“Take it with a grain of salt.” a common saying that basically means you shouldn’t take everything someone says too seriously, that whatever they’ve said for whatever reason isn’t entirely correct. Now, there’s a general consensus that the sciences, because of how they operate, are intrinsically impartial. That they, and the facts they provide, are removed of prejudices. In a perfect world, institutions such as history, sociology, anthropology and even medicine would be operated by truly stone-cold logical unbiased people.
But as many would point out, this is far from a perfect world. As such, these, and other institutions, have their flaws. Let’s start with anthropology, the study of human societies both past and present. First off, it’s heavily viewed from a western perspective. You ever notice how man-made wonders like the pyramids and ziggurats are accused of being made by aliens? Or rather that extraterrestrials inspired such feats of architecture? Racist, insensitive,and ludicrous just about describe such theories. Especially since no one ever looks at the Colosseum of Rome or the aqueducts and think “Wow, aliens must’ve built this!”
Often when studying POC civilizations those involved ignore the explanations of the people.
These for example, the Easter Island heads on Easter Island (Rapa Nui: Rapa Nui, Spanish: Isla dePascua) a Chilean island in the southeastern Pacific Ocean. It's a known fact that the rock that they're made of isn't from the part of the island the statues are on. When Europeans came to the island, they asked the natives how the statues got there. The natives said they walked there. Of course the Europeans took this as a fairy-tale and chalked it up to a mystery. It wasn’t until recently (in the grand scheme of things) that researchers figured out what they meant by “walking.”
You can watch the video from National Geographic here (in case the gif isn't enough for you.) Encounters like this have happened numerous times, simply because Europeans didn’t believe the natives. I could write an article about just these instances, but I have more to breach upon. But if you’re interested in another case of that, here’s a Facebook video about Roopkund Lake AKA “Skeleton Lake” in the Himalayas in India.
In the world of medicine, the same can and does happen. All too often I’m afraid. Recent studies have shown that almost 200,000 people die to medical negligence, apathy, and racism towards minority patients. Quoting Medical malpractice: Why minorities suffer from racism by Dr. Franklyn Beckles, Jr. “...the medical studies found that Hispanics received worse care than whites about 60 percent of the time. African Americans, American Indians and Alaska Natives received worse care than whites about 80 percent of the time.”
There is an underlying belief that African Americans have an inherently higher pain tolerance than our white counterparts. Thus, Black patients get less pain relieving medicine on average for serious injuries. This isn’t surprising considering that most medical schools (and other institutions) are geared towards white, cis-gendered, bodies.
It wasn’t all that long ago (again in the grand scheme) that science determined that they were fundamental differences in the races. That on a biological and genetic level there was something that separates the races. This, of course, leads to the beginning of Eugenics. This stemmed from the idea that there was a difference, and scientists set out to find them since that’s what they believed already. Modern science will tell you that race is nothing more than a social construct.
In the end, the various sciences are but tools. And I’m not going to expand on the obvious cliché metaphor about tools. If the sciences which at their core are supposed to be impartial; aren’t. Then how can we trust any institution, such as law or education to be unbiased? Something to think about.
