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Supremacism is the belief that a particular race, religion
Religion

A religion is an organized approach to human spirituality which usually encompasses a set of myth, symbols, beliefs and practices, often with a supernatural or transcendence quality, that give meaning to the practitioner's experiences of life through reference to a higher power or truth....
, gender
Gender

Gender comprises a range of differences between man and woman, extending from the biological to the social. Biologically, the male gender is defined by the presence of a Y-chromosome, and its absence in the female gender....
, species
Species

In biology, a species is one of the basic units of biological classification and a taxonomic rank. A species is often defined as a group of organisms capable of interbreeding and producing fertile offspring....
, belief system
Belief

Belief is the psychological state in which an individual holds a proposition or premise to be true....
 or culture
Culture

Culture is difficult to define. For example, in 1952, Alfred Kroeber and Clyde Kluckhohn compiled a list of 164 definitions of "culture" in Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions....
 is superior to others and entitles those who identify with it to dominate, control or rule those who do not. Examples include supremacism based on ethnic
Ethnic group

An ethnic group is a group of humans whose members identify with each other, through a common heritage that is real or presumed.Ethnic identity is further marked by the recognition from others of a group's distinctiveness and the recognition of common culture, linguistic, religion, human behaviour or Race traits, real or presumed, as indic...
 or anthropological
Anthropology

Anthropology is the study of humans and humanity in its totality. Anthropology has origins in the natural sciences, and the humanities. In Great Britain it was originally divided into physical anthropology and cultural anthropology, which itself was divided into archaeology, technology, ethnology and sociology ....
 origins (white supremacy
White supremacy

White supremacy is the belief that white people are superior to people of other Race . The term is sometimes used specifically to describe a political ideology that advocates the Society and Politics dominance of whites....
, black supremacy
Black supremacy

Black supremacy is a racist ideology based on the assertion that black people are superior to other racial groups....
, ethnocentrism
Ethnocentrism

Ethnocentrism is the tendency to look at the world primarily from the perspective of one's own culture. The term was introduced in 1906 by William Graham Sumner, a Yale professor and anti-imperialist, in his book Folkways....
), sexuality
Human sexuality

Human sexuality is how people experience and express themselves as sexual beings. Human sexuality has many aspects. Biology, sexuality refers to the reproductive mechanism as well as the basic biological drive that exists in all species and can encompass sexual intercourse and sexual contact in all its forms....
 (male supremacy, female supremacy), sentience
Sentience

Sentience is the ability to feel or perceive subjectivity. It is an important concept in philosophy, particularly in the philosophy of animal rights and in eastern philosophy, as well as in science fiction and the study of artificial intelligence, although in each of these fields the term is used slightly differently....
 (human supremacy, alien supremacy) and religion
Religion

A religion is an organized approach to human spirituality which usually encompasses a set of myth, symbols, beliefs and practices, often with a supernatural or transcendence quality, that give meaning to the practitioner's experiences of life through reference to a higher power or truth....
 (see below).

omeone believes something is true whilst someone else believes it is false, each will probably regard the evidence and reasoning
Reasoning

Reasoning is the Cognition process of looking for reasons for beliefs, conclusions, actions or feelings. Although reasoning was once thought to be a uniquely human capability, other animals also engage in Animal_cognition#Reasoning_and_problem_solving....
 for his or her belief to be superior (more informed, more considered) than that of the other.






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Supremacism is the belief that a particular race, religion
Religion

A religion is an organized approach to human spirituality which usually encompasses a set of myth, symbols, beliefs and practices, often with a supernatural or transcendence quality, that give meaning to the practitioner's experiences of life through reference to a higher power or truth....
, gender
Gender

Gender comprises a range of differences between man and woman, extending from the biological to the social. Biologically, the male gender is defined by the presence of a Y-chromosome, and its absence in the female gender....
, species
Species

In biology, a species is one of the basic units of biological classification and a taxonomic rank. A species is often defined as a group of organisms capable of interbreeding and producing fertile offspring....
, belief system
Belief

Belief is the psychological state in which an individual holds a proposition or premise to be true....
 or culture
Culture

Culture is difficult to define. For example, in 1952, Alfred Kroeber and Clyde Kluckhohn compiled a list of 164 definitions of "culture" in Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions....
 is superior to others and entitles those who identify with it to dominate, control or rule those who do not. Examples include supremacism based on ethnic
Ethnic group

An ethnic group is a group of humans whose members identify with each other, through a common heritage that is real or presumed.Ethnic identity is further marked by the recognition from others of a group's distinctiveness and the recognition of common culture, linguistic, religion, human behaviour or Race traits, real or presumed, as indic...
 or anthropological
Anthropology

Anthropology is the study of humans and humanity in its totality. Anthropology has origins in the natural sciences, and the humanities. In Great Britain it was originally divided into physical anthropology and cultural anthropology, which itself was divided into archaeology, technology, ethnology and sociology ....
 origins (white supremacy
White supremacy

White supremacy is the belief that white people are superior to people of other Race . The term is sometimes used specifically to describe a political ideology that advocates the Society and Politics dominance of whites....
, black supremacy
Black supremacy

Black supremacy is a racist ideology based on the assertion that black people are superior to other racial groups....
, ethnocentrism
Ethnocentrism

Ethnocentrism is the tendency to look at the world primarily from the perspective of one's own culture. The term was introduced in 1906 by William Graham Sumner, a Yale professor and anti-imperialist, in his book Folkways....
), sexuality
Human sexuality

Human sexuality is how people experience and express themselves as sexual beings. Human sexuality has many aspects. Biology, sexuality refers to the reproductive mechanism as well as the basic biological drive that exists in all species and can encompass sexual intercourse and sexual contact in all its forms....
 (male supremacy, female supremacy), sentience
Sentience

Sentience is the ability to feel or perceive subjectivity. It is an important concept in philosophy, particularly in the philosophy of animal rights and in eastern philosophy, as well as in science fiction and the study of artificial intelligence, although in each of these fields the term is used slightly differently....
 (human supremacy, alien supremacy) and religion
Religion

A religion is an organized approach to human spirituality which usually encompasses a set of myth, symbols, beliefs and practices, often with a supernatural or transcendence quality, that give meaning to the practitioner's experiences of life through reference to a higher power or truth....
 (see below).

Beliefs and ideas

If someone believes something is true whilst someone else believes it is false, each will probably regard the evidence and reasoning
Reasoning

Reasoning is the Cognition process of looking for reasons for beliefs, conclusions, actions or feelings. Although reasoning was once thought to be a uniquely human capability, other animals also engage in Animal_cognition#Reasoning_and_problem_solving....
 for his or her belief to be superior (more informed, more considered) than that of the other. For instance, if person X believes the Earth is flat
Flat Earth

The flat Earth model is an ancient view of the Earth's shape which conceived of it as flatness like a piece of paper or an infinite plane .This belief contrasts with the view introduced around the 4th century BC by natural philosophers of Classical Greece that the spherical Earth....
 whilst person Y believes it isn't, X would probably consider the evidence and reasoning for his or her belief to be superior to that of Y.

Supremacism, however, goes much further. A supremacist not only holds that any evidence and reasoning for his or her beliefs is superior to any other,, but that those holding such beliefs have rights over those who do not. For example: "American leadership is good both for America and for the world" - New American Century Project
Project for the New American Century

The Project for the New American Century was an United States Neoconservatism think tank based in Washington, D.C. that lasted from early 1997 to 2006....


Attempts at justification

Following the development of theories such as evolution
Evolution

In biology, evolution is change in the heritability trait of a population of organisms from one generation to the next. These changes are caused by a combination of three main processes: variation, reproduction, and selection....
 and eugenics
Eugenics

Eugenics is a scientific field involving the controlled breeding of humans in order to achieve desirable traits in future generations. Eugenics was at its height in first half of the 20th century and was largely abandoned with the end of World War II....
, supremacists have sought scientific
Science

In its broadest sense, science refers to any systematic knowledge or practice. In its more usual restricted sense, science refers to a system of acquiring knowledge based on scientific method, as well as to the organized body of knowledge gained through such research....
 justification for their views through notions such as Social Darwinism
Social Darwinism

Social Darwinism refers to various ideologies based on a concept that competition among all individuals, groups, nations, or ideas drives social evolution in human societies....
.

Historical examples

Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler

Adolf Hitler was an Austrian-born Germany politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party , popularly known as the Nazi Party....
's Nazi
Nazism

Nazism, officially National Socialism , refers to the ideology and practices of the National Socialist German Workers? Party under Adolf Hitler, and the policies adopted by the dictatorial government of Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945....
 Party was perhaps the best-known and documented organization in history with fundamental principles of racial supremacy. They believed in the establishment of an Aryan
Aryan

Aryan is an English language loanword. As the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language states at the beginning of its definition, "[it] is one of the ironies of history that Aryan, a word nowadays referring to the blond-haired, blue-eyed physical ideal of Nazi Germany, originally referred to a people who looked vastly di...
 empire throughout Europe
Europe

Europe is, conventionally, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally divided from Asia to its east by the water divide of the Ural Mountains, the Ural , the Caspian Sea, and by the Caucasus Mountains to the southeast....
 and Russia
Russia

Russia , or the Russian Federation , is a list of countries spanning more than one continent country extending over much of northern Eurasia....
, where all people who were not of the Proto-European (Aryan) master race
Master race

The 'master race' was a concept in Nazism ideology, which holds that the Germanic peoples represent an ideal and "pure Race ". It derives from 19th century racial theory, which posited a hierarchy of races placing Jews at the bottom of the hierarchy while Northern Europeans at the top....
 were to be below them. These beliefs resulted in World War II
World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global military conflict which involved a Participants in World War II, including all of the great powers, organised into two opposing military alliances: the Allies of World War II and the Axis powers....
 and The Holocaust
The Holocaust

The Holocaust , also known as , Churben is the term generally used to describe the genocide of approximately six million European Jews during World War II, as part of a program of deliberate extermination planned and executed by Nazi Germany under Adolf Hitler....
.

Following the American Civil War
American Civil War

The American Civil War , also known as the War Between the States and several Naming the American Civil War, was a civil war in the United States....
, southern whites and former Confederates
Confederate States of America

The Confederate States of America formed as the government set up from 1861 to 1865 by eleven Southern United States U.S. state of the United States of America that had declared their secession from the U.S....
 formed the secret society known as the Ku Klux Klan
Ku Klux Klan

Ku Klux Klan is the name of several past and present secret domestic militant organizations in the United States, originating in the southern states and eventually having national scope, that are best known for advocating white supremacy and acting as terrorists while hidden behind conical hats, masks and white robes....
. They preached Anglo Protestant supremacy over all other races, as well as over Jew
Jew

A Jew is a member of the Jewish people, an ethnoreligious group that traces its ancestry to the Israelites or Hebrews of the Ancient Near East....
s and Catholic
Catholic

Catholic is an adjective derived from the Greek language adjective , meaning "whole" or "complete". In the context of Christianity ecclesiology, it has a rich history and several usages....
s.

During the first part of the Showa era, the propaganda of the Empire of Japan
Empire of Japan

The Empire of Japan was a Japanese political entity that existed during the period from the Meiji Restoration in 1868 until its defeat in World War II in 1945....
 used the old concept of hakko ichiu
Hakko ichiu

was a Japanese political slogan that became popular during the first part of the Showa era, and was popularized in a speech by Prime Minister of Japan Fumimaro Konoe on January 8, 1940....
 to support the idea that the Yamato
Yamato people

The are the dominant native ethnic group of Japan. It is a term that came to be used around the late 19th century to distinguish the residents of the mainland Japan from other minority ethnic groups who have resided in the peripheral areas of Japan such as Ainu people, Ryukyuan people, Nivkhs, Oroks, as well as Korean people, Taiwanese people, and...
 was a superior race, destined to rule Asia and the Pacific. Many documents such as Kokutai no Hongi, Shinmin no Michi
Shinmin no Michi

The was an ideological manifesto issued by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology during World War II aimed at Japan?s domestic audience to explain in clear terms what was expected of them "as a people, nation and race"....
 and An Investigation of Global Policy with the Yamato Race as Nucleus
An Investigation of Global Policy with the Yamato Race as Nucleus

was a secret Japanese government report created by the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare ?s Welfare's Population Problems Research Center and completed on July 1, 1943....
 referred to this concept of racial supremacy.

Certain sectors of the Jamaican-born religion of Rastafarianism preach the supremacy of the black race and the need for an Exodus back to Africa (Ethiopia
Ethiopia

Ethiopia , officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked country situated in the Horn of Africa. Ethiopia is bordered by Eritrea to the north, Sudan to the west, Kenya to the south, Somalia to the east and Djibouti to the northeast....
).

A study done by ] states that: "The government of Iran is teaching the country’s children to discriminate against women and minorities, to view non-Muslims with suspicion if not contempt, and to perpetuate the regime’s theocratic ideology. Discrimination and intolerance are deeply ingrained in the textbooks that make up the core of Iran’s school curriculum. The country’s textbooks systematically denigrate the importance of women as individuals, largely neglect minority groups or fail to acknowledge them entirely, propagate Shi’ite egocentrism, and encourage hostility toward non-Muslim countries. The textbooks present a particular interpretation of Shi’a Islam as the basis of Iran’s political order and adopt this interpretation as their ideological foundation. They often describe this political order as “sacred” and warn that criticism of the regime constitutes opposition to divine “will.”"

Racial supremacy differs from racism
Racism

Racism, by its simplest definition is the belief that Race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race....
 in that, racism is the dislike or disrespect for a particular ethnic group. Racial Supremacy is the belief that one's own race is superior, dominant, chosen, smarter, more civilized, or more productive than any other race.

Hierarchy of Races

Some supremacists believe in the existence of a "hierarchy of races," in which certain races are more or less "evolved" than others. White supremacists believe they are more evolved than Blacks while certain Asians (particularly those of East Asian descent) believe they are the most superior race based on factors such as IQ, educational attainment, low rates of crime and violence, and wealth (e.g., the model minority
Model minority

Model minority refers to a minority ethnic, Race , or religion social group whose members achieve a higher degree of success than the population average....
, cognitive elitism).

See also

  • Anti-humanism
    Misanthropy

    Misanthropy is a general dislike, distrust, or hatred of the human species or a disposition to dislike and/or distrust other people's silent consensus about reality....
  • Biphobia
    Biphobia

    Biphobia is a term used to describe fear of and aversion toward bisexuality and bisexuals as a social group or as individuals. People of any sexual orientation can experience such feelings of fear and aversion....
  • Black supremacy
    Black supremacy

    Black supremacy is a racist ideology based on the assertion that black people are superior to other racial groups....
  • Chauvinism
    Chauvinism

    Chauvinism is extreme and unreasoning partisanship on behalf of a group to which one belongs, especially when the partisanship includes malice and hatred towards a rival group....
  • Cognitive elite
    Cognitive elite

    The cognitive elite of a society, according to some social science researchers, are those having higher intelligence levels and thus better prospects for success in life....
  • Heteronormative
  • Heterophobia
    Heterophobia

    Heterophobia is a term used to describe irrational fear of, aversion to, or discrimination against heterosexuals. Heterophobic is the adjective form of this term used to describe the qualities of these characteristics while heterophobe is the noun form given as a title to individuals with heterophobic characteristics....
  • Heterosexism
    Heterosexism

    Heterosexism is a term that applies to negative Attitude , bias, and discrimination in favor of opposite-sex sexuality and relationships. It can include the presumption that everyone is Heterosexuality or that opposite-sex attractions and relationships are the norm and therefore superior....
  • Homophobia
    Homophobia

    Homophobia is an irrational fear of, aversion to, or discrimination against homosexuality or homosexuals. Some definitions lack the "irrational" component....
  • Humanocentrism
    Anthropocentrism

    Anthropocentrism is the belief that humans must be considered at the center of, and above any other aspect of, reality. This concept is sometimes known as humanocentrism or human supremacy....
  • Jewish supremacy
  • Malay supremacy
  • Misandry
    Misandry

    Misandry is hatred of men or boys. It is parallel to misogyny?the hatred of women. Misandry is also comparable with misanthropy which is the hatred of humanity generally....
  • Misogyny
    Misogyny

    Misogyny is hatred of women or girls. It is parallel to misandry?the hatred of men. Misogyny is also comparable with misanthropy which is the hatred of humanity generally....
  • Model minority
    Model minority

    Model minority refers to a minority ethnic, Race , or religion social group whose members achieve a higher degree of success than the population average....
  • Triumphalism
    Triumphalism

    Triumphalism is the attitude or belief that a particular doctrine, religion, culture, or social system is superior to and should triumph over all others....
  • White supremacy
    White supremacy

    White supremacy is the belief that white people are superior to people of other Race . The term is sometimes used specifically to describe a political ideology that advocates the Society and Politics dominance of whites....
  • Islamism
    Islamism

    Islamism is a set of Ideologies of parties holding that Islam is not only a religion but also a political system; that modern Muslims must Islamic fundamentalism, and unite politically....