On Racial Preferences in Dating

[Shamik]

Question on Love asked on May 12, 2011:

"Most people, I'd guess, have racial preferences in dating. I don't
think that this is morally problematic in itself, since there is
surely no obligation to date anyone, or members of any particular
group. Still it strikes me that many cases of racial preference in
dating are likely rooted in racism. For instance, I have never been
attracted to black women; and while I would insist that I have no duty
to be anything like an equal opportunity dater, I strongly suspect
that my preference in this case is at least partially the result of
racial prejudice. (I imagine that I would more often find myself
attracted to black women if I had not internalized various
stereotypes, racially-based aesthetic norms, etc.) Is this a problem?
Does it matter to our evaluation of a particular attitude if, though
perhaps innocuous in itself, it has a causal origin in bigotry?"

Oliver Leaman's reply on June 2, 2011

"I doubt whether we should feel that we ought always to treat everyone
entirely equally to avoid being called racist. We are allowed to have
preferences and sometimes these will be on racial grounds, perhaps,
provided that those preferences do not systematically discriminate
against people in ways that do them harm. Unless we had some fairly
fixed preferences, it would be very difficult to discriminate among
different sorts of people in any way whatsoever, and dating is based
on such discrimination. It is as well to be aware of one's prejudices
and to consider whether it is worth trying to challenge them, but
there is nothing wrong in acknowledging them and recognizing their
role in defining a personality.

Blind dates are fun because they force the individual to respond to
partners with whom one might not otherwise consider going. On the
other hand, if every date were to be a blind date, this would not be
evidence of having an open mind but rather of a lack of character."

My Response and Concerns

I love the way the question was put. However, I have quite a few
objections to Oliver Leaman's reply and they are as follows:

1. I'm not sure that he's being very clear about what he's saying. Is
he saying,
- "That one of the bases for attraction(out of fairly fixed
preferences) may be on racial grounds because that would help one pick
out a partner. And that is legitimate because it is a preference which
does not systematically discriminate against people in ways that do
them harm?"

If he is, then my question is- Does harm merely mean physical acts or
speech acts? And if it is about speech acts, then don't racial
preferences form part of the presuppositions behind those speech acts?
If there is a broader system of speech acts, if not a system of
physical acts of racism, present in society, might not one be called
to be wary of racial presuppositions behind any of these
'preferences'? Or is it, that in a consumer oriented society, it is ok
for this presupposition to be converted to a mere preference while
glossing over the wider implications of it?
He seems to be confusing the distinction between the normal and the
natural (taking from Cavell who takes from Wittgenstein) and thinking
that perhaps it is ok in this case to think that what is considered in
normal (same race preference) in this case is is actually natural. It
might be more mature to actually conceive of how a black person might
find another black person beautiful and how the system of beauty works
within blacks to see the beauty in another race and how one might be
attracted to the other.

This is particularly an imperative in North India, where there is a
prejudice to marry a person with a fair skin, who's considered more
beautiful and there are derogatory words for dark skinned people. In
my case, being from an upper caste Brahmin background who found it
difficult to conceive even how dark people found their children cute,
a disciplined exercise in empathetic understanding was necessary (it
takes Huck Finn a long time to overcome the shadows of his prejudices,
which wasn't just about negative discrimination, but a positive
enlarging of his humanity) . Which again didn't mean that I was
obliged to fall in love with a dark person.

2. I don't get the blind date metaphor. Either it is mostly irrelevant
and merely makes the point that it is good to have an open mind. But
the moment you begin to relate it to the rest of what has been said
with "this would not be evidence of having an open mind but rather of
a lack of character", does it mean that at times not fixing your
preferences on the basis of what might be your racial preferences may
at times actually display a lack of character??!!