Nah. The idea of being white is the idea of roughly being from Europe ancestrally. It's true that that ancestry has been used to justify slavery and colonialism. But it makes no sense to conflate ethnic origins with an evil moral position. It's not that it's morally wrong to do so, it's just a category error.

The idea of being white is the idea that you're skin color determines your status in society — Marchesk

This is true, but I would add especially in the context of radical change. The radical change in Anglo-American culture was the rise of abolition, the end of the slave trade, and the events preceding (and following) the American Civil War.

The English ended their participation in slave trading in 1807. They didn't do this because it was unprofitable. The Anglo-American Abolition Movements began within the Quaker and Evangelical Christian groups on the grounds that slavery was un-Christian. A concern for civil and human equality followed later - quite a bit later.

"Whiteness" and "Blackness" wouldn't be so intense a concern in a settled, enforced system of slavery. Racial difference would become a hot issue once the settled enforced system of slavery was blown open and former slaves suddenly were presented as equals. Racial distinctions would now be critical in establishing a new social order.

I would guess that many Europeans--who hadn't previously thought a lot about racial and ethnic differences--suddenly became sensitive to these differences with the sudden arrival of waves of refugees. People having difficulty making accommodating too much too fast change aren't necessarily racists.

↪Marchesk Nah. The idea of being white is the idea of roughly being from Europe ancestrally. — The Great Whatever

There was an interesting lecture from the BBC Reith Lectures series on the radio -- something like 3:00 in the morning in the US. Don't remember who was speaking, but he was pointing out how "white people" pride themselves on having "European heritage" and being inheritors of "Western Civilization", while actually knowing almost nothing about it.

It's not the idea of ethnic origins, of which there are many in Europe, it's the idea of race that is the issue. The idea of being white, brown, black, red, or yellow stem from a belief of racial superiority and inferiority, which has been used to justify various political and economic policies over time which were discriminatory. This played out all over the Americas. Being white means you get to be in the higher social class. It's true that wealth matters as well, but it's been pointed out that being poor and black (or native) is always considered worse than being poor and white.

If my suspicion of what you mean is correct (upper-class narcissists), no. Otherwise, I'm not really familiar with its history or cultural usage.

My usage was deliberate though. I thought its self-important, sneering glee at the pain and suffering of others was a fitting description of thinking shallow annoyance or offence of an opponent was hilarious.

We aren't doing that. The "evilness" of white people is a description of how social relations have been expressed in our societies more or less since colonialismand after. It's not white skin that's a problem. Nor is it white enthic identity. The issue is a social advantage white people have had for a period of time, a description of a social power and dominance the white enthic group has had over others.

This is why some people say "white people can't be subject to racism" in the West. Not because people of the white ethnic group cannot be discriminated against, but because the don't live is a society which defines their ethnic identity as a second class citizen.

People who say white people can't suffer racism are (rightly) concerned that suggestioning otherwise will lead to an equivocation of the treatment of white people with those of other ethnic groups, leading to an invisibility to the latter.

We actually saw this in your post earlier. You treated racism as if it was merely a question of being unable to take pride in one's identity, as if not being able to say: "White people are the greatest people" belonged in the same catergoy as the dispossession, slavery and social inequality that constitutes our society for many people if other enthic groups.

You are right that (white)Western liberal culture views people without identity. The "free" everyman who's distinctions don't matter is the defining idea of the classical liberalism our culture has grown out of.

Part of the post-modern critique is this is a myth. Since people have their own identity, distinctions matter. In terms of our understanding and categories, the might only be a social construction, but that doesn't mean they are not real.

Earlier you pointed out that racial distinction is of great importance to the post-modern critic. This is absolutely true. They know that just saying the distinction doesn't matter does not reflect how people are treated.

Contrary to the classical liberal narrative, the post-modernist is saying that distinctions always matter, for each individual is distinct. If someone is living is a society, they need a place as a distinct person. Just saying the are "free" isn't enough. Distinction matters and we have to be careful of how our understanding of it impacts on people-- thus, the dominate group doesn't get go around proclaiming itself as the greatest, for it implies the exclusion of others from value.

It's not the idea of ethnic origins, of which there are many in Europe, it's the idea of race that is the issue. — Marchesk

It seems to me (provincial that I am) that actual races do exist side by side with race-used-as-a-vehicle-to-suppress-those-groups-and-elevate-these-groups. Blacks, after all, are black because of their recent place (last 25k years) of origin, and whites are white for the same reason. Aboriginals have been separated from other groups long enough to take on some unique characteristics. NONE of the characteristics that different groups feature are bad. The features are just different. NONE of the groups are superior in significant ways. Each group has some metabolic features (on the level of detail more than anything else) that are unique to that group -- just as males and females have metabolic differences.

Personally, I like the existence of people who look consistently different, who have characteristic skin tones, differences in hair, and so on. I think we are more interesting as different than if we were all coffee-with-cream colored with tightly curled hair.

One of the confusions that occur that make race much more problematic than it would otherwise be is that people link particular cultures to race. Black/violent; white/smart; blacks easy going; whites uptight; asians/smart; Indians/drunk, and so on. Of course these cultural stereotypes are harmful, because most blacks aren't violent. Blacks, whites, asians, and indians are all represented similarly on a distribution of basic intelligence and a long list of other variables.

It IS the case that many blacks in America do poorly in academics, from the get-go. We have good reason to think this has nothing to do with basic intelligence and everything to do with more cultural factors like the impoverished language culture of poor people (in this case, blacks). Poor people living in a culture of impoverishment do not express themselves the same way that better off people living in
a cultures of sufficiency or advantage. Poor American Black children arrive in kindergarten having heard perhaps 20-30 million fewer words spoken by parents or caregivers, and have heard far more negative and command language than children from cultures of sufficiency or advantage. These deficits appear to be lifelong -- not readily remediated after the age of 7 or 8.

Because language is formed early and is difficult to change, some people have assumed that differences in school performance was genetic. It isn't, of course. It's cultural.

The "evilness" of white people is a description of how social relations have been expressed in our societies more or less since colonialism and after. — TheWillowOfDarkness

This is why some people say "white people can't be subject to racism" in the West. Not because people of the white ethnic group cannot be discriminated against, but because the don't live is a society which defines their ethnic identity as a second class citizen. — TheWillowOfDarkness

Various European groups did not colonize other peoples to prove that they were better than colored people. They colonized other people because it was economically, militarily, and politically advantageous to subjugate other peoples and extract their wealth from them.

Many of the elites that profited from a lot of the colonialism that occurred are still in place, still benefitting from their acts of exploitation, still exploiting fresh people. It is entirely possible for the rich, white, elite to discriminate against poor, white, people -- and to do so just as viciously as they would exploit colonialised brown people.

Exploitation, colonialism, subjugation, and so forth is primarily an economic process -- not a racist, sexist, white-run social operation.

The idea of being white, brown, black, red, or yellow stem from a belief of racial superiority and inferiority, — Marchesk

No, it stems from the fact that people come from different places and look different ways based on where they come from. There would still be white, black, etc. people whether or not this were used to attribute superiority or inferiority.

You are right that (white)Western liberal culture views people without identity. The "free" everyman who's distinctions don't matter is the defining idea of the classical liberalism our culture has grown out of. — TheWillowOfDarkness

Not quite. It views white people as without identity. Although the moderate right does evoke the 'colorblind' position.

It views everyone without identity. Everyone is invisible, which is how the myth functions. It doesn't matter if you are black, white, rich, poor, gay, straight, trans, etc., etc., any person is thought to be a free individual who can do anything. It is the "colourblind (and everything else too)" position. The are no issues or problems because everyone is considered a priori equal and the same to everyone else. An imagined freedom and equality, rather than a lived one.

No doubt this is not what people think in practice. They think about identity the time, including white identity ("European heritage" ), but it's not what registers in understanding of society.

Not at all. Identity politics is a driving force in modern Western politics, and is being exported to the rest of the world.

For sure. Do you think that makes it any better? Are native americans meant to take solace that they were disposed of their lands, had their cultures destroyed and a genocide committed against because the powerful white Americans just want to get richer, rather than prove the superiority of the white race( though that happened too, as an excuse to exploit other ethnicities for resources)?

Let me put in terms you might understand. What do you think has a greater "racist" impact? A cabal sitting around talking about how they will "prove" white people are superior and plotting instances of deliberate hate crime to rally people to their cause? Or an economic vision of manifest destiny which sees entire cultures and its people wiped out? How can you say that the deliberate killing of someone for their ethnicity is "racist," but then turn around and say that the dispossession and genocide of entire ethnic groups is not "racist" just because it was done to make someone richer? I mean the latter is the former multiplied by the thousand if not million.

Racism isn't about intention. It's about effect.

No, it stems from the fact that people come from different places and look different ways based on where they come from. There would still be white, black, etc. people whether or not this were used to attribute superiority or inferiority. — The Great Whatever

But there wouldn't be white, black , etc racial categories. Those were invented during the colonial era. There is no scientific evidence for a "white" race, anymore than there is for a "red" or "yellow" one. In fact, it's absurd on the face of it.

Consider, who belongs to the "brown" race? Mexicans, Arabs, Indians? That's three very distinct groups from different geographical locations. Who all is "black"? Do you count Aborigenes? What color are Polynesians? Are Eskimos "redskins"? Are Siberians or Hindus "yellow"?

There are no such races. It's a complete myth.

But there wouldn't be white, black , etc racial categories. Those were invented during the colonial era. There is no scientific evidence for a "white" race, anymore than there is for a "red" or "yellow" one. In fact, it's absurd on the face of it. Were Eskimos, Cherokee and tribes from the Amazon all part of one "redskin" race? Are Hindus "yellow"? Are Native Siberians? — Marchesk

What exactly do you think is absurd? That there are ethnic groups? I seriously don't know what you're trying to say here, nor how protesting that classifications of things can be made along different lines changes anything.

Anyway, science has disavowed the notion of race. There is one species of homo sapien consisting of many ethnic groups, none of which are white, black or brown, or any other color, although the amount of skin pigmentation, eye color, kinds of hair follicles, nose size, average height, etc all vary amongst them. — Marchesk

What are you even saying here? There is one race, but they vary along a ton of physical dimensions that has to do with where they come from. Okay, so how is that different from race? If you don't want to use the word 'race' for political reasons, whatever. But you're being incoherent right now. Would it make you feel more comfortable to say there are different ethnic groups? And that these vary in greater or lesser details roughly in correlation to their native homelands? But if you agree with that (and you would have to be delusional on an unbelievable scale not to), what exactly are you even arguing about?

A mystery regarding white people: if there's no such thing as them, how do they keep causing all the world's problems? How can everything be the fault of people who don't exist?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=453&v=s1SaD-gSZO4

Or another riddle: if there are no white people, how is it possible for white people to hate themselves so much?

I can't believe Trump won?!

And now there is a republican majority in the house and senate.

The one thing that will probably happen is they will do both supply side and Keynesian economics at the same time.

They will cut taxes and increase government spending, Trump is already talking about infrastructure stimulus.

I wish republicans understood that doing both stimulus and tax cuts is what, in reality, bloats deficits.
You would think this should be obvious and of some concern to them considering how much they complain when democrats fail to fix their mistakes quickly enough.

Pick one or the other, but tax cuts and stimulus is wrong economics.

Marchesk, please tell me where you begin to disagree:

1) There are different groups of people who originated in different parts of the world.
2) These groups of people, due to breeding with those close to them, have differing physical features that are easily recognizable.
3) These groups are all different from each other, but they are more different from those who originated yet farther away from them.
4) One's belonging to one of these groups has serious implications for the sort of identity politics one can engage in, in the Western World.

Okay, so how is that different from race? If you don't want to use the word 'race' for political reasons, whatever. — The Great Whatever

I've never denied ethnicity. I've denied the concept of race based on skin color. The idea that an entire continent of people could be considered belonging to the same racial group, or that it's even meaningful to say that there are such racial groups, because their skin color is similar.

So you're denying that people who descended from European ancestors are part of a group? What do you mean by 'racial group,' and how does that differ from 'ethnic group?'

So you're denying that people who descended from European ancestors are part of a group? What do you mean by 'racial group,' and how does that differ from 'ethnic group?' — The Great Whatever

There part of many different groups, migrating in and out, fighting and conquering one another across an entire continent over thousands of years. You wouldn't claim that all Asians or Africans belong to a single racial group, would you?

Yes, there were many groups, which were more closely related to their neighbors than those farther away. This correlates with physical traits, the most obvious of which is skin tone.

If Europeans don't form a genetic group, how is it possible that genetic testing can trace your ancestry to its place of origin, including Europe?

Are you denying that people who originated from places closer on the globe have a greater genetic similarity to each other? If so, that's clearly absurd; but if not, I don't understand what you take yourself to be denying in distinguishing 'race' from 'ethnicity.'

Yes, by and large, European people have a common genetic ancestry in virtue of originating from the same continent. This does not mean that they are all the same, or that all Africans are the same, or anything like that.

1) There are different groups of people who originated in different parts of the world.
2) These groups of people, due to breeding with those close to them, have differing physical features that are easily recognizable.
3) These groups are all different form each other, but they are more different from those who originated yet farther away from them.
4) One's belonging to one of these groups has serious implications for the sort of identity politics one can engage in, in the Western World. — The Great Whatever

1). They didn't originate there, unless it's sub-Saharan Africa, but okay, their ancestors lived there long enough to adapt.

2). To the extent it's passing genes on and not a common adaptation across multiple groups, sure. That said, do you believe that the entire continent interbred?

3). Does the science back this up? Are you sure that any given Scandinavia is more similar genetically to any Frenchman than a Korean?

4) The reason for identity politics is a reaction to the result of racial categorizations during Colonialism.

3). Does the science back this up? Are you sure that any given Scandinavia is more similar genetically to any Frenchman than a Korean? — Marchesk

OK, I legitimately can't tell. Are you serious?

Yes, by and large, European people have a common genetic ancestry in virtue of originating from the same continent. This does not mean that they are all the same, or that all Africans are the same, or anything like that. — The Great Whatever

But you wouldn't say the same about Asia, right, considering that Hindus, Chinese, Siberians and natives of Paupa Guinea vary considerably? Just as you don't think of Arabs when mentioning blacks. So what makes Europe different? That it's too small to have large enough differences? That they're all closely enough related such that they can be lumped into one racial category? Because Portuguese and Ukrainians are so much alike?

...Yes, the Portguguese and Ukranians are genetically related, not as closely as the Spanish and Portuguese, and more closely to each other than the Portuguese and Zulu. I don't get what is so hard about this.

And no I wouldn't say that about all Asians, because I never said there was a 'one ethnic group' or 'one race' per continent rule. It just so happens that a certain group of people were by and large established on a certain continent. That you would think that because there are other continents (the definition of 'continent' being arbitrary anyway) that have a larger ethnic diversity in them, whether because of size or whatever, this is somehow negated, this baffles me.

Regardless of whether we can meaningfully categorize a large geographical population into one super ethnic group, that doesn't change the origin of doing so based on skin color, whose goal was to justify a social order where ethnic groups considered to be white had the power in society. That's the role of whiteness in Western civilization, and it hasn't gone away just because we've become more sensitive about treating people equally.

Also, it doesn't change the historical fact that Europeans didn't consider themselves belonging to a continent spanning racial category called white until rather recently (and there's always been a dispute over which ethnicities from Europe get to be called white).

I suspect not, at least in the sense you're thinking.

In terms of identity though, yes. Race and ethnicity are both categories or discourse, as opposed to the presence of either a cultural practice or a particular genome. We may say that, for example, that someone of Korean descent living in France has no less belonging to the category of Frenchman than either a Scandinavian or a Frenchman of European descent.

Genetics do not constitute our understanding of someone beginning to a particular category. It's just, to borrow from similar analysis on sex and gender, the body. The identity categories we use, they are our understanding, our sorting of people within our conceptual frameworks, no matter how many "factual" markers (e.g. skin color, genetics, genitals, chromosomes, etc.,etc.) we happen to use.

OK, but 'white' means roughly 'of European descent.' To be of European descent is not a social construct, nor is it somehow equivalent to evil ethical positions. To suggest that until a couple hundred years ago people were unaware of the fact that people from Europe were more closely related to each other than those on other continents (or that Scandinavians might be more closely related to Koreans than the French...?) is obviously crazy, as is the suggestion that skin color didn't form part of that understanding. FFS, the Edomites were singled out for their 'red' skin explicitly, and they were next door neighbors to the Judeans.

Race and ethnicity are both categories or discourse — TheWillowOfDarkness

What does this even mean? Does it mean that we talk about them? Okay, yes we do. But that is a weird way of saying that.

Does it mean that ethnicity is literally somehow made out of words or constituted by discourse? Okay, it's obviously not. So why would you say it?

Does it mean that ethnicity is literally somehow made out of words or constituted by discourse? — The Great Whatever

Yes, it does. Particular experiences, to be entirely accurate. Ethnic identity is only our thoughts and words. If people, for example, thought of black people as white people, then within our categories they would be "white."

Bodies remain what they are (e.g. white skin and black skin) obviously, but that runs on a different axis. It's a descriptive discourse of someone's bodily trait, which doesn't carry with it belonging to a particular discourse of identity. To say someone belongs within a category because of their skin (e.g. a white person has the identity of "white" and a black person has the identity of "black") is entirely a social construction, our moulding of the meaning of an individual within our community that is parasitic on states we have observed (and many then falsely proclaims that identity is defined by the existence of those bodily states).