GERMANS BY RACE [To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR]
StR,—What, it may be asked, does Mr. Alfred Beesly mean by the word " race "?
His letter would suggest that because the majority of the Swiss people, as well as the Alsatians and Luxembourgers, speak a language more or less the same as that spoken in the German Reich they are of the German race. This is probably not his meaning, but if it be, then the inhabitants of the British Isles are of the same race because for the great majority English is their mother tongue. Furthermore he must include Englishmen in the German race, English being fundamentally a " German " language. A reductio ad absurdum.
But if your correspondent implies that the people of Alsace, Luxembourg and the greater part of Switzerland are ethnologi- cally of the same stock as those living in the Reich, on what grounds does he base his statement? It has been conclusively shown that, anthropologically and biologically speaking, there is probably no pure race now existing on the globe. Mankind is irrevocably mixed. Some peoples have more of the original " blood " in them than others, that is all that can be said.
Anthropometric observations in Germany prove that except on the shores of the Baltic, the majority of the population are physically of a more Eastern type, Slavonic, or Mongol. This fact has been suppressed by the Nazi ideologues as conflicting with their claim to be pure Nordics (whatever that may mean).
In short, the word " race " should now be dropped as its use in controversy almost certainly leads to misunderstanding.
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