Separatism

Separatism is a term used to describe a belief hed by a specific group of people, that is, the desire to remain separated from different groups of people. The reason, as well as the degree of the desired separateness, may vary significantly from group to group.

The main forms of separatism are cultural, racial, and religious.

Cultural Separatism[edit]

Though there are many different forms of cultural separatism, they all the same goal: preserving a certain ethnic/cultural group's culture. In some cases cultural separatism is merely a form of Christian Separatism, like the Calvinist Boers and paleoconservatives.

Racial Separatism =[edit]

Very similar to cultural separatism, but the emphasis is on race. While cultural separatists desire their ethnicity to be protected against all other cultures, regardless of race, racial separatists seek to preserve a the purity of a specific race, which may consist of many ethnic groups. It is within this category that extremist groups (some of which are known to be violent) are classified, such as the Ku Klux Klan and the Nation of Islam.

Religious Separatism[edit]

To an extent religious separatism is held by most Christians, particularly in the area of marriage, whereby a Christian should not marry a non-Christian.

However, it is especially common in Fundamentalist Christianity whereby fundamentalists do not work with other Christian groups in any realm for any reason, believing such to be a violation of Biblical standards. For example, even though fundamentalists and Catholics both view abortion as murder, due to fundamentalism's view that Roman Catholicism does not teach true Christianity, they will not partner with Catholics on this issue.