Against Spangler’s “Race Realism”

It’s been over three years since I last posted here—time enough to have a third child, graduate seminary, buy and renovate a home, and start a church plant. I have been too busy to write anything here, but I’ve been fighting the urge since July, when I first read Michael Spangler’s newly published “Race Realism” series. For several years, Michael was a minister in my denomination, the Orthodox Presbyterian Church, until he was divested from office this April. Just a few days ago, at his request, our presbytery erased him from membership in the OPC.

By removing Michael from membership, we are no longer able to address his racial views through church discipline. I cannot speak for my fellow presbyters, but I personally voted for erasure because Michael has not attended an OPC congregation in years, and his continued membership in our denomination tied the hands of sister denominations where he began attending. Better to recognize that reality, erase him from membership, and address his views through other means.

To be clear, what follows is in no way an official answer to Michael from either my presbytery or the denomination. I have heard universal grief and opposition to his racial views from my fellow pastors, but in this response I speak only for myself. I am choosing to specifically respond to Michael’s “Race Realism” series because it is a good representation of a small but growing number of voices on the theological right, and because it originates from my own part of the church. I don’t want to elevate fringe voices by engaging with them, but I think we’ve reached a point where critical response is needed, even from such small platforms as mine.

“Race Realism” Summarized

Michael’s argument is laid out in a series of six lengthy articles. I do not intend to respond to every detail, and I will consciously ignore some bits which I find abhorrent in order to focus on the core of his argument, from which the rest grows.

The series’ basic argument can be outlined as follows:

1. Race is real.
2. Differences between races are real, and remain relatively constant over time.
3. Because of these differences, some races are definitely and fixedly superior to others, with the white race preeminent.

From this third point, various applications are drawn, such as opposing interracial marriage, promoting segregation in society and church, opposing equal civil rights for non-whites, calling for the removal of non-white immigrants regardless of legal status, and suggesting foreign missions should be deemphasized to focus on revitalization of beleaguered white churches.

The main problem with Michael’s argument as an argument is simply that it is unsound, neglecting important facts and drawing unjustified inferences. The main problem with his argument in practice is that it undermines love between neighbors and brothers and promotes pride in those who hold to it.

Is race real?

Michael’s first article argues that the left recognizes that race is real, and hates the white race. “They are gunning for white genocide. And so far it appears they have had good success: by feminism, birth control, abortion, demoralizing propaganda, war, pornography, perversion, and replacement through unfettered non-white immigration, the white man is, in relative terms, dying with alarming speed in his own lands.”

In response, he writes, those on the right simply ignore the reality of race altogether. “Our own pastors preach race isn’t real, punish their people for insisting otherwise, then praise those who teach leftist race consciousness, even as it fuels the fires burning down our nation and its churches.” Instead of denying racial realities, Michael argues we need to recognize and embrace race and racial differences.

On the narrow question of whether there is such a thing as race, I don’t disagree with Michael. Nor does the US Census. Or the pre-visit paperwork at the doctor. Or your driver’s license application. Or a thousand other places where the obvious reality that race exists is taken for granted. When we read Revelation’s description of “every nation and all tribes and peoples and tongues” praising Christ (Rev. 7:9), I think we can all picture the scene!

The fact that there are recognizable races is obvious and uncontroversial. Calls for “colorblindness” aren’t meant literally, and only the most wooden literalism could interpret the slogan “One race, the human race,” which Michael attributes to his opponents, to be a universal denial of the concept of race. Amusingly, Michael himself writes later, “In short, I am a ‘race realist.’ This means I believe that though there is one human race, the more common use of the term race (to describe categories of ethnicity like Black, White, and Asian) speaks of something real” (emphasis added). In his own writing, he recognizes that affirming “one human race” conveys a meaningful truth which is not inconsistent with affirming real racial differences.

So yes, race is real, and that proposition should not be especially controversial. However, throughout these articles the pedestrian truth that “race is real” bleeds very easily into the very different proposition that some races are inherently superior to others.

Are racial differences real and fixed?

If race is real, then it follows that some types of racial differences must exist. Those categories on the census form must mean something! Distinction without some difference is impossible. We may define “race” more or less broadly, and many of us don’t fit neatly into just one racial category, but nonetheless, when the census distinguishes between “American Indian or Alaska Native,” “Asian,” “Black or African American,” etc., we all recognize that those categories are loosely associated with characteristic physical features and a native geographical distribution.

However, Michael argues, race entails more than these relatively superficial or accidental qualities. “Rather, race goes deep, extending… to countless other realities, physical, cultural, intellectual, moral, and spiritual.” In Part 3 of his series, Michael argues that culture, morality, religion, and intelligence are among the qualities strongly influenced by race. In particular, he considers the “white race” notably and fixedly superior to the “black race” in these categories.

(At this point, I should pause to note my own discomfort at interacting with these ideas. It is not pleasant to have to entertain the hypothesis—even for the purpose of rebuttal—that my black friends and neighbors are seriously morally and intellectually deficient. I am sure it is even less pleasant for them to be the subject of such speculation. Sadly, ugly ideas can only be rebutted with ugly debates.)

Michael’s argumentation on this point is, frankly, just not very good. On the topic of morality, the single concrete data point advanced in support of his hypothesis is the well-known fact that black males commit a disproportionate share of murders in the US, from which he concludes, “This is the secret reason violent crime rates are so high in America, and especially in the South: it’s not our guns, it’s our blacks.” The fact is noted and the conclusion drawn within a single short paragraph. Just as a matter of objective analysis, from a statistical, sociological standpoint, this is an embarrassingly puerile assessment.

A great deal of study has been devoted to the question of criminal violence among black males in America. Both common sense and empirical study identify the causes in a toxic stew of socioeconomic factors in many black communities, such as a breakdown in the family structure, poverty and its effects, and poor educational opportunities. (Many of these factors, it is worth noting, are rooted in generational sins against black Americans by their white neighbors.) On this point, Charles Murray’s Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960–2010 offers a striking analysis of white communities with similar socioeconomic conditions to those more prevalent in black American communities, and which in turn demonstrate very similar rates and kinds of social pathologies.

The idea that “black morality” is inherently deficient to “white morality” is key to the development of Michael’s argument, but it is assumed rather than proven. One would think a professed Christian, intent on asserting a serious innate moral deficiency in his neighbors, would devote more effort to securing the foundation of his argument. (This is why I am convinced the first sin of these and similar arguments is really against the truth, whether because of mere negligence, or something worse.)

Moving to the topic of intelligence, Michael begins by stating that “For this again experience is a better teacher than statistics,” which is obviously false for a population-level analysis, but which again makes handwaving anecdata an easier substitute for careful evaluation of the support for his claims. However, for this assertion we do at least get several paragraphs to back up the proposition that black people generally score lower on IQ tests than white people.

As a matter of objective fact, and perhaps to the surprise of many readers, this is true. Social scientists are understandably uncomfortable with this phenomena, and have sometimes suppressed discussion of it. Various explanations have been advanced, ranging from biased tests to social, cultural, and environmental factors. Clear causation is notoriously difficult to nail down in the social sciences, and this topic in particular is muddied both by those with racist motivations and those motivated primarily by avoiding accusations of racism.

To get a sense of the difficulties in analyzing IQ, consider the experience of Holland in the mid-1900’s:

Since World War II, IQ in many countries has gone up 15 points, about the same as the gap separating Blacks and Whites in this country. And in some countries, the rise has been even more dramatic. For example, average IQ in Holland rose 21 points between 1952 and 1982… One very important conclusion from the Flynn data is that no one understands very much about how environmental variation differentially affects IQ. The cause of the large increases in Holland is simply unknown. Even Herrnstein and Murray concede that “relatively little [of the environmental variation in IQ] can be traced to the shared environments created by families. It is, rather, a set of environmental influences mostly unknown at present, that are experienced by individuals as individuals.”

Given how many other traits are at least somewhat genetic and linked to race, it would not be surprising if race did have some slight, difficult to distinguish effect upon IQ. However, when many countries saw a 15 point increase in IQ since WWII—for reasons no one can fully explain—it is absurd to hastily draw causal conclusions about the observed gap between black and white IQ test results, let alone try to draw out policy implications.

Michael’s article barely acknowledges and does not meaningfully engage with these difficulties in any discussion of IQ, which have a huge bearing on his central thesis. Again, given the magnitude of the claim he is making, one might expect more careful handling of these essential premises if the article was genuinely concerned with promoting the truth.

Do racial differences make some races superior?

Michael’s second article purports to show scriptural support for “race realism.” The majority of his argumentation rests upon a category error, reading a concern for racial purity into God’s protection of his people’s holiness amid the Gentile nations. Yes, the Old Testament law distinguished between Jew and Gentile, including a prohibition against marrying Canaanites. However, God himself explained the reason: “For they will turn your sons away from following Me to serve other gods” (Deut. 7:1-4). To take just two of several possible examples, Scripture celebrates Rahab, a prostitute from Jericho, and Ruth, a Moabite, both of whom married Jews and appear in the lineage of Jesus. These women had a different race but the same God, and that was ultimately what mattered. Conversely, Scripture is at some pains to deny that God’s favor upon Israel was the result of any innate superiority (Deut. 7:6-8).

Michael makes much of Paul’s sharp condemnation of the Cretans, quoting one of their own poets, as “liars, evil beasts, lazy gluttons” (Titus 1:12–13), but there is no reason to take this as racial criticism rather than a critique of prevalent national sins. Indeed, since the inhabitants of Crete were largely Greek during the first century AD, if their deficiency was racial then one might expect Paul to have made similar statements in his several epistles addressed to other Greek populations.

Scripture recognizes the reality of differing races, but gives no warrant for concluding that some are superior to others. And, as noted above, the sociological arguments advanced for fixed, racially determined differences in morality or intelligence are also considerably less than convincing.

With neither scriptural nor natural warrant for concluding that some races are superior to others, the “race realism” argument has no ground upon which to stand. But there is a second fundamental defect in Michael’s thesis, namely a misapplication of the concept of “superiors and inferiors.” Based on his assumption that the white race is naturally superior, he concludes that white people should, “conscious of their own racial superiority,” behave in an “upright manner toward their racial inferiors,” commanding them and setting them a good example.

The language of superiors and inferiors comes from the Westminster Standards, the confessional documents of the OPC. It is old-fashioned language to express the biblical idea that some people have authority over others, such as husbands over wives, parents over children, elders over congregations, or rulers over citizens. The Westminster Larger Catechism defines “superiors” as those superior “in age and gifts; and especially such as, by God’s ordinance, are over us in place of authority, whether in family, church, or commonwealth” (WLC 124).

The Bible certainly assumes that some people will have authority over others, and that those under authority should submit to those who exercise it within their proper sphere. However, authority in Scripture is consistently a matter of position, not natural endowment. A high-IQ wife still has a responsibility to submit to her lower-IQ husband; virtuous children should obey a drunkard father as long as his commands are lawful; an educated young seminarian must still submit to a less biblically knowledgeable elder; a citizen must obey even a wicked ruler, so long as his commands do not oppose Scripture.

This is only a secondary evil within Michael’s larger argument, but I think it is important to empathize that there is no scriptural basis for declaring oneself a “superior” on the basis of self-assessment of one’s own gifts (whether personally or racially), and thereupon demanding a corresponding position of superiority. Indeed, demanding position on the basis of self-declared superiority seems opposed—to say the least—to the spirit of the One who washed his inferiors’ feet, and who advised his followers “whoever wishes to become great among you shall be your servant; and whoever wishes to be first among you shall be slave of all” (Mark 10:43-44).

I do not know what sort of prideful folly can make the sentiment expressed below seem fitting for a Christian, but it is most certainly not an attitude shaped by God’s Word—either written or incarnate.

In conclusion

I am more sympathetic than it may appear to some of the concerns which I believe motivate Michael and other young men like him to slip into the “race realism” camp. I am troubled by the explicit anti-whiteness espoused by some parts of the political left (for largely the same reasons that I oppose the “race realism” reaction!). I also believe our present almost uncontrolled flow of illegal immigration is dangerous to our nation, and that limits on immigration are not at all contrary to Christian charity.

However, the Christian is not permitted to fight folly with folly, nor sin with sin. We do not fight on a level playing field. We are called to let the opponent have the advantage, if seeking a commiserate advantage for ourselves would be sin. By faith, we can accept every tactical disadvantage, provided only that God is on our side. Neither Sun Tzu nor von Clausewitz would approve, but we are called to defeat the wisdom of the world with the foolishness of the cross.

Keep your behavior excellent among the Gentiles, so that in the thing in which they slander you as evildoers, they may because of your good deeds, as they observe them, glorify God in the day of visitation… For this finds favor, if for the sake of conscience toward God a person bears up under sorrows when suffering unjustly. For what credit is there if, when you sin and are harshly treated, you endure it with patience? But if when you do what is right and suffer for it you patiently endure it, this finds favor with God. (1 Peter 2:12, 19-20)

So-called “race realism” sins against the truth and against love. It slanders our neighbors and promotes pride. It is not an option for the Christian.