“Dark oxygen” discovery probably more junk science

January 19, 2025

Well! Well!

Another scientific myth bites the dust. But never believe anything which feels compelled to use the word “dark”.

BBC

Scientists who recently discovered that metal lumps on the dark seabed make oxygen, have announced plans to study the deepest parts of Earth’s oceans in order to understand the strange phenomenon. Their mission could “change the way we look at the possibility of life on other planets too,” the researchers say. The initial discovery confounded marine scientists. It was previously accepted that oxygen could only be produced in sunlight by plants – in a process called photosynthesis.

But I am extremely sceptical of all “dark” things. Dark energy and dark matter are fudge factors and were never even claimed to be real things. Now, even the need for the fudge factor is vanishing. I suspect dark oxygen may also turn out to be just another example of junk science.

Evidence of dark oxygen production at the abyssal seafloor

Abstract
Deep-seafloor organisms consume oxygen, which can be measured by in situ benthic chamber experiments. Here we report such experiments at the polymetallic nodule-covered abyssal seafloor in the Pacific Ocean in which oxygen increased over two days to more than three times the background concentration, which from ex situ incubations we attribute to the polymetallic nodules. Given high voltage potentials (up to 0.95 V) on nodule surfaces, we hypothesize that seawater electrolysis may contribute to this dark oxygen production.

Of course there are many who claim this is a nonsense discovery. If photosynthesis is not the only way of producing oxygen and it can actually be produced in the depths of the ocean, then microbial life is not just possible but likely on the deep ocean floor. That could allow fanatic environmentalists (like the ones who caused the LA fires) to disturb the potential mining of metals (rare metals especially).

BBC

The initial discovery triggered a global scientific row – there was criticism of the findings from some scientists and from deep sea mining companies that plan to harvest the precious metals in the seabed nodules. If oxygen is produced at these extreme depths, in total darkness, that calls into question what life could survive and thrive on the seafloor, and what impact mining activities could have on that marine life. That means that seabed mining companies and environmental organisations – some of which claimed that the findings provided evidence that seafloor mining plans should be halted – will be watching this new investigation closely.

I find the criticisms of dark oxygen much more credible than the discovery paper by Sweetman.

Critical Review of the Article: “Evidence of Dark Oxygen Production at the Abyssal Seafloor” by Sweetman et al. in Nat. Geosci. 1–3 (2024)

This review examines the findings and methodologies presented in Sweetman et al. (2024) (hereafter referred to as ‘the paper’). The paper presents findings contrasting those of all previous comparable work and has stirred international debate pertaining to deep-sea minerals. We identify significant issues in data collection, validation, and interpretation including unvalidated data collection methods, the omission of crucial observations relevant for electrolysis processes, and unsupported voltage measurements which undermine the study’s conclusions. These issues, coupled with unfounded hypotheses about early Earth oxygen production, call into question the authors’ interpretation of the observations and warrant re-examining the validity of this work. 

Dark oxygen sounds more like junk science and funding hype than any real discovery.

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Idiocy (or terrorism)

January 16, 2025

There is no such thing as Islamophobia.

The fear of radical Muslims is entirely rational.

Now fundamentalist Pakistan is threatening Paris

(or they are imbeciles).

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And he’s not even in office yet ……

January 16, 2025

Unlike many of my friends and acquaintances (and not to mention my religiously liberal relatives), I have rather high expectations of a Trump Presidency. The reversal of some of the obscene wokery that has spread around the world has started. Whether the world can be inoculated against the woke virus remains to be seen. I was expecting the Middle East to get quieter and the NATO expansion to be curbed. I expected some solution – no matter how unpleasant – of the Russia/ Ukraine – NATO-EU conflict. I am expecting a new growth surge to break the EU engendered economic slumber that currently prevails. I am expecting / hoping for a rollback of some of the intellectual prostitution and multilateral excesses that have become globally endemic.

Well, we shall see. He will not take office till Monday, but the signs are promising

HT:

Israel and Hamas have agreed to pause the devastating war in the Gaza Strip that was going on since October 7, 2023.

Netanyahu also called Trump to thank him.

The US State Department on Wednesday said the involvement of President-elect Donald Trump’s team was critical in getting the truce deal between Israel and Hamas in Gaza over the line.

President-elect Donald Trump was in the centre of news after Israel, Hamas deal.(AP)

State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller also thanked Donald Trump and his team for working with the Joe Biden administration and said it was important that they were on the table.

“When it comes to the involvement of President-Elect Trump’s team, it has been absolutely critical in getting this deal over the line. It’s been critical because obviously, as I stand here today, this administration’s term in office will expire in five days…We, of course, thank the Trump team for working with us on this cease-fire agreement. We think it’s important that they were at the table,” he said in a press conference after the deal was announced.

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Diversity perils

January 10, 2025

LA has it tough.

Not only the Sierra Club, an incompetent mayor and a dilettante Governor – and now this.

Presumably the arsonists are all illegals as well.

Amid Palisades fire, Los Angeles’ first LGBTQ+ fire chief is proving lesbians get it done

Firefighters are currently trying to stop the Pacific Palisades area fire, led by lesbian Fire Chief Kristen Crowley.

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The UK grooming gangs have been active for at least 40 years

January 5, 2025

I am surprised at the denial we see now. The UK Pakistani-British grooming gangs have been active for over 40 years. The scandal has even made it past the Wikipedia political correctness police.

Wikipedia:

The Rotherham child sexual exploitation scandal consists of the organised child sexual abuse of girls that occurred in the town of Rotherham, South Yorkshire, Northern England, from the late 1980s until 2013[9] and the failure of local authorities to act on reports of the abuse throughout most of that period.[10] Researcher Angie Heal, who was hired by local officials and warned them about child exploitation occurring between 2002 and 2007, has since described it as the “biggest child protection scandal in UK history”,[11] with one report estimating that 1,400 girls, primarily from care home backgrounds, were abused by “grooming gangs” between 1997 and 2013.[9] Evidence of the abuse was first noted in the early 1990s, when care home managers investigated reports that children in their care were being picked up by taxi drivers.[12] From at least 2001, multiple reports passed names of alleged perpetrators, several from one family, to the police and Rotherham Council. The first group conviction took place in 2010, when five British-Pakistani men were convicted of sexual offences against girls aged 12–16.[13]

In the first half of the 80s I used to travel regularly to the Grimethorpe/Doncaster/ Bradford area and recall first hearing vague pub gossip about gangs exploiting young girls who were in care by creating and feeding their drug habits. But it was just gossip then. It was at a time when it was taboo to say anything negative about the immigrant community. Truth be damned. It was only in the 90s that some few journalists began writing about this. Council politicians, social workers, policemen and the politically correct fraternity did not just turn a blind eye. The girls were mainly “white trash” and “in care” after all. They actively protected the perpetrators and demonised the victims. The current groomers are not new immigrants with a culture gap. They are second-generation, but brought up in their multiculturally allowed grooming culture.

So why the hand-wringing and surprise now.

I told you so.

I wrote this post almost 11 years ago:

A “society” – to be a society – can be multi-ethnic but not multicultural

A “culture” is both the glue that binds any society of humans and lubricates the interactions within that society. It applies as well to a family or an association or a sports club or a company or a geographic area (say a country). The culture of any sub-society – a sub-culture – must be subordinated to that of the larger society it is  – or wants to be – part of.

Of course one can have – if one wishes – many different cultures within different sub-societies in a single geographic area. But if these sub-cultures are not subordinated to a larger culture then the sub-societies cannot – because it becomes a fatal contradiction – make up any larger society. Multiculturalism dooms that geographical area to inevitably be a splintered and fractured “greater” society – if at all.

The politically correct “multiculturalism” followed in Europe in recent times has effectively preserved and maintained each ethnic group in its own cultural silo and – inanely – made a virtue out of preventing the evolution of any overriding, common culture. This has been the fundamental, “do-gooding” blunder of the socialist/liberal “democrats” all through Europe. Creating a society of the future with a common culture as the glue has been sacrificed in a quest for some imagined God of Many Cultures. For an immigrant – anywhere – how could it be more important to keep the language of his past rather than to learn the language of his future? The “do-gooders” have prioritised living in the past to creating and living in a new future.

Hence Rotherham and Bradford or Kreuzberg or Rosengård or Les Bosquets,

Multi-ethnic communities particularly need both a glue and a lubricating medium. And that has to be an overriding common – new – culture and not some mish-mash, immiscible collection of sub-cultures – each within its own silo, insulated and held separate from all others.

  1. Multi-ethnic societies are inevitable around the world.
  2. A single society has a single culture.
  3. To have many cultures in one area – which are not subordinated to a larger culture (values) – is to exclude a single society.
  4. Promoting multiculturalism is to promote the fracturing of that area into many immiscible (inevitably ethnic) societies.

Multi-ethnicity – especially – requires a mono-culture to be a society at all.

Multi-ethnic and multi-cultural is separatism and serves to ensure that a single society will never be established.

and again 8 years ago ..

“Multiculturalism” always gives fractured and segregated societies

It seems obvious. Multi-ethnic societies, even with well -developed sub-cultures, work very well under an over-riding common culture. In fact the over-riding common culture is dynamic and takes on parts of the various sub-cultures. But societies with parallel cultures with no over-riding common culture can only give a fractured society. It  prevents any common culture developing and inevitably gives ethnic segregation. For over 5 decades, these parallel cultures have been promoted by the liberal, social-democratic, do-gooding, misguided elite of Europe.

It is not at all surprising that the cities of Europe now have segregated and have no-go ghettos which consider themselves outside of the main society and not subject to the rules and behaviour expected in that society.

Well, I did tell you so.

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No “DEI Hire” can ever be the “best choice” for any position or award

January 4, 2025

DEI programs are part of the wokery delusion. By definition a “DEI hire” would not have been appointed to any position or received any award without having received unfair favour – to the detriment of somebody else being discriminated against. No “DEI Hire” can ever be the “best choice” for any position or award.

Claudine Gay is one of the more famous woke/DEI catastrophes. She would never have been appointed to be President of Harvard if she had not been black and female. She was neither best qualified nor most competent for the job. But she was black and she was female. The insidiousness of cancerous DEI programs is that I now assume – as the default assessment – that any black person in a high position in US academia must probably have been a DEI hire. Almost every university has its token employees and some in very high positions. I was listening to a black Dean from Columbia recently and my automatic assumption was that this was  a “DEI hire”. The Dean said nothing sufficiently insightful to change my mind during the 4 minute interview. I have written him off in my mind as a “DEI hire” but, for all I know, the Dean may actually have been quite competent and deserving of the appointment. 

Too late. DEI has struck. The label is permanent. 

I find most DEI / affirmative action / reservation schemes fundamentally flawed and unjust. By definition a “DEI hire” would not have been appointed to any position or received any award without having received unfair favour – to the detriment of somebody else being discriminated against. No “DEI Hire” can ever be the “best choice” for any position or award. No matter how qualified, the beneficiaries of such schemes will always carry the stigma of not having been the “best” for the position (whether job or student place). There is no doubt that in the US, competence has suffered as a consequence of affirmative action and DEI. The reservation system and its distorted benefits in India has helped perpetuate the caste system. So much so that the reservation system is institutionalized and corrupted. In Europe the decline in competence of public service TV employees is on continuous display with program presenters and coordinators lacking in basic competences but fulfilling some “inclusivity” or “diversity” wish. In countries with quotas for women directors, competent women are unfortunately being painted with the quota brush. The New Zealand Navy has prioritized diversity over the sinkability of its ships. It was recently apparent that the US Secret Service has also decreased its capability to protect its charges by giving priority to diversity in hiring. A small person holding up her hands, apparently to protect a very tall person, was one of the more ludicrous images that persist.

These schemes are not far short of stupid. Reverse discrimination involves actions against the innocent to favour the currently disadvantaged to try and compensate for criminal discrimination by other people to other victims. They are all inherently unjust schemes with a remarkable lack of common sense.

I try to list the failings of such schemes (mainly as practiced in the US and Europe).

  • Tokenism: DEI programs are often just a facade to appear inclusive. That ethnically diverse work places provide benefits is a religious woke belief but there is no evidence that it is so.
  • Reverse Discrimination: DEI initiatives always lead to reverse discrimination, where qualified individuals from majority groups are overlooked in favor of less-qualified candidates from underrepresented groups. This has inevitably caused resentment and emphasized the stupidity of such schemes.
  • Lack of Measurable Results: The effectiveness of DEI programs is unproven due to the impossibility of measuring their impact on organizational performance. Diversity and inclusion only bring political benefits to the program organizers, but benefits to the organization cannot be quantified.
  • Focus on Diversity Over Inclusion: DEI programs often prioritize diversity in terms of demographics (race, gender, etc.) but neglect the importance of the primary purpose of any workplace – which is to do some specified work.
  • Administrative Burden: DEI initiatives are extremely time-consuming and resource-intensive, requiring significant administrative effort to implement and maintain. This are a significant burden on organizations, especially smaller ones with no quantifiable benefits.
  • Stereotyping: DEI initiatives lead to stereotyping and perpetuating of such stereotyping.

It is often sanctimoniously claimed that DEI is “about creating a workplace where everyone feels valued, respected, and has equal opportunities to succeed”. What they conveniently forget is that a workplace is for doing work. Getting the work done is the objective not the practicing of religious rituals.

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Science ultimately needs magic to build upon

January 3, 2025

The purpose of the scientific method is to generate knowledge. “Science” describes the application of the method and the knowledge gained. The knowledge generated is always subjective and the process builds upon fundamental assumptions which make up the boundary conditions for the scientific method. These  assumptions can neither be explained or proved.

I find it useful to take knowledge as coming in 3 parts.

  1. known: This encompasses everything that we currently understand and can explain through observation, experimentation, and established theories. This is the realm of established scientific knowledge, historical facts, and everyday experiences.
  2. unknown but knowable: This is the domain of scientific inquiry. It includes phenomena that we don’t currently understand but that we believe can be investigated and explained through scientific methods. This is where scientific research operates, pushing the boundaries of our knowledge through observation, experimentation, and the development of new theories.
  3. unknown and unknowable: This is the realm that I associate with metaphysics, religion and theology. It encompasses questions about ultimate origins, the meaning of existence, the nature of consciousness, and other metaphysical questions that may not be amenable to scientific investigation.

Philosophy then plays the crucial role of exploring the boundaries between these domains, challenging the assumptions, and developing new ways of thinking about knowledge and reality.

I like this categorization of knowledge because

  • it provides a clear framework for distinguishing between different types of questions and approaches to understanding.
  • it acknowledges the limits of scientific inquiry and recognizes that there may be questions that science cannot answer, and
  • it allows for the coexistence of science, philosophy, religion, and other ways of knowing, each addressing different types of questions.

To claim any knowledge about the unknown or the unknowable leads inevitably to self-contradiction. Which is why the often used form “I don’t know what, but I know it isn’t that” is always self contradictory. It implies a constraint on the unknown, which is a contradiction in terms. If something is truly unknown, we surely cannot even say what it is not.

Given that the human brain is finite and that we cannot observe any bounds to our universe – in space or in time – it follows that there must be areas beyond the comprehension of human cognition. We invent labels to represent the “unknowable” (boundless, endless, infinite, timeless, supernatural, magic, countless, ….). These labels are attempts to conceptualize what is inherently beyond our conceptualization. They serve as placeholders for our lack of understanding. But it is the human condition that having confirmed that there are things we cannot know, we then proceed anyway to try and define what we cannot. We are pattern-seeking beings who strive to make sense of the world around us. Even when faced with the limits of our understanding, we try to create mental models, however inadequate they may be.

Human cognitive capability is limited not only by the brain’s physical size but also by the senses available to us. We know about some of the senses we lack (e.g., the ability to detect magnetic fields like some birds or to perceive ultraviolet light directly like some insects), but cannot know what we don’t know. We cannot even conceive of what other senses we might be missing. These are the “unknown unknowns,” and they represent a fundamental limit to our understanding of reality. Even our use of instruments to detect parameters we cannot sense directly must be interpreted by the senses we do have. We convert X-rays into images in the visible spectrum, or we represent radio waves as audible sounds. This conversion necessarily involves interpretation and introduces subjectivity. We also know that the signals generated by an animal’s eye probably cannot be understood by a human brain. The brain’s software needs to be tuned for the senses the brain has access to. The inherent limitations of human perception makes the subjective nature of our experience of reality unavoidable. The objectivity of all human observations is thus a mirage. Empiricism is necessarily subjective.

Scientific inquiry remains the most powerful tool humans have developed for understanding the world around us. With sophisticated instruments to extend our limited senses and by using conceptual tools such as mathematics and logic and reason we gain insights into aspects of reality that would otherwise be inaccessible to us. Never mind that logic and reason are not understood in themselves. But our experience of reality is always filtered through the lens of our limited and species-specific senses. We cannot therefore eliminate the inherent subjectivity of our observations and the limitations of our understanding. We cannot know what we cannot know.

I do not need to invoke gods when I say that “magic” exists, when I define “magic” as those things beyond human comprehension. This definition avoids superpower connotations and focuses on the limits of our current knowledge. In this sense, “magic” is a placeholder for the unknown. I observe that the process of science requires fundamental assumptions which are the boundary conditions within which science functions. These assumptions include:

  • Existence of an External Reality: Science assumes that there is an objective reality independent of our minds.
  • Existence of Matter, Energy, Space, and Time: These are the fundamental constituents of the physical universe as we understand it.
  • Causality: Science assumes that events have causes and that these causes can be investigated.
  • Uniformity of Natural Laws: Science assumes that the laws of nature are the same everywhere in the universe and throughout time.
  • The possibility of Observation and Measurement: Science depends on the assumption that we can observe and measure aspects of reality.
  • The biological and medical sciences observe and accept but cannot explain life and consciousness.

Science operates within a framework given by these fundamental assumptions which cannot be  explained. These incomprehensibilities are the “magic” that science builds upon. Science can address them obliquely but cannot question them directly without creating contradictions. If we were to question the existence of an external reality, for example, the entire scientific enterprise would become meaningless. Science can investigate their consequences and refine our understanding of what they are not, but cannot directly prove or disprove them. These assumptions are – at least currently – beyond human comprehension and explanation. Science builds upon this “magic” but cannot explain the “magic”.

Magic is often ridiculed because it is perceived as invoking beings with supernatural powers which in turn is taken to mean the intentional violation of some of the laws of nature. The core issue lies in the definitions of “magic” and  “supernatural.” I take supernatural to be “that which is beyond the laws of nature as we know them.” But we tend to dismiss the supernatural rather too glibly. If something is beyond comprehension it must mean that we cannot bring that event/happening to be within the laws of nature as we know them. And that must then allow the possibility of being due to the “supernatural”. If we do not know what compels existence or causality then we cannot either exclude a supernatural cause (outside the laws of nature as we know them). In fact the Big Bang theory and even quantum probabilities each need such “outside the laws of nature” elements. A black hole is supernatural. Singularities in black holes and the Big Bang represent points where our current understanding of physics breaks down. The laws of general relativity, which describe gravity, become undefined at singularities. In this sense, they are “beyond” our current laws of nature. A singularity where the laws of nature do not apply is “supernatural”. Dark energy and dark matter are essentially fudge factors and lie outside the laws of nature as we know them. We infer their existence from their gravitational effects on visible matter and the expansion of the universe, but we haven’t directly detected them. Collapsing quantum wave functions which function outside space and time are just as fantastical as Superman. All these represent holes in our understanding of the universe’s composition and dynamics. That understanding may or may not come in the future. And thus, in the now, they are supernatural.

Supernatural today may not be supernatural tomorrow. It is the old story of my technology is magic to someone else. Magic is always beyond the laws of nature as we know them. But what is magic today may remain magic tomorrow. We cannot set qualifications on what we do not know. What we do not know may or may not violate the known laws of nature. While we have a very successful theory of gravity (general relativity) that accurately predicts the motion of planets, we don’t fully understand the fundamental nature of gravity. We don’t know how it is mediated. In this sense, there is still an element of “magic” or mystery surrounding gravity. We can describe how it works, but not ultimately why. The bottom line is that we still do not know why the earth orbits the sun. We cannot guarantee that everything currently unexplained will eventually be explained by science. There might be phenomena that remain permanently beyond our comprehension, or there might be aspects of reality that are fundamentally inaccessible to scientific investigation. By definition, we cannot fully understand or categorize what we do not know. Trying to impose strict boundaries on the unknown is inherently problematic. We cannot assume that everything we currently don’t understand will necessarily conform to the laws of nature as we currently understand them. New discoveries might require us to revise or even abandon some of our current laws.

The pursuit of scientific knowledge is a journey into the unknown, and we will encounter phenomena that challenge our existing understanding. But we cannot question the foundational assumptions of science without invalidating the inquiry.

Science depends upon – and builds upon – magic.

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A spectacular sunrise on Christmas Eve

December 24, 2024

A light smattering of snow last night. It won’t last but there is enough for it to be white Christmas,

A spectacular sky just 15 minutes before sunrise.

Season’s greetings to all.

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Legacy media is no longer “the medium” and their messaging is becoming irrelevant

December 21, 2024

It seems that data (based on circulation numbers versus subscribers or followers) shows clearly that legacy media is no longer “the medium” and consequently cannot carry the message. The recent US Presidential election being a case in point. Marshall McLuhan’s thesis that the “medium is the message” is in fact being confirmed as the medium shifts.

Legacy media – probably as a reaction to the internet and social media – has abandoned all traces of impartiality and has adopted blatant biases as a misguided way of stemming at least some of the waves who are abandoning them. I had great respect once for, among others, The New York Times, The Guardian, The Washington Post, The Times, The Telegraph, The Times of India, The Hindu, Reuters, AP, El Pais, Le Monde, der Spiegel, Deutsche Welle, and even NHK. Not any more. They are now part of the legacy media I consider irreversibly corrupted by their bias. The bias is most evident in the political arena but has now seeped into their coverage of sports and the arts. I see that the LA Times which was even more blatantly biased is now trying to shift direction but it is not likely to be very successful.

Legacy media will no doubt struggle on but they will all only struggle on to bankruptcy. They are now as obsolete as roaming bards, town criers or wall news-sheets. Legacy print media is going downhill fastest but even broadcast TV for messaging is dying.

ktwop:

The decline in circulation numbers for traditional print media, coupled with the rise of digital subscriptions and social media followings, strongly supports the idea that legacy media is dying. This shift directly relates to Marshall McLuhan’s famous assertion that “the medium is the message.”

The reasons can be broken down as follows:

  • Changing Consumption Habits: People are increasingly getting their news and information from digital sources. This includes online news websites, social media platforms, blogs, and podcasts. This shift in consumption habits directly impacts the reach and influence of legacy media.
  • The Medium Shapes the Message:McLuhan argued that the medium through which a message is conveyed is as important, if not more important, than the message itself. The format of a newspaper, with its structured layout and focus on in-depth articles, creates a different experience than scrolling through a Twitter feed or watching a short video on TikTok.
  • Digital Media’s Advantages: Digital media offers several advantages over traditional media, including:
    • Accessibility: Information is readily available on various devices and platforms.
    • Interactivity: Readers can engage with content through comments, shares, and likes.
    • Immediacy:News can be disseminated quickly and efficiently.
    • Personalization: Algorithms can tailor content to individual preferences.

As a consequence and as their audience shrinks, legacy media outlets are drastically losing their ability to shape public discourse.  Social media influencers and online personalities are shaping the conversations as they build large and engaged followings. People are increasingly getting their news from different sources, leading to fragmented audiences. Very often their sources are their own echo chambers and can reinforce existing biases.

The data clearly indicates a shift in media consumption, with digital platforms taking center stage. This shift validates McLuhan’s thesis, highlighting the profound impact of the medium on how messages are received and interpreted. 

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US Presidential voting – Black women appear the most racist voters

December 19, 2024

The numbers usually tell the tale.

You don’t have to be an expert psephologist to be able to read the numbers (and of course most expert psephologists have been proven not just to be wrong but remarkably so. Prof Allan Lichtman being the unedifying example of one such unable to acknowledge his own mistakes and his ignorance).

What the exit poll numbers show quite conclusively in the US Presidential election is that black men (77/21), all blacks (86/13) and black women in particular (92/8) voted along racial lines. No other ethnic group comes close to this one-sided voting pattern. Of course there are other nuances here that do not surface through the raw numbers. Nevertheless the numbers are not wrong.

Among all other ethnic groups votes were reasonably well distributed and both candidates received over one third of the votes. Certainly the Latino vote was not skewed towards the Democrats as I had first thought it would be. However sometime before the election I realised that illegal immigration is seen very negatively by legal immigrants, both for the economic space they occupy in the country and for the threat the illegals pose to the social standing of the legal immigrants. Only among native American Indians was there a clear preference (68/31 but far from overwhelming) for one candidate (a little surprisingly for the Republicans). It seems the Democrats are no longer the party of choice for Latinos or blue collar workers.

The exit poll results suggests strongly that in practice blacks in the US – and black women in particular – are now probably the most racist ethnic groups, at least with regard to who they vote for.

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