Dig this handy racial classification chart shared on Twitter.
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| "I am angry beyond words. My 3 year old grandson whose dad is a high ranking military officer, just started pre school at a military sponsored program. Click to see the racist chart they made on day one. Parents, please wake up and act before our kids & nation are ruined for good!" |
A while back, I pondered what might be the best way to do racial classification.
Who is white? Without an objective definition, we can't effectively choose up sides. For example, I know a young lady who is half-black. Is she white? She doesn't have a lot of stereotypical black features. If her husband is white, will her children be white? After all, they will be a quarter black. Perhaps we should consult one of my favorite infographics of all time, the Nazi racial chart from the Nuremberg Race Laws.
What if we decide that black and white refer strictly to skin color? We could then be issued color swatches to use when classifying our neighbors and coworkers. Imagine the fun we'd have, whipping out the swatches and holding them up against foreheads, arms, legs and scapula. We'd all look like a load of Nazi researchers. Yes, again with the Reich, but, hey, if you're going to obsess about race, why not learn from the master race?
Really, how else are you going to do it, short of taking DNA samples? That would be more precise, but who's going to pay for them? If we shell out that kind of dough, we might have to fire a diversity coordinator to make up the difference*. No, the color swatches are the best way to go.
I guess I should take back all those snarky blog posts about the left having almost no practical knowledge.
* - Oh, who am I kidding? We'd just print more money. Duh.
Who is white?
ReplyDeleteWhoever gets treated as being white by the teachers, police, baristas, employers, etc.
=> LeBron James is white.
ReplyDeleteK T Cat,
ReplyDeletePerhaps he is, at this point. Michael Jordan as well. Not so much when they were growing up, though. Those scars last a lifetime.
ReplyDeleteFrom everything we are seeing in the news lately, being treated as white by a teacher or barista is the opposite of the point you are implying, OB.
I was watching a pulp top 10 list history channel TV show last night. The ones with the overly dramatic voice over guy and "experts" talking about things or people. It was Top 10 dictators of the ancient world, something like that. Ceaser, Celopatra, Niro, Ramsis II, the first emperor of China, Alexander the Great. So take this with that in mind.
The show said that 1 in 200 men (I don't know why they said men) have direct linage back to Genghis Khan (who was number 1 by the way).
Perhaps the most absurd thing about that color swatch chart is that if we’d done that when I was kid in Ohio, at the start of the school year (end of summer) I would be between the fourth and third ones from the left. Then by the time the school year (winter) ended I’d have faded to either the third from right or right most (that kinda pink one between them would never be me). Anyways, that would imply that my identity varies with the seasons.
ReplyDeleteAlso, here in San Diego, where my swatch varies between the two middle ones, and with my mustache, it is not an uncommon event for someone to come up to me and speak Spanish. Apparently, they think I’m Hispanic and are treating me as such. Does that mean that I *AM* Hispanic?
Mostly Nothing,
ReplyDeleteFrom everything we are seeing in the news lately, being treated as white by a teacher or barista is the opposite of the point you are implying, OB.
I believe that says more about your sources of news than anything else.
The show said that 1 in 200 men (I don't know why they said men) have direct linage back to Genghis Khan (who was number 1 by the way).
Sounds like a prolific guy.
Perhaps the most absurd thing about that color swatch chart is that if we’d done that when I was kid in Ohio, at the start of the school year (end of summer) I would be between the fourth and third ones from the left. Then by the time the school year (winter) ended I’d have faded to either the third from right or right most (that kinda pink one between them would never be me). Anyways, that would imply that my identity varies with the seasons.
Also, here in San Diego, where my swatch varies between the two middle ones, and with my mustache, it is not an uncommon event for someone to come up to me and speak Spanish.
Interesting. Does it bother you, or motivate you to learn/improve your Spanish? Just curious, no judgement implied.
Apparently, they think I’m Hispanic and are treating me as such. Does that mean that I *AM* Hispanic?
Is there more to 'being Hispanic' than being treated as if you are Hispanic by other people (including parents, other relatives, etc.) over the course of your life?
OB, if I were you, I'd drop the whole "news source" angle. It doesn't work for you, particularly when you talk about how Hispanics are treated to a bunch of San Diegans or people who lived in San Diego. The races are so mixed through friendship and marriage around here that if you're Hispanic and are treated badly, it's because you're a jerk.
ReplyDeleteK T Cat,
ReplyDeletePerhaps you missed this, but the comment I responded to started with, "From everything we are seeing in the news lately,...", which certainly puts news sources into play.
Maybe you meant to type MN, and putting in OB was just a typo? Perhaps you're just looking to criticize me more than someone you feel you agree with?
MN - Your comment about one in 200 men are related to Genghis Khan tickled my memory. It finally bubbled up. They can easily trace this to men only, because they are comparing the Y chromosomes, which obviously go through the paternal line. There is a book I read (long ago) called Adam’s Curse by Bryan Sykes where he says that they had looked at Y’s all over the region of Khan’s empire and quoted that one Y accounted for 8% of the Y’s. They then attributed that Y to Khan after they determined that that line has been spreading for about a millennia and Khan had a practice when conquering that he got all the “pretty” [Sykes’ word] women. Anyways 8% in that region could easily convert to 0.5% world-wide.
ReplyDeleteNote that Bryan Sykes also wrote the “Seven Daughters of Eve” where he describes that all the women in the world can be traced back to only 7 women. That is done using mitochondrial DNA which comes through the egg, so hence it is entirely maternal line.
Ohioan, Ah, that makes sense, I hadn't thought about the difference between a man and a woman. Thanks.
ReplyDelete