[CWuestefeld]

If a person believes this is due to some "inherent racial trait", they're a racist, plain and simple.

From this I think you're (a) allowing that there might be cultural differences correlated with race that are causative; and (b) expressing that it's flatly impossible that there could be (statistically on average) genetic differences that contribute to greater or lesser success depending on the prevailing environment.

Point (b) sounds like a denial of the mechanisms of evolution that we have high confidence are correct, and Lysenkoism more generally. It's not that (b) is necessarily true, but your implication that it cannot possibly be true (or at least that admitting it's true makes one the worst sort of monster) is shutting science out of the discussion before it can even be consulted.

[endominus]

I don't think that's the most charitable possible interpretation of the argument, though I would heartily concede that the matter is heavily, and at times it seems even intetionally, obfuscated by the double meaning of the terms racial superiority/inferiority. To whit, they are used as both objective measures and moral ones, and vacillating between the two allows for specious arguments to be put forward.

An example of the first; we know that there are genetic differences in average heights of populations, and other physical measures; if a biologist were to tell me, for example, that people with lighter skin were superior at generating Vitamin D from sunlight, I would not be inclined to disbelieve them; there is strong evidence for heritability of traits as fine-grained as political leanings; and so on. Saying that a race has a superior economic position due to these factors is, as far as I can tell, usually insufficient - the differences are minor enough, and usually overshadowed by other factors like noise or culture, that I don't think the math adds up.

But there's also a moral judgement made in the racial superiority argument; that because Race A has higher incidence of traits X, Y, and Z, they deserve a higher place in society/greater wealth/whatever. This is a racist outlook because it prejudges people based on their race rather than their merits, and paints an entire race of individuals with the same brush. Still, this is the argument that many avowed racists have made in the past and many in the present are quite sensitive to it.

The difference is subtle but important; the first meaning acknowledges distinctions between races and ethnicities, but allows for individual variation and places no moral weight on those differences. The second implies that acknowledging differences between races is tantamount to declaring that one race deserves supremacy and obeisance from the others. The difficulty comes from people who believe the implication of the second meaning while hating the conclusion, and that's where you get Blank Slaters and, as you mentioned, Lysenkoism.

Arguing for the first meaning is not productive without disambiguating it from the second.

[CWuestefeld]

Your first meaning, the non-moral one, is what I had in mind. Clearly there are some people who would prefer to think about the alternative way, and they have my contempt.

But the popular culture today is, itself, trying to impute a moral judgment. Where most of us, I think, very much want to get past all this racial BS, we're being forced to view the world through a racial lens so that the "anti-racists" can make a moral judgment about observed differences in outcomes.

[ajross]

I made this point above and you didn't engage, but there's a point at which "wanting to get past all this racial BS" turns into "you can't teach kids that minority communities are poorer" or "you can't speak to Google employees about caste discrimination".

Where do you draw the line? Doesn't a straightforward interpretation of free speech and civil discourse demand that we let the assholes be assholes, and not cancel them?

From my perspective on the other side, I find it really weird that a bunch of highly paid, middle aged white professionals (and I'm one too) seem so threatened by college kids yelling about privilege or whatever. College kids have always been assholes. You don't remember meeting (or... being?) them?