Shhh... this gets in the way of a multi-billion dollar company being able to virtue signal to its customers, which in turn allows them to virtue signal.

I've mostly been under the impression that Neanderthals were superior to humans in strength, intelligence, social structure, etc.. but humans required less energy to hunt / gather and hence survived resource bottlenecks much better (to the point that Neanderthals went extinct). Adaptability is paramount for a species to survive the long game.

Are there not a number of animals that can interbreed but are clearly not the same species? A number come to mind that produce sterile offspring like Tiger/Lion or Horse/Donkey ... perhaps there are additional examples where the children are fertile?