Context (From Wiki ): On 11 April, Marcella Sherwood, an elderly English missionary, fearing for the safety of the approximately 600 Indian children under her care, was on her way to shut the schools and send the children home. While travelling through a narrow street called the Kucha Kurrichhan, she was caught by a mob who violently attacked her. She was rescued by some local Indians, including the father of one of her pupils, who hid her from the mob and then smuggled her to the safety of Gobindgarh Fort.
After visiting Sherwood on 19 April, the local commander of Indian Army forces, Brigadier General Dyer, enraged at the assault, issued an order requiring every Indian man using that street to crawl its length on his hands and knees as a punishment.
Dyer later explained to a British inspector: “Some Indians crawl face downwards in front of their gods. I wanted them to know that a British woman is as sacred as a Hindu god and therefore they have to crawl in front of her, too.” He also authorised the indiscriminate public whipping of locals who came within lathi length of a police officer. Marcella Sherwood later defended Dyer, describing him as “the saviour of the Punjab”.
I just can’t fathom ever thinking I’m better than someone based on race. Other biology, sure, but we all got our quirks and flaws—I got an excellent swimmers body, and I got really shitty eyes. But, like, no one’s making me crawl for not having 20/20 vision, just like I’m not making people crawl for being slow in a pool.
And then there’s race. At best it’s a blanket for a small portion of these things, like some people’s bodies aren’t good out in the sun too long, other people’s bodies can handle oxygen levels amazingly at high altitudes. But that’s really as far as it goes lol. There’s no social aspect to these things, just geographically influenced evolution like every other creature on the planet.
But then comes along a group of people that do introduce a social aspect to it, entirely baselessly. There is no scientific way of backing their claim—it’s all fabrication—lest if there were, they would be just as vulnerable at having to recognise their own biological shortcomings, even though these socially mean nothing.
So, really, they’re using biology to assert the claim that their society or position in society is superior. And then one has to consider the fundamental irony of that. How can a baseless claim around social superiority be anything more than an indicator of a social flaw?
Humans can be so weird. The most interesting part of it is that you could erase all current concepts of society from people’s minds today, right now, and they would never appear again. But I’m sure new ones would arise as individuals get an idea on a way they can better themselves. Imagine 500 years later, everyone with a bigger second toe has to hop down the street, because this is the new inferior trait and the new physical action of inferiority. Its fundamentally no different, and in that just as ridiculous.