Racism is a dysfunction in the ways that people deal with and relate to each other. The ultimate dysfunction happens when a person would die or kill rather than be helped by or to help a person who is of a race that they have decided to hate.

Racism is dysfunctional when a person who is confused about a stranger’s race will inquire. When a despised race is given, the racist will immediately change their behavior and attitude and go into a negative, ostracizing and hateful state.

Given that humans have an instinctive need to group up with or to take assistance from other humans in a crisis, racism is such a dysfunction that it takes a crisis for them to even consider relating to other races in a normal or collaborative fashion.

Racism is simply irrational and unjustified disrespect, hatred, negative attitudes and negative actions toward other humans based solely on their apparent race or based on being informed of the person’s race.

As far as identifying racist acts, the main difficulty comes from a 30 year backlash in America against identifying anything that white racists do as a racist act. But white racists and their enablers in the media will show no end of outrage if a person of another race does the same. White supremacists and their enablers in the media will also use racism by one group to set non white groups against each other. The recent, almost histrionic coverage by CNN of the Katt Williams non scandal is an example of attempting to set Black Americans against Hispanic Americans when the problem was actually between a Mexican national who was heckling an American citizen, saying that the American’s homeland of California was actually part of Mexico.  This is a highly offensive statement for a Mexican national to make to a Californian, but most of America is ignorant about the issue.

Many people of color have given in to the backlash and will even get angry at one of their own race who attempts to identify and confront racism. Many times, a white person will call out something or someone as racist when the person of color will not. 

Racism is going on when:

A negative judgement or contempt is automatically applied only to people of one race (including their own) or to another race.

A stranger or new arrival gets a negative judgement, is oppressed, is cheated, is harmed, is mistreated or is denied opportunity because of their race and for no other reason.

An institution shows patterns of negative action that is taken on one racial group or on non whites, or that universally favors whites for beneficial action, with mixed or total lack of favor for other racial groups.

An institution that does not hire or promote in proportion to the qualified people of color who live within the commuting area and who apply for jobs at that institution.

Whites, Hispanics, Asians and Blacks get different mortgage rates, but have identical qualifications.

Communities are completely of one race or another.

A person of color hates, rejects or avoids other races or whites, whether they are familiar or are total strangers. This includes avoiding entertainment, food, culture, working relationships and all other forms of interacting and social encounter. This may be in a milder form for middle and upper class people of color who live in urban areas, because of the increasing diversity of living and working in such communities. 

This type of racism is easy to confuse with, and may actually be xenophobia, which was and is rampant among people who grew up in or recently moved from the segregated south; in the originally restricted living areas for Black, Chinese, Mexican or Indian communities in California; or in the Hmong communities that were entitled to come to America after helping during the Vietnam war. European immigrant communities were somewhat xenophobic in the first generation and subsequent generations simply feel better in own “little” community, as with Chinatowns, little Italy’s, barrios and historic Black neighborhoods.

Otherwise, much more observation needs to go on with an individual who might say something racist or behave strangely toward people of other races. The issue may be unfamiliarity, mental illness, institutional and work culture racism or from some other cause. A person might feel that they are comfortable repeating a joke that they heard at a comedy club, or may be a hard core racist who normally is well controlled in public or at work. A person may just be like Don Rickles, the famous insult comic: offensive to everyone, regardless of who they are.

This is why people are often hesitant, except in the most obvious cases, to identify a person, a policy, or another thing as  absolutely racist.