Is America Racist?

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Welcome to Bible Bashed, where we aim to equip the saints for the works of ministry by answering the questions you're not allowed to ask.

We're your hosts, Harrison Kerrig and Pastor Tim Mullett, and today we seek to answer the age -old question,

Is America Racist? Now, normally what we try to do with this show is, typically we try to present you title questions that are not normally the questions everyone is asking themselves, at least out loud anyways.

Part of the joke is we introduce these as age -old questions, but then normally no one's really asking them anywhere.

Typically people want to know the answers, but they're not normally going around to everyone they can and asking them these types of questions, and that's meant to be part of the joke on our end.

But then this is a unique episode where our title question, Is America Racist?

is actually something that everyone is talking about, and everyone is wondering either,

Why is our country so racist? Why are we permeated with this weird treating one race as if it's lesser than all the other races?

Or they're wondering, Why are we talking about this so much? I don't see racism anywhere, but everyone's talking about it like it's everywhere.

I don't understand. And so this is actually the kind of question that really everyone is asking. And so,

Tim, why don't you just start us off by just addressing that question head -on. Do you think

America is racist from your perspective? Yeah, well, as you think about the idea of that kind of question,

Is America Racist? This is a question that really the word racism is a word that has a meaning, it had a meaning, but then in common parlance, it's being used in so many situations now that basically anything and everything is being called racist.

So an individual who is arguing with a liberal will inevitably be called a racist.

Anyone who essentially is standing in the way of something that an African -American wants, they're going to be called racist.

Anytime anyone resists anything that the political left is trying to shove down your throat, you're going to inevitably be accused of racism in one way or another.

If you have eyes in your head, you're going to be accused of racism. And so when you think about this idea of racism right now, the truth is that if everything is racist, then there's nothing that's racist.

And so it's a word that is remarkably overused, and it's overused to the point where most people are somewhat sick of it.

And it doesn't have the same kind of terror -inducing, gut -wrenching kind of fear associated with being labeled as a racist as it used to.

I mean, it used to be that people were so afraid of having that label attached to them that essentially they would do whatever the left wanted them to do.

They would apologize and follow all over themselves to essentially give in to whatever demands were made of them because they were so terrified of that label and the canceling power that was associated with that.

Now it's just being used to such an extent, it's so overused that it's just functionally meaningless.

But then it is a word that had a unique historical meaning that is associated with what's described as scientific racism.

And so scientific racism was the idea that essentially humanity is divided into various races of people who were almost what you might consider sub -human categories of people, sub -human species.

And so you think about in an evolutionary framework, this is an idea that Darwin essentially advanced to where humanity was evolved from a common ancestor with apes and the different groups of people, whether it's

Africans or Asians or Europeans or Caucasians or whatever, each one of these races are basically in an evolutionary sense descended from apes, this common ancestor with apes, to varying degrees.

And so Darwin in his book On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection or the Preservation of the

Favored Races in the Struggle for Life, this idea of scientific racism was found in his actual book there.

He wrote a follow -up called The Descent of Man. And essentially in that he said the

Western nations of Europe now so immeasurably surpassed their former savage progenitors that they stand at the summit of civilization.

And then he says the civilized races of man will almost certainly exterminate and replace the savage races throughout the world.

And so this idea of racism was built into the fabric of Darwinism. And it was essentially this belief that mankind could be divided into various subspecies of humanity, almost subhuman species that were further along on the evolutionary ladder than others.

But then it was this idea that basically gave a basis for chattel slavery that we see.

And so like the idea of enslaving blacks was perceived through a

Darwinian lens as being basically okay because they were lower on the evolutionary ladder than the favored races were.

And so under that kind of idea of scientific racism, I would say that there's very few people today who actually think that way.

I mean, you're going to have some Southern redneck guys out in the middle of the Ozark or whatever who basically think that Africans are essentially apes or something along those lines.

And so you'll have those kind of individuals. Or on the left, you'll have Nick Cannon essentially arguing that white people are essentially devils and subhuman and due to their lack of melanin, he says, their lack of melanin, they're unable to have basic morality and inherently savages.

But that kind of thing is basically pretty rare in America in general.

Very few people actually think of humanity as being divided into these quasi -subhuman kind of species as far as that's concerned.

So when you think about the idea of racism in general, there really isn't this overwhelming or pervasive racism in the scientific sense around today.

Most people realize that the human race is essentially unified. And we more naturally talk about different ethnicities than we do races.

Or if we are talking about races, we're not races in general, or we're more naturally appealing to a concept of ethnicity for the most part in the vast majority of cases, particularly with Christians.

But I would say no. I mean, America in of itself is not fundamentally racist anymore.

We all, not in the scientific sense for sure. So not in the scientific sense are we racist.

At least as a general statement, there's not really groups of people that are going around saying, hey, this other group of people are barely human.

Yeah. I mean, that's what the Nazis did with the Jews. And that's what we did during chattel slavery. But very few people are like, it's so anti -PC to even talk that way at this point.

But I don't think most people even think that way anymore, that people are almost different species of humanity, as far as that's concerned.

With the genetic advancements nowadays, I mean, we realize that we're more alike than we are different.

Yeah. Yeah. And just as a side note, I do think it's really funny that evolution in general is pretty, even though it's just a theory that hasn't been proven, it's pretty much widely accepted as fact in the secular world.

But then the downfall of, you know, the theory of evolution is you get stuff like this.

And it's totally, if you want to stay consistent with that theory, it's totally okay to be a scientific racist.

Well, yeah, I mean, it makes the most sense of a Darwinian worldview. I mean, the idea that we are all, you know, one shared humanity descended from Adam, that comes from a biblical worldview.

But then the idea of survival of the fittest and, you know, natural selection, like Hitler was following the logic of Darwinianism.

You know, the slave trade was following the logic of Darwinianism. I mean, that's where it naturally leads.

That makes right, you know, survival of the fittest. Like, you know, if you, if like, there are some people groups obviously who were more technologically advanced than others.

And why wouldn't you think it was because they were higher on the evolutionary ladder than others. And if they are higher on the evolutionary ladder than others, why, what, what is to say that they didn't have the right to exterminate other groups of people?

You know, it's basically we're all fighting over shared resources and that was Hitler's thing. I mean, we're all fighting over the same shared resources.

Scarcity of resources is, is a thing. And, you know, eventually given enough time, we're all going to be going to war anyway.

So why don't, why not circumvent the process and, you know, let the higher races prevail as they're destined to do.

Right. Yeah, definitely a faulty worldview to say the least. But I, you know,

I think when it comes to the conversation, if you can really call it that over the last few years in America, I don't think most people that would say

America is racist, I don't think they're probably, I don't think their critique would typically be, well, most people in America view, you know, normally

African -Americans, most people in America normally view African -Americans as essentially subhuman.

I think at least from my perspective, it seems more like the critique is, hey, it seems like most of America is might, might view black people as humans the same as everyone else, but then they still, we as a country still treat them in a way that we don't treat white people.

Basically that that's the critique I see more than anything else. So that seems different than scientific racism.

So addressing that, that critique more directly, do you think America is racist in light of that?

Yeah. I mean, there are any number of reasons that why individuals could be treated in a way that's different based on certain, that has some sort of correlation with skin color for sure.

But like in terms of just, you know, your standard definition of racism in the dictionary, one of the things that you're going to find is you can just look up racism and Merriam Webster.

And it's a belief that race is fundamental, the determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superior superiority of a particular race.

So I read that again, a belief that race is a fundamental determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race.

So even the definition of racism in the dictionary is largely appealing to that notion of scientific racism there.

But then, there's also what now has been described as this systemic oppression of a racial group to the social economic and political advantage of another.

And so that's essentially what's happened is we've changed the definition from the common usage from what normally is called, you know, scientific racism more to what is being described as systemic racism along those lines.

And so people are now are asking, you know, because there are disparities in the world between whites and blacks or between Asians and whites and Asians and blacks, because there are these disparities then in a simplistic way, essentially what's being argued is that all those disparities ipso facto are evidence of, of systemic racism.

And this is essentially what David Platt was arguing at his infamous T4G sermon on Amos, let justice roll down like waters, where he without any thought whatsoever, essentially listed economic disparities between blacks and whites, economic and social disparities between blacks and whites as ipso facto evidence of systemic racism.

And so now we're using racism, basic racism now is being used to, to basically as an all purpose explanation to explain why these disparities exist.

But then that's, that's moving away from what might be described as conscious prejudice towards members of an opposite race.

If you want to use that unhelpful category to implicit bias and microaggressions and all these things like that.

And so, you know, as you're answering that kind of question, if you're going to talk about, well, is America systemically racist in that way?

I would say, well, the only systemic racism that exists in America, as far as the actual laws that are there is laws that favor

African -Americans over whites or Asians. Okay. Yeah. So, so basically what you're saying is there's a lot of people who are looking around and seeing that you know, when it comes to African -Americans, typically it seems like they're normally not as well off financially.

They don't normally have which, which stands to reason they don't normally have the same high paying jobs that, that white people might normally have.

And so their answer to that, their, their answer to their, their explanation for that observation is to say, well, obviously there's, this means that there's systemic racism involved.

Yeah. Right. Yeah. And essentially, yeah, that's defined as like prejudice plus power. So because white people are in power, then they're creating a system which inherently favors white people over black people.

And so in that way they may not even be conscious of, you know, the, the nature of their exercise of power in that way, but they created a system which inherently is going to privilege people of their skin color over and against others.

And, you know, individuals like Robin D 'Angelo who wrote a book, white fragility is essentially arguing that, you know, racism is the normal state of affairs in, in our country.

And, but then, you know, racism is defined in that way as prejudice plus power, meaning it's only white people who are able to have race be racist and not blacks.

And that's why, you know, a lot of individuals basically say I'm black. I can't be racist. It's because we've changed the definition from the scientific notion which, you know,

Nick Cannon is certainly guilty of a black man and rednecks, some rednecks.

But then you, you, you, you have, now it's prejudice plus power. And so then you have the system supposedly that's rigged against African Americans, you know, in favor of whites.

And it may not be, you know, conscious racial animosity towards members of a different ethnic group, but there's a system that's in place.

And so, you know, Robin D 'Angelo basically would be quoted as saying something along the lines of it's not whether racism occurs.

It's it's how did it occur in any interaction? And so racism is the normal state of affairs.

And basically, you know, any base, basically you're getting that from the notion that any economic or social disparity is, there's only one explanation for it that can possibly be conceived.

And that is the systemic racism essentially. Yeah. Okay. Well, I guess that really leads to two inevitable questions,

I guess. And the, the first would be number one, is the claim true then that African Americans, you know, finance, for example, financially are typically much worse off than, than Caucasians in America.

That would, that would be the first question. And so, you know, basically the claim that America is racist is based off of that premise.

So, so that needs to be true, right? In order for the claim that America is racist to be true.

The second question that would have to be asked then is, can you clarify that question real quick?

What was the question there? Oh yeah. Basically just saying, number one, you know, are, are black people, for example, financially worse off or, or more disadvantaged?

Disadvantaged. Yeah. That's, that's probably, I think that's a term that they use a lot. Disadvantaged compared to white people.

So that would have to be true, right? For their claims to make any sense.

Right. Yup. And then the second, the second question would have to be, well, is the only explanation for something like that, that they're being, they're being oppressed, whether consciously or unconsciously, are there any other explanations that could be given for why that's happening?

That's happening. Does that make sense? Yeah. I mean, I think I could probably answer both of those in one question, essentially are in one response.

You know, the National Museum of African -American History put out their infamous poster online.

Do you remember that coming out? I do. Yeah. Yeah. I saw that. So, you know, this, this poster is essentially talking about race.

And so at, essentially it said aspects and assumptions of whiteness or white culture in the

United States. And so it was basically this flyer that they put out that they received a lot of heat from.

And it's difficult to know what to make of their retraction of this, because this is essentially what's being argued.

But then they, they put it this way. They say white dominant culture or whiteness refers to the way white people and their traditions, attitudes or way of life have been normalized over time and are now considered standard practices in the

United States. And since white people still hold most of the institutional power in America, we have all internalized some aspects of white culture, including people of color.

And so basically like you have to, in order to interact with something like this, you have to put on your multicultural lenses essentially.

And you have to basically, basically view all cultures as being fundamentally neutral.

So all cultures. So think about it that way. All cultures under their view are perceived as being fundamentally neutral.

And so then like the fact that, you know, white people are basically ahead in, in the world that we live in today is basically because white people built the culture and society we live in.

And there are certain aspects and assumptions of whiteness or white culture in the United States that black individuals by and large don't share.

But then when you actually examine their list of things, that's what is somewhat shocking about it is so, so basically, basically here's some characteristics of what they call whiteness.

The idea of rugged individuals, visualism. So the individual is considered the primary unit.

There's this idea of self -reliance or independence and autonomy are highly valued and rewarded. Individuals in this way are assumed to be in control of their environment.

So you get what you deserve. In other words, now, you know, so far maybe, okay, maybe, you know, white people are more individualistic and black people are more communitarian and okay, you know, whatever.

But then you think about the family structure, you know, assumptions of whiteness. You have the nuclear family, a father, a mother, and two to three children is the ideal.

So social unit. Right. So that's not an aspect of whiteness. That's an aspect of the

Bible, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Family husband is the breadwinner or the head of the household. That's not an aspect of whiteness.

That's an aspect of the Bible. Okay. That's Western civilization was built on a, you know,

Christian worldview. The husband is the breadwinner, the provider. But then, you know, this has to be an aspect of whiteness because black illegitimacy rate at this point is, you know, 78 % or something ridiculous along those lines.

But then think about this. The wife is the homemaker and subordinate to the husband, you know, so, but that again, that's, that's biblical

Christianity, right? Children should have their own rooms be independent. Okay. That's the individualism component there again.

But then where it gets really crazy is so right now whiteness is being viewed as predominantly a biblical worldview.

Okay. Responsibility placed on the individual and all that. But then they, they go on to say emphasis on the scientific method method.

So objective rational linear thinking is characteristic of whiteness. Well, what's the inverse of that being irrational and being subjective?

Like, so again, I mean, these are biblical values. This isn't just, you know, multiculturalism that one, you know, you can't criticize any kind of culture.

These are problems that, you know, if, and I mean, essentially, you know, the national museum of African -American history is saying that black people are irrational and illogical.

They don't understand cause and effect relationships like white people. Sounds pretty racist.

Meaning if you shoot someone, you're going to go to jail, you know, like they don't like, like that's just a matter of whiteness, right?

Quantitative emphasis. Right. So like these are just, this is scientific method. This is how we built our society.

I mean, you can't send a rocket into space without an emphasis on scientific method. You can't build a car without emphasis on scientific method.

You can't accomplish anything in life without emphasis on the scientific method. Like this is these are, you know, if God is an orderly creator, he made the world in such a way that reflects his character.

Like we're not going to be able to subdue the earth and have dominion over it. If we don't have an emphasis on objective, rational, linear thinking.

Okay. So basically, you know, then the bottom it's like a

Protestant work ethic, you know, hard work is the key to success. I mean, my goodness, I go to the ant, you're sluggard.

I mean, just read the Bible, read the book of Proverbs. This is straight out of the book of Proverbs. I didn't know King Solomon was, was blinded by whiteness.

My goodness. Yeah. Well you work before you play. Right. It's like a, yes. I mean like, yes, we all have eyes.

We know that African -American culture is obsessed with sports and, you know, and games and everything else.

And, you know, but like, that's what you're telling us. You're telling us that essentially African -Americans are lazy and that they're illogical and, and everything else, you know, if you don't meet your goals, you didn't work hard enough

Protestant work ethic, you know, and it goes on to talk about, you know, being polite and things like this.

And so, you know, but if those are like, so what's happened is you have to put your multicultural lens on this kind of framework.

And then essentially you're viewing all cultures as neutral and you're not allowed to criticize any culture cultures.

And basically you know, the, the idea then is just that white people have created a society that prefers the things that they subjectively decided to value for whatever irrational reason they decided to value it.

But then if you have a, of a black belt society, then essentially that was characterized by laziness and, you know, disrespect and, you know, single motherhood and you know, irrational illogical thinking then, you know, then essentially in that kind of society, then blacks would excel.

But then the problem is, it's just, this isn't reality. This isn't the way the reality works. And this isn't biblical.

And so, you know, that they were forced to take that down because everyone was basically, they could read the, you know, subtext there, you know, essentially the lines there.

So you're saying that I guess white people are hard workers and nice and polite and logical and African -Americans are lazy and, you know, prioritize playing over work and are rude and illogical.

And so they had to take it down. But then that part of the problem though, is you do have a clash of values that are happening and there are a clash of values that are happening in our society right now.

And, and, and that matters. And, and so like a lot of these things, aren't just,

I mean, there's an objective standard in the Bible about how to get ahead in life. And it's largely with what the national museum of African -American history calls whiteness essentially.

And so, but, but if that's an accurate reflection of reality, which it seems to be, you know, you're not allowed to say it, but they knew what they were saying and we all can understand what they're saying.

But if that's the case, you know, I mean like, look, I mean, if you're not allowed to say these things, but I mean, it is just to give examples of the way that this actually works.

I mean, it is a very different experience to go to Hardee's than it is to go to Chick -fil -A. Okay. Related to the idea of niceness, like one culture prioritizing niceness over another culture, you know, as far as that goes.

And as far as just hard work and everything else, I mean like emphasis on the, you know, logic and scientific method and everything else.

I mean, I like, I like just watch a rap video and you're going to see that there are problems in the

African -American community. The African -American community right now is profoundly anti -intellectual in the same way that Southern white redneck culture is profound, is profoundly anti -intellectual.

And so there, there are problems there that, that from a biblical worldview, but if there is such a thing as objective truth, and the

Bible does give us a way to get ahead, then these aren't just white issues of whiteness or this,

I mean, these same traits are at work and, you know, Asian societies too, right? This is not just something that white people invented.

I think Asians are now considered white. It's not supposed to make any sense, but.

If I'm up to date on all of my, my, you know, social media stuff,

I'm pretty sure Asians are now considered white people. They're also people of color, colorless people right over and against the people of color.

Now, I mean, so you, you look at these things and it's like, no, I don't, I don't believe that there's some kind of systemic oppression of black people that are holding black people back.

In fact, there's a systemic favoritism towards black people in our society right now.

If you try just a little bit in our society, you'll get ahead. Like if you just like, you'll have any number of people fall.

Like if you're an African -American person who just tries to speak English and tries to apply yourself to your studies, you'll have any number of people who will fall over themselves to try to give you whatever you want in our society.

And you don't even have to try near as hard as the standard, you know, white person. I mean, I went to seminary and I had an

African -American friend and, and, you know, my, my African -American friend, he had, you know, professor after professor, after professor, he had 20 professors offered to be his mentor, his personal mentor during our education there.

And you can imagine how many professors offered to be my mentor. I'm guessing not 20.

Zero. No, and I don't, I don't begrudge that. I don't begrudge that, but I'm just trying to say that there are opportunities there.

You know, the fact that I was a quarter Mexican didn't even count, you know, I wasn't minority enough, you know, but it didn't count, you know, but I mean, the thing is like we're living in a society that's falling all over itself to be diverse and show reverse partiality there.

We're not living in a society trying to hold anyone back. And there are simple, you know, ways to get ahead in the world.

And if African -Americans want to take them at this point in history, there's nothing to stand in their way.

But then the problem is that you have, you know, testimony after testimony of, you know, individuals like Ben Carson or Bodie Balcombe or, you know, those kinds of individuals who basically say, describe their childhood of them trying to, you know, learn and as being accused of being white, you know, at various points.

And so there's, there's a cultural pressure within the African -American community to keep the

African -American community back. And that's the biggest, one of the biggest threats that's happening right now.

Speaking of, you know, biblical teachings, racism ultimately is a question of morality above all else.

And so we, as Christians, we wanted to go to the Bible and let God tell us what is right and what is wrong.

And so we spent, you know, about 30 minutes talking about. Pretty much how the world would define racism.

So Tim, why don't you explain for us now how the

Bible would categorize racism? How, how does the Bible define racism for us?

Yeah, I think this was hard because, you know, racism is obviously not a word that's found the Bible, but then the problem is the concept of race really isn't found in the

Bible either in the same kind of way. And so the Bible doesn't teach that individuals are essentially a subhuman species that are higher up on the evolutionary ladder.

I mean, the Bible teaches that the entire human race is descended from Adam. And it's, it's, it's basically kind of inappropriate to talk about like race, like the concept of race, because there aren't races in the scientific

Darwin sense of racism. We have different ethnicities, we have different nationalities and, you know, it's not entirely true that everyone of a particular skin color really even shares the same traits in any kind of homogenous way.

And so all, you know, all Caucasians aren't obviously the same in any way. There's vast cultural differences between different types of Caucasians.

And the same thing is true of African -Americans. I mean, there are politically conservative African -Americans, but they don't apparently count as African -Americans because you know, the

Southern white or the Southern black redneck culture is basically defined as true blackness at this point now.

But then biblically speaking, like this idea of race isn't, isn't really, it's a figment.

It's a figment of people's imaginations. We do better to talk about ethnicity at that point because we're all, you know, one human race descended from Adam and then

Noah and his family. So with, with that, the Bible doesn't address this topic of racism because racism is really kind of a new concept that has happened.

But then, you know, if you were to think about like some of the things that are like, are called racism, then what you would do is try to ask like, what are the things that are being called racism that the

Bible either approves of or disapproves of? Does that make sense? Yeah. Yeah. So like the idea of what might be to call what, what you might call ethnic pride or something like that.

The idea of like a sense of moral superiority to be found in one's own ethnicity, that would be repugnant to a biblical worldview.

I shouldn't think of myself as being superior because I'm a particular skin color to any other

Mexican. Yeah. Well, that's what, what's hard about that is that I guess, apparently because of the effects of critical theory in the world, 75 % of myself wants to deport the other 25%.

And so I can't, I just,

I mean, I live in a, living in a permanent schizophrenia there to where, you know, it's just, you know, 75 % is racist.

And the other 25 % is an oppressed minority. And I mean, just imagine the psychological damage that happens with that kind of thing.

But no, no, I mean, look, so, I mean, like, if you, there's plenty of people though, that have a sense of ethnic superiority based on who they are.

I mean, you know, Chinese people can be pretty, you know, as I've interacted with Chinese people that like there's a, there's a strong element of that within Chinese culture.

That is this ethnic superior superiority there. Like that I got almost a pride and that's different than just like general thankfulness for who you are, you know, your people, your country, where you came from a general kind of patriotism kind of thing.

That's different than like, you know, black, you know, black pride, You know, like all, you know, all the kind of pride that individuals are told that black pride could be as innocent as just, you know,

Thankfulness for how God made you and your culture and everything else. But at times it appears to be more than that.

And certainly no one's allowed to say white pride without being Hitler incarnate or something like that.

But, but we, I think like the Bible would repudiate a kind of glorying in your own, like superficial characteristics or background to where you consider yourself superior to anyone else.

So that would be a type of racism that I think the Bible would Validate as being wrong.

If you can distinguish it from just general patriotism, Thankfulness kind of thing, love of your culture kind of thing.

It may be that like in an innocent way, you think, oh man, you know, I'm Italian and you know,

I'm not actually Italian, but you know, I'm Italian and we have the best food in the world or something like that. That would be somewhat innocent, you know,

But we, as a people are superior to every other people. That would be where you would get in trouble, that kind of racial pride, like the idea of discrimination is much more complicated.

So a common element of racism in the way that we think of is like any discrimination, but that's, that's, that's a lot more complicated than what the simplistic way that we're viewing discrimination right now.

Okay. So to discriminate between two things is essentially to say like this, this and not that.

So a man of discriminating taste would be a man who was able to pick a high quality, you know, couch or car or something like that, or suit, you know?

So like discrimination, like, Is not necessarily as problematic as what we point out.

And that would be, you know, making certain assumptions about certain groups of people that are either positive or negative.

That would be in some sense bound in some sense fact based on facts.

Right. So when Jesus comes up to Nathaniel, he says to Nathaniel, you know, behold an

Israelite in whom there is no deceit or no guile. Right. Yeah. Now that's, you know, that would fall fly of our common definition of racism because like we think of racism as any negative, like stereotypes related to any particular people group.

But then the problem is that like, it, it doesn't matter if like you're, if, if, if the

Jews at that point in time had become a bunch of swindlers just like their father, Jacob, right. You might, you know, and Jesus calls them on it, right.

Behold an Israelite in whom there is no deceit or guile. Right. He's calling them on it. He's, he's calling them on, you know, that that scenario that happened with Jacob and Laban and, you know, the flocks and the, you know, trading the dot trading, you know,

Leah out for Rachel and all that. Like if that had become characteristic of a society that they were, they were swindlers, then like that, that might affect how you, how, how you do business there.

Right. So I mean, that's just sanity. That's just wisdom at that point.

And you know, Paul says that the Cretans that they're always, you know, lazy evil beast and gluttons.

And then he says, you know, as a prophet of your own says, and he says, this testimony is true, you know, like they're always lazy.

So, I mean, you imagine you're living in that time. It's like, would you want to hire a Cretan? No, you know,

I mean, you might want to have, you know, and if you were the kind of person who says, Hey, maybe we should have a few more references for the

Cretan, you know, you might want to have a few more references for the

Cretan, you might want to have a few more references for the Cretan, you might want to have a few more references for the Cretan, you might want to have a few more references for the Cretan, you might want to have a few more references for the Cretan, you might want to have a few more references for the Cretan, you know, So yeah, like that's a lot more caution with the natives. So, you know,

I don't, I don't know that the idea of discrimination in the way that we think like we think of discrimination is as, as if like, you have to just have a.

You start every encounter with a different. Ethnic group with just the total blank slate.

With no inherent assumptions made whatsoever. and I just, I don't know that that's realistic or biblical or it seems like you have some direct

Bible verses that would contradict that kind of thing. So I think the racial vainglory, that's definitely a no.

The discrimination thing, that's complicated. That's complicated. That's a little more complicated in terms of the biblical morality of it.

Like the idea of systemic oppression, in general, the Bible gives us this Protestant work ethic, the importance of two family homes.

Every sociologist would tell you that if you want to get ahead in the world, you need two parents of opposite genders.

This single mother thing results in crime and failure and everything else and you're not going to get a full picture of image of God.

So the systemic oppression kind of idea, I think that's somewhat bankrupt. It's more complicated than that.

But I think the main idea though is just this either glory, like the racial vainglory or the glory in one's ethnic group and inherent hatred.

What you might call it a hatred for members of different ethnicities, that would also be what you might describe as something the

Bible would condemn that is also categorized as racism. And then maybe finally, just like this idea of individuals being higher on the evolutionary ladder, the scientific kind of thing that would basically deny the doctrine of creation at a biblical level.

So that would be prohibited in the Bible also. So what about would partiality fall under that hatred of other races or is that another biblical category that we need to make room for?

Yeah, I mean, I think in some sort of simplistic way, if an individual is just, like basically, like the idea of partiality is like the idea that partiality is when basically you show preferential treatment to one individual over another who has an equal claim to treatment.

Does that make sense? So like partiality in with the idea of partiality, there's individuals who have equal claims.

So there's that idea. So I show partiality to my wife over and against all other women because she has a greater claim to my love and affection than anyone else, right?

The same thing with my children, like I show partiality to my children, but then over and against other children in the world.

So it's named Jesus says, it's not good to take the children's bread and give it to the dogs or whatever. My children have a greater claim to my provision and protection and everything else.

But then within like those children, you would think all children at that point, all of my children deserve the same kind of treatment because they all have equal claim to being my children, right?

So then at a government level, when a government is showing preferential treatment to one group of citizens over another, that would be a violation of biblical partiality.

And that would be part of what you would describe as in the sloppy way of now of racism.

Does that make sense? Yeah. Yeah. So in one sense, the government is actually racist, but not in the way that most people would say that they are.

Right. That would be an example of that. But then, the idea of partiality is like the idea of equal claim, but then like, that doesn't mean though, then that, like if you're, let's say you're a black person and you want to marry another black person, that like you don't have the freedom to pick who you want to pick or something like that, right?

Mm -hmm. So not everything that we're like, you have freedom to have desires and preferences and like, so not everyone has some sort of right to be your marriage partner.

You have the freedom to pick a marriage partner. And so a lot of like the issues of partiality get somewhat complicated as you think through, you know, how it works in the world.

But then, you know, you have to in terms of those equal claims. And so, but yeah, partiality can be a big thing.

You know, you have a lot of churches right now who are showing ethnic partiality towards blacks, you know, like Matt Chandler saying he wanted a black, he would take a black six over a white eight, you know, or something like that on his pastoral search thing, you know, that would be example of racism in that way, but sure.

So, okay. So we have that biblical category for, you know, what most people would call racism.

We kind of have a few, we don't have like a category called racism in the

Bible. There's not like a verse that says thou shalt not be a racist, right.

You just basically have to take everything that people are describing as racism and work it through a biblical filter and say, is that fine or not?

Right. Does that make sense? Yeah. Yeah. There's on a case by case basis because everything's called racism now.

So like, if you oppose, like, or if you support voter ID laws or something, you're going to be called a racist, but is that racist to want to have an accurate vote?

Right. So you have to work through each one of those things and in that way, but there's certainly some things along those lines that are, it would be sinful that are called racist.

Does that make sense? Yeah. Yeah. Well, so if we're thinking about this biblically, then what exactly would you, there's been a lot of conversation from people on the left who are, who are pushing the idea that America is systemically racist and they're, they're basically, who, who was it that you said earlier?

David Platt? No, you quoted that said, Robin DiAngelo. It's not about if racism happened.

It's about how it happened or something. I don't remember. Yeah. That was a white fragility,

Robin DiAngelo. Robin DiAngelo. You have a lot of people who are basically saying like,

Hey, look, if you're a white person, you're inherently racist. Right.

Cause you're a part of a system that is designed to keep minorities down by virtue of appealing to these biblical criteria.

Right. So I guess my first question, I wasn't planning on, on when

I started talking, I wasn't planning on asking the question I'm going to ask you now, but I guess my first question then now that I'm thinking about it would be, well from a biblical perspective, is there,

I mean, is that, isn't that just a totally outlandish thing to say? Like, Hey, if you're, if you're a white person, you're inherently a racist, whether you want to be or not.

Isn't that totally unbiblical to say? Yeah. I mean, this is essentially like a religious claim that's being made.

And so racism is a bad word, right? So you can't, you know, accuse one group of people on the basis of their, you know, superficial skin color of being inherently more sinful than another group, like by virtue of, you know, factors that are beyond their control.

Right. And essentially like this is what's happening is you have like a biblical doctrine of original sin being applied only to white people.

And so when you think about the way that like that critical theory and all that actually works, it's just, there's no more oppressive kind of doctrine than the idea of critical theory in that way, because you're accusing like people of a certain skin color of essentially being irredeemably wicked.

And all they can do is just constantly be in a state of permanent repentance over the factors that they can't control.

But then biblically speaking, like the, like if racism is a sin, it has to be a sin that everyone can commit.

Like there are no sins that only one people can commit over and against another, over and against another person.

Right. And so like, you know, you, you like, if this is a, if this really is a sin, then it has to be something that everyone is able to, you know, has, has the ability to commit in some way or another.

You can't just categorically dismiss it. And you can't just pretend like life is so simple to where there are no, like, you know, if you say, okay, well, yes, oppression is a, you know, a sin that people in power have to commit.

But in, so then, you know, white people are in power. That's just like a completely oversimplified view of the way the world actually works.

There's a lot of black people in power right now. Okay. Yeah. So like the, the, the idea then is, yes, like it's just like this doctrine of original sin being applied only to white people.

And basically you're in a permanent state of sin with no hope of redemption. I mean, there's no hope of, of ever, of ever doing enough in order to write the scales, you know until like essentially all black people own at least four or five white people or something like that.

Like then, then at that point, maybe, you know, we'll still be talking about how evil and wicked we are and, you know, basically go the other way at that point until the, you know, the

Hebrew blackies Hebrew Israelite dream is realized. Well, that's what

I was going to ask you next was, um, what exactly, uh, you know, this sounds like a very, uh, religious claim that's being made.

You know, uh, all, all white people are inherently sinful. There seems to be a lot of, um, uh, presuppositions that you're making there.

And so, uh, one of, one of the things that they inevitably lead to next is, well, you've got to fix it somehow.

If you're, if you're a white person, you're inherently sinful. You need to work, right? You need to do the work.

And so what exactly are they saying is the, uh, you know, quote unquote repentance, uh, and their worldview.

Yeah. Repentance is just giving black people unearned favor and privileges, you know, divesting yourself of property, divesting yourself of positions of authority, uh, divesting yourself of, um, like, uh, power.

Like, so essentially that there's no, there's no end to it. Like there's no end game here. It's just, uh, meaning like you can't ever repent enough.

You can't like, yeah, you, it's just a works righteousness system that you can never win until, you know, in some sense, the scales are totally reversed.

Uh, but then the problem is that you can do that all day long. And like, they're like, you're not going to build a good society.

You know, a good society is going be built on logic and reason and the scientific method. And if you can like, my goodness, man, like I went to this,

I was the white guy on the basketball team growing up. And like, I, I, I have, you know, former, you know,

Facebook friends that used to be on my basketball team. And, you know, many of them are like, we went to the same exact high school and they're barely literate.

Like they're barely literate. They can barely speak the English language. And I'm not saying that the, like,

I'm not making any, I'm just making a claim to say we had the same education and they can barely communicate in English.

And they're posting pictures of themselves, you know, uh, doing gang, you know, sign poses and, you know, dress like thugs and everything else.

And it's just like, are you going to ask them to build a car? Right. Are you just going to make them like the

CEO of a major corporation? They don't have the skills necessary to be a CEO of a major corporation.

Like, what are you going to do? And it's like, well, they must've like, there was systemic oppression. It's like, my goodness, man, like we went to the same high school.

We got the same education. Like, it wasn't about that. I looked at them in high school that I went to, they didn't pay attention.

They're constantly like joking around, stealing stuff, like getting in trouble, getting in fights, you know, being like, what do you do with that?

Like, you can't just in some simplistic way say, Hey, like, that's all racism that did all that.

And the only answer is just for white people to give them stuff that they didn't earn and they didn't work for. And they didn't care about, and they didn't prioritize.

Like it's like you do that. You're just ending society is what you're doing. Like in order to build anything that actually requires, like, you have to have competence in order to build anything.

Like you can, you can do the diversity hires like with, you know, across the board and do it all day long.

But all you're doing is you're putting unqualified people into positions. They don't know how to fulfill. And like, that's the truth.

That's the truth. Like, and, and, and so like, not only is it like a system that you like that, that is destructive and that it's putting one people group at, at enmity with another and basically blaming all the problems of one group on the, on the shoulders of another, and then taking resources from one group and giving it to the other that are unearned.

Like, it's just a recipe for disaster. Like if you want everything, if you want all the lights go off, if you want all the shipments to stop, like if you want, you know, all the cars to quit being produced, then just, you know, basically call, call anyone who tries in life a racist and tell them that the only solution is to, you know, give up all their stuff.

And eventually what you're going to have is, you know, if you, if you keep it up, you know, everyone would just give up. Right. And we, we all surrender this

Protestant work ethic, you know, work before you play kind of thing. And then what you'll have is you'll have, like, you'll have the ghetto is what you'll have.

Like, that's the truth. You know, you're not allowed to comment on that, but it's just like that, like, what do you want?

What do you want in society? You know, like so you have to think through these things.

It's like these, these are not, you can be, you can be naive about what we're talking about and idealistic, or you have to look and look at the cold hard facts of reality and talk through, well, what does the

Bible say about these things? If that makes sense. Yeah. So opposed to that kind of worldview, and, and I guess the narrative that the people on the left are trying to push in terms of racism, as Christians, what advice would you give to the person who's looking at themselves and genuinely asking the question,

Hey, or they're thinking to themselves, Hey, look, I don't want to be the person who shows partiality towards other people.

You know, I don't want to be the person who's, you know, quote unquote racist, um, in God's eyes, you know, even though that might be kind of a clumsy way of, of wording it, maybe you get the sentiment behind what they would mean.

What, what, so what kind of counsel would you give to that person, uh, in order to help them, uh, really just be able to analyze themselves internally, analyze their, their own heart, um, to, to, uh, determine whether or not they are in sin in any way, when it comes to how they interact with people, um, of a different culture or a different skin color or whatever.

I mean, the Bible, yeah, the Bible tells us not to show partiality to the rich or to the poor. And so you don't want to show partiality either way.

And you don't want to be showing, you know, preferential treatment, um, in isolation, uh, across ethnic lines.

Right. So I mean, I think what you have to do is you have to like make basic distinctions between, um, different types of things.

And so, uh, Thomas Sowell in his book, Black, uh, uh,

Rednecks and White Liberals, he essentially, one of the things that he did there was he, uh, gave a, that's a good book if you want to read it and learn a little bit more about, um, some of the things that we're talking about in terms of why, um, why we are where we are.

Uh, but then, uh, one of the things that's happened in an unfortunate way is that, uh, essentially

Sowell was making this argument that Southern White Redneck, I'm going to do a monologue and I'll get to the question, but he's essentially making the argument that Southern like ghetto culture is essentially

Southern White Redneck culture. And one of the things that happened was there was an intellectual movement in the sixties to basically identify this

Southern Black Redneck culture or ghetto culture as authentic Black culture, if that makes sense.

And so, uh, you know, everything that's associated with your standard rap video, uh, uh, like that, that like these character traits are the same character traits that you're going to find in Southern Redneck culture, you know, like the anti -intellectual, uh, kind of culture, the focus on big purchases, uh, rejection of delight, gratification, focused on games and entertainment, hair trigger violence, that kind of stuff.

All that has been associated with Blackness now in a way that is totally destructive to Black culture.

And so if you're wanting to think through issues of partiality, like certainly you're going to have to make distinctions, uh, in your mind between what type of person am

I looking at? Does that make sense? Yeah. And so like Southern White Redneck culture is like,

I think the vast majority of people are not going to want to like, you know, if you have a branch manager job and like a guy comes in there with a and a wife beater, uh, you know, and, uh, you know, a wife beater, uh, you know, dirty clothes, and you can barely understand him because he's so country, right?

You're probably not going to give him that job. And because you're going to make certain assumptions about his competence level.

But then the same way, if you have someone come into your branch, you know, trying to get a branch manager job who, uh, is, uh, uh, in full, you know,

Tupac get up, right? Um, like you're probably not going to want to hire them too, because the way that they're presenting themselves is saying something about their character, saying something about the level of customer service that you're going to get and everything else.

And so like there, there's a kind of like, um, so you wouldn't want to describe like partiality across ethnic lines in some kind of simplistic way to say that anyone of any skin color with any kind of traits associated with that, it's all neutral.

It's like, no, I mean like, my goodness, like I, um, you know, if, if, uh, if my daughter wanted to go on a date and like what rolled up to my house was a, you know, an escalade with, you know, huge rims and stereo system and, you know, uh, you know, four gangsters walked out, individuals dressed as gangster walked out, she wouldn't be going on that date.

You know, I would make certain assumptions and that isn't partiality. That's more about a culture that you're embracing that I view as destructive.

Does that make sense? Yeah. So as a Christian, you have to make distinctions between skin color, proper ethnicity, proper, and certain destructive subcultural traits that are unnecessary to that.

Does that make sense? So as a Christian, I think what you want to do is you're thinking through this issue of racism as you're asking, like, like,

I don't think that you just take any culture and say all cultures are neutral and all you just ignore all the cultural baggage that's associated with certain kinds of cultures.

Does that make sense? Yeah. Yeah. So like, you don't ignore all those kinds of things, like, you know, uh, in that way, like there are destructive cultures, but at the same time, any ethnicity,

I think you want to, like, if, if all you're looking at is ethnicity, like in a person's looking at, like, um, like, uh, an

African -American and a white person, both of whom are practicing delayed gratification, both of you who are exercising clear, logical, linear thinking, both of whom are, you know, trying to behave in a respectable way.

Like my goodness, like there's no reason to prefer one over the other at that point. Does that make sense? So you have to be able to make those kinds of distinctions as it relates to partiality.

And if you're a Christian, you're not going to, you know, if you're the kind of person who's just so excited that you have like, you know, black people on your worship stage, you're, you're so excited that you have black people in church leadership and that kind of way, what you want is you want someone who's competent, who is able to handle the word of God, even at Jeholical Church right now, like they're falling over themselves to show partiality to ethnic minorities, that they basically let a bunch of prosperity people into the church and they better let a bunch of critical race theory, uh, embracers into the church.

And it's caused a lot of damage, you know, and, and we've had to ignore it for years and years and years, but that's what's happened.

And so you want someone who has doctrinal integrity, who knows what the Bible says, who knows how to teach it, who can think clearly, who's an expert in the scriptures.

You're not looking at skin color at that point. You are trying to appeal to, you know, what

Martin Luther King was advocating, uh, you know, the, that adulterous, uh, heretic, um, that color blindness, which has become so problematic at this point, you are not trying to judge someone solely on the basis of their content or the color of their skin, but on their content of their character.

Sure. Uh, and I care if you have some kind of inherent view that your ethnic group is superior to other ethnic groups.

I mean, you need to repent of that. If you have a hatred for ethnic groups, even with all their problems, you need to repent of that.

That's sinful. Um, you know, but that doesn't mean you can't acknowledge that like certain cultures have certain problems that are holding them back and causing, uh, damage in the world and critique that, uh, as well.

Does that make sense? Yeah. Yeah. So to the individual Christian, I would, you know, rid yourself of any kind of pride and are in who you are, you know, any sense of moral superiority based on superficial, uh, you know, traits of your background, your upbringing, your skin color, rid yourself of all that.

Remember that we're all one human race inter interact with the world in a wise way, uh, to, uh, and I think you'll be going a long way.

Um, the, the next question I wanted to ask you, um, kind of going along with that idea of identifying the various sins that might, some people today might categorize as racism is, uh, could you just kind of, uh, take a few minutes to just compare the quote unquote repentance required, uh, by people today who are claiming that America is systemically racist.

Compare that to the repentance, um, the, that God requires for the person who is quote unquote racist.

Could you just compare the two, um, and I guess kind of comment on which one you think is better.

Yeah. I mean, biblical repentance is gonna be like, if you want, if you want actual reconciliation in the world, if that's what you want, if you want people to be reconciled, then what we're going to, what you're going to have happen is you're going to have a biblical view of partiality.

You're not going to prefer one, you know, skin color and definitely over and against another. I mean, that's just a way to stir up racial tensions and, and anger and animosity.

I mean, when, you know, and that's basically what our society is doing at almost every single level.

I mean, all the black on Asian violence right now is somehow in the news being called, you know, a product of white supremacy.

I mean, that's insane. You know, like if you, if you let certain groups of people riot, loot and burn down cities and blame it all on, you know, white supremacy, like this, you're just having a recipe for disaster.

And so biblically speaking, like each man is going to be held accountable for their own sins. Like you can't blame your sins on other people.

We all enter into the world as fundamentally sinful, but then not only do we enter into the world as sinful, we, we all, we're all sinners.

Like there's not one group of people who are uniquely sinners over and against others. We all have sins that we commit on an everyday basis, but then

Jesus offers us free and total forgiveness of that. If we ask, then we can be reconciled to other people.

If we ask forgiveness and like this idea of, you know, forgiveness and racial reconciliation in the critical theory sense is you're putting two people at odds permanently with no hope of reconciliation, like until someday the agreed party, you know, someday determines that they're over all their bitterness and able to go to church with you.

I'm looking at you, uh, GMR Tisby, uh, you know, after Trump was, uh, elected, he couldn't, he was so emotionally damaged.

He couldn't even go to church, you know, but I mean, it's just like, because he was, you know, triggered.

Uh, but I mean, my goodness, like you live in a world like, um, we all sin against each other in a variety of ways.

The humble person is going to see that their sin against God is way bigger than anyone's sin against them.

And like, we're not going to hold this record of wrongdoing over each other's head until we plunder them of everything that they have, uh, in undisguised, um, uh, envy and greed forever.

I mean, the Bible offers like real reconciliation. That means that we, you know, cast each other's debts against us in a sea of forgetfulness and remember it no more, just like God does.

And like that, that, and we're not holding the sins of, you know, our ancestors over against other people's heads in perpetuity forever, uh, costing at the mercy.

So biblical solution is far better. Okay. Yeah. And I realized that was a little bit of a, um, you know,

I guess, uh, almost borderline rhetorical question, but I figured it probably needed to be talked about.

Um, but I guess, okay. So, um, before we end the episode,

Tim, do you have any like final comments or closing thoughts that you would want to leave everyone with?

Yeah, I would just say, yeah, just summarize it, man. I don't think America is systemically,

I don't think America is racist. I think the vast majority, there are a few racist people out there, um, uh, in terms of the scientific version of that, um, like Nick Cannon and would be a good example of that.

But no, I don't think that we're scientifically racist anymore. But I mean, if you follow a Darwinian worldview, we might as well be like, there's no reason not to it's only the

Christian worldview that has a solution to racism. And that's going to be found in the knowledge that we all are members of the same human race.

And because we're all members of the same human race, we have to look at what the Bible says. And if you want a real racial reconciliation of the world, you're going to look at what the

Bible says about how to achieve it. What you're not going to do is look to Robin DiAngelo, basically to put one class of people permanently, uh, at the mercy of another.

Okay. Well, uh, hopefully this has been a helpful episode for you guys on a pretty, uh,

I guess, complicated topic, if not just because, uh, the waters have been so muddied by all of the, um, you know, conversation, if you can call it that, um, throughout the last few years on this topic.

So hopefully this has been helpful for you guys and we want to thank you for listening and we look forward to seeing you guys on the next episode.

If you would like to be Bible bashed personally, then please know that we also offer free biblical counseling, which you can take advantage of by emailing us.

Now go boldly and obey the truth in the midst of a biblically illiterate world who will be perpetually offended by your every move.