Race has zero relation to all of what is "other",
@BlueJay.
The concept of race also quickly breaks down if one begins tracing the lineages of various species across time, even human beings, and is while a physical result of the evolutionary process in progress toward adaptation to environments that becomes actual evolution, and so has no correlation to therianthropy or similar. Even regular human perceptions of organisms are often wildly inaccurate because they are so temporally insignificant, humans having existed all too briefly and having all too limited of a concept of how the fourth dimension in time actually functions. An example of this is the cheetah, often thought of as an exclusively African species and iconic of the savannah, which really has its origins in North America hundreds of thousands of years ago. It persists in its modern extent in Africa solely because of the change of the planet over the last major interglacial period, what is often referred to as the "Ice Age", where it largely migrated out of that habitat in following its prey over countless generations to where its modern incarnation is now because the planet has been undergoing a steady process of warming back to its normal climate. This is, in fact, why Africa is the last continent on the entire planet which contains megafauna left over from this period even, which people scarcely know, let alone comprehend. Point being, race is extremely asynchronous with species which are not humans.
As
@RowanWolf noted too, no one chooses their "kintype", either one simply
is that thing regardless of their opinion of it, or they are not that thing and thus are not in this case, "kin" to it. It is not an elective process any more than one's own race in this lifetime, at least not in the earthly sense. If one is a zebra but comes from the Pacific, is that any less valid? Not at all, no less valid than if one was born in Taiwan yet is of African descent. It is non-elective in either case, just as no one chooses to be in this life man or woman, blonde or brunette, islander or mainlander, rich or poor, at least so far as psychological perspectives can go. Many spiritual systems do say one, in the spirit, chooses who and what they wish to be to experience in this life, or are sent into a life to live to do these things, but of these things so too nothing can be definite about them, thus the argument is a non-argument; no one can say positive or negative against.
This all raises a question then if one is not "otherkin" but something else and electively chooses to be say, said zebra, is it then racist? The question then becomes, "Is one biasing
for or
against that decision based on racial conceptions?" If so, it may have undertones of racism, for recall it is favoritism for or against a race depending on how it is expressed. But is it inherently racist, in the stereotypical negative aspect we all imagine? Perhaps, perhaps not, that is an ethical debate that will likely never be settled. It might one day be found that being infatuated with a certain culture, society, race, or so on is outright negative or maybe it is not, but in this instance, is one being negligent and disrespectful in the process? If not, and one has done no harm and intends no harm, then there is no malice and thus no issue.