Is it racist to compliment a race?

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This was a comment and I decided to make it an answer because I’m interested in getting more feedback. If it’s good then I’ll put it up on my blog and refer to it whenever I see similar questions. I’d really like to nail down the question of “what constitutes racism” because we need more awareness and discussion and ambiguity only chills the discussion.

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Race is more than skin color, there are also cultural and genetic components. When most people say “race” what they really mean is “ethnicity.” One shouldn’t get too hung up on semantics, it creates more problems than it solves.

Black people are better at sports because they just have better genes for it. Look into fast and slow twitch muscle fibers. People that have more of one or the other are better at certain sports. It’s not racist at all to say this, just stating facts.

For something to be racist it needs to be false, malicious, irrational, and focused on something unrelated to culture / genetics. If it’s true then it’s just mean. If it’s not malicious then it’s just ignorant. If it’s not irrational then it’s bigotry. The difference between bigotry and racism is that you can talk someone out of bigotry.

If it’s actually focused on a real racial difference, then it’s categorically not racism or bigotry. An example of violating this rule would be not wanting to call someone black when they self-identify as black. If you refuse to “see color” then you’re contributing to the problem of racism by trying to mentally edit it out of your life. Really you’re more concerned about not appearing racist, and that is itself racist.

Of course, if you’re White American then you need to avoid any statement that is any one of those four things, you don’t get the luxury of the benefit of the doubt here. Yes it’s a double standard but we’ll only get that privilege back when we can stop oppressing black people.