Maybe not in Political Correctness Land, but there are in the real world. We can marvel at the ‘natural ability’ of Michael Jordan or Donovan Bailey and snicker at Tiger Woods showing us a thing or two, but the very idea that differences may extend beyond court, track or golf course makes women scream and collapse in a dead faint. Let’s concentrate on the physical aspect, because this willful ignorance does nothing to prepare us for the realities of our own racial legacy. Some diseases prey on specific races: Tay Sachs Disease (Jews), Multiple Sclerosis (whites), Sickle Cell Anaemia (blacks). And it may not be all bad; a single copy (from one parent) of Sickle Cell provides a degree of immunity to malaria. In August, 97, researchers at Bowman Gray School of Medicine announced that white and Hispanic populations with insulin- resistance face higher risks of ‘hardening of the arteries’ than do similarly insulin-resistant blacks.
Given the fact that blacks actually face a higher risk for stroke and heart disease, the suspicion is that blacks somehow metabolize insulin in a completely different way. In the same month, the Journal Cell reported that Jews, Turks, Armenians and Arabs share a ‘fever gene’ which leads to bouts of familial Mediterranean fever. Bone marrow donors for Leukemia sufferers are selected on the basis of the most rigourously narrow racial selection. The discovery of ‘Kennewick Man’ has forced the American government to address issues of race and primogeniture.
There is no politically correct explanation for the presence of a 9,300 year old Caucasian skeleton in North America. Last August, the Aaron Diamond Aids Research Centre in New York announced the discovery of the CCR5 genetic mutation in the white population. Briefly, the gene fails to produce a certain protein. It is that missing protein which provides a ‘docking point’ for the AIDS virus to enter cells. Without the protein, a degree of immunity to the virus exists among whites. However, in this most politicized of diseases, this remarkable discovery has been deemed decidedly ‘incorrect’ and is not aggressively pursued. Isn’t it odd that while we are expected to subscribe to the currently trendy idea that race is just a cultural thing – people are ‘born’ gay?