Define race--because now I'm confused

What is race?

If a black man acts white and says he's white---what race is he?

If a hispanic looks Mexican, but was born in the U.S and has a European name---is he white? Or is he hispanic. And if he looks racially hispanic but is a "white" hispanic does this mean he is as diabolical as a caucasion? Or could he be as victimized as a hispanic depending on the situation?

How fluid this race thing has gotten!

If a president is half black and half white--is he white? Or black? Or does he get to choose that according to what brings the most political power?

If a Cherokee Indian looks Indian, has a father who is Cherokee Indian but he says he's white and the media says he's white----which is it?

Suddenly I'm seeing race as so vague a term....that it can be twisted to be used for any political purpose under the sun.

To me a race is a race--physical characteristics derived from genetic heritage.

I'm curious to hear thoughts.


Thread started at Forum 4 Politics on 04-08-2012 02:28 PM

 

its about percentages
culture plays a important role in the behavior of that person race, if your a black male and your a engineer say and follows the white European culture more like whites say more, then that behavior of his past old culture of africa then he has change with time of that guys race, because he now has put his older culture and behaviors in the back of his mind.
now if your a new black panther say, you are going to like to stay in your original culture, thus your race is african behavior like, so your more percentagally into your race

 

just to add the new world order focuses on elimination of all cultures especially any alpha male old European dominate ones, why? because there more independent minded , and that threatens its power structure it has gain in the past 50 years.

 

Alpha male? What nonsense to read, or more importantly, what machista sentence I have to read. We are not animals we are humans, not wolf packs.

Elimination all cultures? What nonsense are you saying.

 

As good a definition as any I guess. There has never been any real concept of stability or clear boundaries between racial groups, especially with ever increasing population movement over the past couple of centuries.

After all, you talk of Hispanic as a race yet that's a relatively recent development, mixing European (largely Spanish and Portuguese) with native South Americans (neither of which necessarily comprised of a single racial group in the first place). Similarly, "black" and "white" don't really describe single identifiable racial groups and, especially in the USA, will in fact be quite diluted genetically (with various parts of Europe, Africa, North and South America and East Asian in the mix).

Biologically, it probably isn't all that important. Politically it seems to have become so but for no good reason as far as I can see.

 

Race is a myth. We're all human beings with different cultures.

 

Take a DNA Test ...

 

Oohhhh, okay then. Race exists to me personally and I tend to dislike black "people." You probably don't know what black "people" are because "race is a myth" to you, so you should probably disregard my opinion, but one thing you must NEVER ever do is call me a "racist" because to you "race is a myth" and so is racism.

 

I was under the impression you were not religious. What scientific evidence exists that shows humans are not animals?

This link is to a interactive website that explains race.
http://www.pbs.org/race/001_WhatIsRace/001_00-home.htm

 

I believe your logic is flawed. If race does not exist to him then he should never be called a racist. Why would someone need justification to call you something? When you do such a fine job of showing an illusion of superiority.

 

Such people's logic is so often flawed, one shouldn't be surprised to see it again so in this circumstance.

 

It's always been fluid and rather arbitrary. Race really just comes down to people's perceptions of Us and Them. The genetic differences between different groups of humans are really trivial. In fact, humans have very low genetic diversity compared to other species, which is part of the reason there's speculation that humans may have suffered a near extinction event in the geologically recent past. And often the genetic lineages do not line up with things like skin color that we normally use to assign race. For example, I was watching a TV program a while back about the National Geographic's Genographic Project ( https://genographic.nationalgeographic.com/genographic/journey.html ) where they brought a large group of New Yorkers together who had had their genomes analyzed and were discussing their ancestor's journeys. At one point, they had the people stand in different areas representing their genetic lineages. And there was this big black guy with very dark skin standing with the Europeans.

For that matter, if you look at the history of how people perceive race, you'll see it shift like a chameleon. A few centuries ago, people would have looked at you funny if you'd talked about a "European race." Even as tight a group as the English are actually a mix of Saxons, Angles, Jutes, Danes, Norwegians, and French. With a few Roman and Celtic strains thrown in for good measure.

And Zook, I generally prefer the term "bigot" to "racist" since to me there's really no difference between hatred based on perceived race and hatred based on anything else. So I will indeed disregard your opinion and I won't call you a racist. But you do make yourself sound like a bigot.

 

And if some "human beings" have not any culture?

 

Culture is a pretty basic thing. Great apes (including non-humans), cetaceans, and some birds all have culture. I have a hard imagining what it would mean to talk about a human without any culture at all, possibly except for if you're talking about someone with extremely severe mental disabilities...

 

Each of the major divisions of humankind, having distinct physical, and biological characteristics.

Contrary to what liberals say, there are major differences between races besides culture.

For better or for worse.

 

To what humans are you referring?

http://anthro.palomar.edu/culture/culture_1.htm

 

Not unless by "humankind" you mean hominids in general, not just H. sapiens. It's just plain flat out not true that there are major biological differences between different groups of H. sapiens. The overt physical characteristics that we normally associate with race (such as skin color) are extremely malleable, and simply do not line up with haplogroups and genetic lineages. I already told you about the dark skinned African looking guy who turned out to belong to a European lineage. Going to the other extreme, in southeast Asia there are two main haplogroups present, who actually are pretty distantly related. And yet there's no way to tell them apart just by looking at them.

 

The topic is slightly more complicated than a dictionary can explain.


Do you have evidence that humans are more diverse than other similar species? How many races of chimpanzee or orangutans exist? Is a liberal someone who disagrees with you?

 

Race is not a myth. There are 3 races:
1. Caucasian
2. Negroid
3. Asian

Hispanic is a contrived word in an attempt to mean Spanish, but true Spaniards take offense when a Mexican or other calls themselves Spanish. Our country is so "diverse" that we have lost sight of our originality.

 

so Geneticists are liberals?...that's surprising to know here I thought they were objective scientists, who knew!

 

If you're talking genetics then you're right. There aren't many genetic differences. However the way that the genes are EXPRESSED is more important than the amount of genetic difference. There is a significant difference in human and chimp gene expression and patterns, not the genes themselves. Small alterations in a single gene, FOX2P, is probably the main reason humans are capable of speech and chimps are not. Small changes have ENORMOUS consequences.

A 2% difference in human and chimp genome produces such extraordinary physical and mental differences, small differences in Races also have important results.

(Part of that is a copypasta but it was worded so adequately, I just felt like using it.)

No, but liberals are in large to blame for spread of the the"race doesn't exist" lie.

There are exceptions to every rule. Doesn't make the rule invalid. If what you were saying is true, then every country would be mixed with different characteristics and the cases you just described would be extremely commonplace. The bottom line is that there are many differences between races or ethnicity, or whatever word you want to use. I personally think of all humans being part of one species and the different "races" are subspecies.

 

1.Caucasoids

2.Negroids

3.Mongoloids
Would be the 3 major races. I personal do not like going by 17th century science if you call it that. You can break down to hundreds of other races as well if you seek to further "divide and rule." At the time it was no more than a excuse for the mistreatment of the supposedly inferior races.

Would be the three major races if you

 

If you are a Hispanic with a white last name who shoots a black teen and the race-baiters, media, and president mistake your for a white then you are white because the race-baiters, media, and president cant be wrong.

 

It was misused to justify horrible acts. Doesn't make it any less true.

 

Our technology is far more advanced now than the 17th century even then there was not universal acceptance. Today experts seem to agree that the concept is flawed.

As JH Relethford writes "Race is a concept of the human mind, not of nature."

An exerpt from the link I will post below:

" We are a extremely homogenous species genetically, as a matter of fact, all humans today are 99.9% genetically identical, and most of the variation that does occur is the difference between male and female and our unique personal traits. Even our closest relatives the chimpanzees have 2-3 times more genetic variations than people. Orangutans have 8-10 times more variation."

http://anthro.palomar.edu/ethnicity/ethnic_1.htm

I doubt many liberals would claim me. I am very independent I only represent my own views.