What is racial discrimination?

Racial discrimination is the devaluation and exclusion of people on the basis of arbitrary, supposed physical or cultural characteristics attributed to them from the outside. These characteristics construct privileged segments of society based on centuries-old racist ideologies. Thus, they divide people into groups such as white vs. Black people. People who are not marked as "white" have no or poor access to material and non-material resources and rights.

Racist discrimination dehumanizes people: They are ascribed bad characteristics and inferiority in contrast to the dominant group. All this leads to individual and institutional disadvantage and violence.