It ought to be obvious to anyone that Darwinism was made in Hell as the perfect theory of origins for racists: It turns out, we are not all the children of Adam and Eve — that’s just … superstition. the truth is: We good, they bad. So we hit hard first.,
Something a chimpanzee would understand.
Anyway, UCal Stanislaus prof Richard Weikart catches us up with the latest efforts to keep all that going by deflecting blame for racism onto creationists:
A recent psychological study by Stylianos Syropoulos et al. published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology suggests that Americans who disbelieve in human evolution have higher levels of racism and prejudice (Stylianos Syropoulos, et al., “Bigotry and the Human–Animal Divide: (Dis)Belief in Human Evolution and Bigoted Attitudes Across Different Cultures,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (2022)). The implication seems to be that disbelief in evolution somehow contributes to racism.
Interestingly, however, at the beginning of the study, the authors admit that belief in evolution has been used in the past to promote and justify racism. Clearly the authors — who embrace evolution, but reject racism — find these historical connections troubling. Thus, while admitting that evolution has been historically connected to racism, they seek to counter this by allegedly demonstrating that belief in human evolution today makes one less prone to racism.
There are numerous problems with this study, but I will focus on three: (1) The correlations that they find are not necessarily caused by the idea of evolution; (2) their definition of racism is problematic; and (3) some of their findings do not support their thesis.
Richard Weikart, “Does Disbelief in Human Evolution Foment Racism?” at Evolution News and Science Today (April 15, 2022)
Just think how many people make their living off Darwinism and we can see a motive right there for the kind of study that attempts to exculpate Darwinism.
You may also wish to read: Richard Weikart: Scientific racism is more virulent than religious racism.