[dragonwriter]

White ethnic groups that are predominantly Catholic being distinguished from "real" whites and being targets of White supremacists is a real historical thing (and not just with the Irish, also true of Italians, and its no small factor historically in why predominantly-white-in-traditional-racial-terms Hispanics have been largely constructed as non-White for quite some time in the US, which has turned out to be more durable than the others.)

Race is a mutable social construct that largely exists to rationalize other prejudices, and ethnic and religious prejudices are high on that list; treating race as if it were a real and fundamental thing orthogonal to other concerns is buying into race essentialism. Which is not to say Ignatiev is right, but rather to pretend that the anti-Catholicism he ignores contradicts a connection to racism and the construction of race rather than explains it is...also wrong.

[skissane]

> White ethnic groups that are predominantly Catholic being distinguished from "real" whites and being targets of White supremacists is a real historical thing

Anti-Catholicism is a huge part of the history of the UK, Ireland and the British Empire. As such, it has no particular connection with white supremacy – were the Penal Laws "white supremacist"? Was the Ulster Protestant League "white supremacist"? Is the Orange Order "white supremacist"?

Outside of the US, anti-Catholicism had no significant association with ideas of "race" or skin colour. Indeed, the whole "Irish weren't white" claim sounds so bizarre from a British or Irish or Australian perspective. All three countries have unpleasant histories of discrimination against Catholics, but nobody ever tried to justify it because "they weren't white". They were discriminated against because of their "popery", because they were viewed as disloyal to the state, bearers of foreign allegiance, practitioners of outdated superstition, etc.

And, much of US anti-Catholicism was directly imported from the UK. Which is why trying to view it all through a racial lens – which is a peculiarly American approach – seems so confused. It seems to come from just looking at things from a narrow US-centric perspective which ignores everything that happens in the rest of the world, and even ignores the British historical origins of much that happened in the US as well.

[dragonwriter]

> Anti-Catholicism is a huge part of the history of the UK, Ireland and the British Empire. As such, it has no particular connection with white supremacy

It does in fact have a particular connection with American white supremacy and, historically, with construction of race in America. You seem to be making the irrational jump from “X originated separately from Y” to “X has no particular connection with Y”, but that’s neither logically warranted nor as at all reliable as a practical guide when looking at elements of culture.

[skissane]

> It does in fact have a particular connection with American white supremacy and, historically, with construction of race in America. You seem to be making the irrational jump from “X originated separately from Y” to “X has no particular connection with Y”, but that’s neither logically warranted nor as at all reliable as a practical guide when looking at elements of culture.

I wouldn't say that race and anti-Catholicism have zero connection in US history – but I do think Ignatiev fundamentally misrepresents what that connection is. People can be prejudiced against both groups A and B simultaneously, without making them the same sort of group or the same kind of prejudice; people can simultaneously have religionist and racist prejudices, without making religionism a form of racism.

And there are some deep differences between the two. Catholics who converted to Protestantism (a significant minority did) found that the vast majority of Protestant prejudice and discrimination against them disappeared, almost overnight – now, they shouldn't have to do that, and of course for most it was not a live option socially or psychologically, but for all it was at least physically possible – the impossibility was in deciding to do it, not in being unable to do it if they'd decided to. By contrast, the vast majority of African-Americans couldn't "convert to being white" – a minority of individuals of mixed ancestry could manage to "pass", but for the vast majority "convert to white" was asking the physically impossible. Ignatiev et al cite occasional historical usage of "racialised" language against Catholics, but they overstate its frequency and significance, and ignore the fact that even most people who deployed this "racialised" language would forget it the moment a Catholic expressed interest in conversion – there was nothing most African-Americans could do to get them to forget it.

The fact is, prejudiced people tend to have lots of different prejudices–that doesn't make all their prejudices the same, or make all of their numerous prejudices instances of just one of them. I mean, if someone is homophobic, is that racism? Sure, most racists may well be homophobic, but gay people can be racist too, [0] and I don't think the Ugandan politicians who have been clamouring to reintroduce capital punishment for homosexuality are motivated by racism either. [1]

But Ignatiev decided to take this one issue, race – which no one denies plays a major role in US history, and arguably a much bigger role than in the history of the rest of the English-speaking world – and turn it into the be-all-and-end-all of American history, in terms of which everything else has to be interpreted, the square hole into which everything else must be squeezed, regardless of its shape. And, this is I think the biggest particular connection between anti-Catholicism and race in US history – through pseudo-history, Ignatiev has made history, and caused very many Americans today to believe such a connection exists, no matter how ahistorical that belief may be – and believing it is true makes it true, not in the past, but in the present. I really doubt the US is going to be able to move past its "deeply unhealthy relationship to race" until people abandon views such as those of Ignatiev and LeVine, who are part of the problem not part of the solution.

[0] https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/intelligence-report/...

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/oct/15/ugandan-mps-pr...

[dragonwriter]

> I wouldn't say that race and anti-Catholicism have zero connection in US history – but I do think Ignatiev fundamentally misrepresents what that connection is.

Sure, I tried to make clear that while I think it goes to far to separate anti-Catholicism from racism (And the evolving construction of race) in America, I'm not defending Ignatiev's particular characterization in so doing.

> The fact is, prejudiced people tend to have lots of different prejudices–that doesn't make all their prejudices the same, or make all of their numerous prejudices instances of just one of them. I mean, if someone is homophobic, is that racism?

I dunno, I think generally multiple bigotries shared by the same person are society constructing different labels for the persons "not like me-ism", so in that sense, yes they are all the same thing having different labels assigned to different manifestations of a unified whole. But, on the other hand, when you are talking about social impacts, it makes sense to look at them differently because the different aspects can have different dynamics as societal forces, whether or not they individually are part of a unified system.

But the relation between anti-Catholicism and racism isn't that they are the same social force, but that they are social forces where each colors the manifestation of the other. This is, AFAIK, not as true of, say, homophobia and racism in the same way (they interact intersectionally, but that's a different thing).

[skissane]

> I dunno, I think generally multiple bigotries shared by the same person are society constructing different labels for the persons "not like me-ism", so in that sense, yes they are all the same thing having different labels assigned to different manifestations of a unified whole

I think that ignores that societies treat some "not like me" groups much better than others, and even have their reasons for doing so (whether right or wrong or a bit of both). British hostility to Catholicism wasn't just "not like me-ism" – they didn't show anywhere near as much "not like me-ism" towards Huguenot refugees, or the Dutch or the Germans – on the contrary, they imported monarchs from the Netherlands (William of Orange) and Germany (George I). Protestant England treated foreign Protestants better than English Catholics, because the religious similarity was seen as more important that the linguistic/cultural/ethnic differences. It is hard for people today – in a society where most people (even religious people) don't take religion that seriously – to understand how seriously people took religious disputes back then. Also, domestic Catholics were seen as a political threat to the reigning regime (many of them were Jacobites, or at least had sympathies in that direction), most foreign Protestants were not.

> But the relation between anti-Catholicism and racism isn't that they are the same social force, but that they are social forces where each colors the manifestation of the other.

Contemporary American culture foregrounds issues of race and backgrounds issues of religion – hence, if one immigrant group (e.g. Germans or Norwegians) was accepted into American society more easily than another (e.g. Irish Catholics) – people are quick to accept the proposed explanation that was because one group was "more white", the alternative explanation of "more Protestant" won't even occur to many people. I think that says more about 21st century US culture than 19th century US history. But isn't that cultural tendency to focus on "racial" explanations for things to the exclusion of non-"racial" explanations, part of that "deeply unhealthy relationship to race" which another commenter mentioned upthread?