europeans. And this relationship continues even as they drop in ranking, because in 2000 they were ranked 9, 8 and 10 respectively.

Obviously, there are cultural factors at play here that override presumed immutable racial traits. Rational people, true scientists, would marvel at the study’s unexpected finding, at lest unexpected for them. But, few actions are rational in America when society defends the American religion of race.

Americans persistently identify people by race in their conversations and in their scientific studies as if it describes the person or situation. But, they never identify the particular racial trait that applies. The article about Americans’ lower height ranking did not explain what significant racial trait made it necessary to name two nations named United States in the study. It did not explain why listing two American racial groups as United States nations in a comparative study about nations did not compromise scientific standards.

Researcher John Komlos did report they tried to eliminate the effect of immigration from the most recent analyst by excluding Latinos and Asians. However, the article did not say if they also considered how the massive European immigration into the United States from 1850 to 1950 distorted their findings.

Maybe the researchers did not consider the effect of European immigration, because they believed they were physically and genetically identical to White Americans.  If so, then why conduct the study, because the average height of the people in Europe would be identical too? On the other hand, how could they not consider the effect of European immigration if they were comparing United States’ and European nations average height? Of course, a better course would be to measure all people here as Americans and report their average height.

This study and others like the one that claims White Americans are happier and read more books than Black Americans and Latinos encourage prejudice and stereotypes about people. After some bogus scientific study concludes some vague racial difference, it’s easier for people to insert their prejudices and stereotypes.

 

Contact Kenneth Brooks at P.O. Box 882, Vallejo, CA 94590.  opinion@ethicalego.com