"Alfred", after leaving some helpful comments on where to buy Spic 'n Span, follows up with a few more disappointing comments in response to an article I wrote on colorblindness (I'm for it). His comments betray his racist tendancies, and argue as to why they're justified.

With conservatives constantly being portrayed as racists (when in fact, we are less so, to my view, than our opponents), I view this as a perfect opportunity to answer Alfred's gripes, and explain why I don't share his views.

Alfred writes:

The bottom line to all these discussions about racism should be the innate right of the people of every race to live, prosper and to define what they mean by "civilization" their own way.

Here in the real world, we vote as countries, not colors. It's really hard to get all the people of a certain skin tone in the world to stage an election which only applies to people of their exact shade; geographic boundaries make a lot more sense.

Perhaps you're unhappy that your grandparents moved from a country where they were a racial monoculture to one like this one which was already populated with Native Americans, and was rapidly enslaving Africans and bringing them here.

Me, I'm glad to be here, thanks, and don't mind the company, however we all got here. And, in line with the golden rule, I think everyone should be afforded equal treatment in the eyes of the law, just as I would want.

The truth however is that white people as a group have no rights as such in any "white" country...

Yes, that's true. But don't expect me to be unhappy about this, for you. I'm as pale as they come, but I don't want to see race-specific rights of any kind. I think the current situation, in whites are officially disfavored in certain cases, is wrong for the exact same reasons I thought the previous one (blacks being disfavored) was.

As a man who seems to think each race should be treated differently (e.g. a racist) I don't see what grounds you have for complaining about race-based legal inequalities that don't favor you.

...while at the same time every other ethnic and religious group has recognized rights not only in their own countries BUT additionally in America and Europe.

Now we get loopy: What do you mean "their own country?" I'm of Danish and Welsh descent, but here in the US, "our country" is America. (Yes, I checked his IP address; yes Canadians, I hear you already...) That also includes US citizens of Nigerian and Japanese extraction.

Bottom line is that if we -the remainder of the white- race do not wake up, we will become extinct before the next century.

Ummm... I'm not sure if you know this, but almost all people -- of any race -- alive today will be extinct before the next century. You're just concerned there will be fewer children in the future with who have a skin tone similar to yours.

But who cares? If I marry a Japanese woman and have slightly asian-looking kids, so what? I'm not "losing" anything I might have had if I married, say, an woman of Polish descent. I'm going to be dead then. My kids will be my kids. God will love them the same regardless of their skin tone.

Now at this point, we have to make a clarification: I'm a big believer in Western cultural values. Specificly, all that stuff we've got from Christianity, Judaism, Protestantism and the enlightenment.

But that's got nothing, nada to do with somebody's skin tone. I've got a heck of a lot more in common, as a Christian, with a black Ethiopian Christian than I do with a white French Atheist.

Perhaps aware of this objection, Alfred tries to counter with:

Some think and say: "What if the white race dissappears?" "What's so horrible about that?" Well, to see the error of that point of view, just ask yourself if any Japanese or any Jew or any Mexican would see such a catastrophic event without trepidation.

Here, Alfred seems to confuse culture with race. Though sharing a common genetic heritage, there are Jews with white, black, and semitic racial features. Despite all the talk of "Mestiso", Mexico also has many different ethnic strains as well.

Loss of culture is indeed sad. My family tries to keep our ethnic traditions alive. But those from the Danish half are entirely different than those from the Welsh half: Sharing a common skin tone doesn't really help any in that area. And this is a private observance, not a demand for state recognition and protection.

But regarding the larger cultural trends, such as Western values, this situation is helped, not hurt, each time an immigrant comes to "the West" and adopts our ideals, rather than living unassimilated. Our focus should be preserving these precious, hard-fought values and freedoms.

Your confusing skin color with Western cultural values isn't helping this struggle any.

No, the natural and healthy impulse is to desire the wellbeing of the people of your own race. This is a sentiment that is shared by every normal person (uncontaminated by the corporate media).

This is partially true. Left to their own devices people -- of every skin tone -- are indeed racists. And as such, Alfred is no different than Louis Farrakhan, Cynthia McKinney, many native Japanese and Chinese, and every liberal who blames "whites" for what's wrong with this country.

Be we part company when we say looking at the world through "race," as a primary filter, is "healthy." To the contrary, I believe it's quite un-healthy, however "natural" the tendency may be.

Of course, I would say that: I'm a Christian.

Some see man as nothing more than an animal, with the logical conclusion being that if something is "natural", then it's also "healthy," or at least not immoral. Instead, Christians believe much of man's struggle is to subdue his "nature" to a higher law. As a normal guy, I "naturally" want to pursue every cute woman who crosses my path. Yet my faith tells me that that more is expected of me.

In the case of juding people primarily by race, my faith tells me that there is "neither Jew nor Greek nor slave nor free in Jesus Christ" -- that "the dividing wall of hostility" between races has been abolished though Jesus' atonement for our sins. And in heaven, we see people of every "nation, tribe, and tongue" standing before God, all together.

The early Christian church was not allowed to divide up, even by such deep and significant cutural differences as those which existed between the Jews and Greeks. How much less, then, the exact amount of melanin present in our skins, even when we largely share a common culture?

But, of course, I'm only phrasing this appeal to those who accept at least some of the core Christian ideals.

The bottom line is that I don't view people first in terms of their skin tone, where Alfred clearly does. As I said, he's no worse than a lot of people -- including an incredible number of liberals -- but hey, I'm hoping someday he changes his mind and starts thinking about more important things, like loss of our faith, freedoms, culture and values -- instead of fretting about the average skin tone of children yet to be born.

You either love an abstraction (like "race") or love actual people. Ultimately, there's no room in the human heart for both.