Like many other browns I know, my name seems to bring out the worst in other people. When I taught elementary school in Brooklyn, an older colleague insisted on calling me “Ms. R.” “I don’t mean to offend,” he explained, “but if I try saying your last name, I know I’ll just sound silly.” Well, now you just sound like an idiot, I thought. A similar encounter occurred during my first week of graduate school, when the Dean approached me and introduced herself. I told her my name, and she asked, “Why couldn’t your parents just name you Molly or Jane?” Yes, I know, Naina Ramajayan…so difficult to pronounce, that even I just call myself ‘The N.’ It’s all pretty ironic, actually; considering that I’m a southie Hindu, my name is about as simple as it gets.
Thankfully, the baggage that comes with my name is fairly harmless, and I’m able to laugh it off. No one has ever looked at my name and suggested that I be targeted for homeland security. Some of my friends from college, however, haven’t been as lucky. When my friend Rahul Shah introduced himself to his co-worker a while ago, she responded, “Like, as in, the Shah of Iran, that Holocaust denier?” (Oh yes, she did.) Another friend felt pressured to start using his middle name at work because his boss joked that his first name, Amit, sounded like ‘Ahmed.’ And so what if does? “Dude,” he explained, “Three of the 9-11 hijackers were named Ahmed.” Amit, Ahmed, Shah, Iran…looks like the code is finally getting cracked.
I used to think these issues concerning names were a burden only for us brown people. But then I learned that Senator Barack Obama of Illinois is in a similar predicament. CNN did a nice story a few weeks ago (you can view the clip here) on the “controversy” surrounding the Senator’s name. Since Obama rhymes with Osama, Barack rhymes with Iraq (and Chirac), and Hussein is his middle name, he’s evidently a newly-discovered threat to the United States. After watching that clip, I felt guilty for thinking my buddy Amit was just being paranoid of his boss all these years. In fact, now I’m even more paranoid than I ever was before. Of rampant stupidity, that is. Aasif Mandvi appeared on the Daily Show on Tuesday night to bring his perspective on Obama-Osama-gate.
My favorite line: Aasif Mandvi? Yikes, I sound like trouble. People, keep your eye on me.
Jokes aside, I have to wonder: if Barack’s name — or any of our names, for that matter — rhymed with McVeigh, Rudolph, or Kaczynski, would any of this even be a topic of discussion?
America needs to get most of immigrants from the country of Japan. Japan is 1st world country but its population is too big for the size of the country.
Past immigrants from Japan of done the best job of intergrating then any other immigrants other group.
“Its obscenely selfish to suck in the scarce resources of an impoverished, backward country like India for the marginal benefit of a wealthy, advanced nation like America that has far more of said resource.”
That’s a valid point, and when India finally ditches socialist policies in favor of free-market ones, more of its high-IQ people will stay home. It does seem weird to have so many Indian doctors in the U.S. when India is so underserved.
I don’t think Christianity alone is enough to tie a nation together, agreed. But Sailer is right that is has some binding power. Citing Christian vs. Christian wars doesn’t negate that point.
Try and think rationally. If nationalism, religion, ideology, caste, class etc override genetic similarity, as history and current events tell us, how the heck can you and Dawkin’s claim its a “law” that genetic similarity is the prime motivator of human behaviour?
You would think that Steve Sailer would have learned something from the Thirty Years War which pitted christian catholics and christian protestants against each other and resulted in one-third of all german-speakers in Europe being wiped out, before talking of “Christist nationalism”. Besides, the United States was founded as a rejection of such theocratic tendencies: the prominent Founders of America weren’t even christians, they were Deists who insisted strongly on the separation between church and state.
Catholicism in the United States is Protestantized; large numbers of Mexicans convert to Protestant sects within two generations of their arrival. One simply need create in popular consciousness that value judgment good American equals Protestant Christian. When the Air Force academy Christianized extensively, it created a tumult of objections, but sailer cites to the success of their football team as an example.
Similarly you would think that Sailer would have learned from the jewish Holocaust that “high IQ immigrants” aren’t necessarily assimilable. Besides, unlike the intelligent ashkenazi jews who were unassimilable in Germany, Poland, Russia etc, indians are tested as being well below the global average in IQ
Au contraire – the intermarriage rate for Jews was 50% at the team of cristallnacht. One might argue that excess assimilation led to German resentment
High IQ people are therefore a scarce resource in India. Its obscenely selfish to suck in the scarce resources of an impoverished, backward country like India for the marginal benefit of a wealthy, advanced nation like America that has far more of said resource.
No argument here. I hope that highly qualified Indians stay in India.
I didn’t read through the 300+ comments… I know of a Gurchristopher. I don’t even know why the parents bothered with the Gur, it just makes the name a mockery of…..names. Also, there used to be a Rachbinder in my elementary school – we called him “fender bender” and it’s STILL funny to me when I think about it.
That is all.
Oh yeah, and one time I knew a girl who used to have a very long last name… on the first day of grade 1, the teacher said to her “That’s a very big name for such a little girl” and she cried all the way home. Her dad felt bad and officially had their last name changed the next day to something much shorter and easier to pronounce. When I heard that story I sort of did feel as if her dad had “sold out” instead of teaching his daughter to be proud of her last name and her heritage. Last names especially come with a great deal of history.
But then again, I’ve never had an especially long name or a hard to pronounce one so I guess I don’t know what sort of trauma that could carry.
That is all, for real this time.
Yet another strike against your thesis that “we aim to help those whose DNA is most like our own”. Give it up WhiteGuy, Dawkin’s gene-centric world view is blinkered nonsense.
Door writes:
“If nationalism, religion, ideology, caste, class etc override genetic similarity, as history and current events tell us…”
Well, nationalism is an expression of genetic affinity on a national scale. Ideology didn’t override genetic similarity in what’s now the former Soviet Union — the ethnic Russians fled Estonia, Kazakhstan, and other former ssr republics in large numbers for Mother Russia. And I think it’s a big “probably not” as to whether multicultural ideology is enough to bind a multiethnic America together.
Re your point on the doctors thing — again, you’re presenting a clear case that supports Dawkins’ Selfish Gene theory as an argument against it. Why do smart people from India move to the U.S. to become doctors? Because they can make more money here — and support their families better. That’s right in line with Dawkins. True, they are leaving behind their larger genetic family (tribe/nation), but that consideration keeps some of them at home, and instills in those who do make the trip a desire to retain their culture in meaningful ways (eg the naming debate we’ve been having here), the key point being that they hope their kids marry other South Asians, because such a marriage will increase the chances of their own (the doctors who immigrated) DNA patterns being thrust forward into the future. If they could make as much money in India as they could in the US, 95%+ would stay home.
I think you oughta read the book before we go any further, you’re claiming to have debunked one of the great scientists of our time (he was even on South Park!) while you’re failing to understand basic points about what he said. And quit calling him “Dawkin” BTW, it’s “Dawkins”.
Whitey
Razib – #12
Was that at U of Minnesota. I knew a chem prof who said the exact same thing. His name was Raj Suryanarayanan
victimized WhiteGuy:
Only problem. “whiteness” is not exclusively a function of DNA composition, rather a large component is socially defined. The irish weren’t considered white when they emigrated, did they some how transform their DNA to gain acceptance? No, it was a social transformation. So please, spare me the “everyone else does it too” line of thinking. Even if you’re argument is correct, it doesn’t rectify or even morally justify the history of the regions that were mentioned.
I didn’t even know who Howard Zinn or Noam Chomsky or Tim Wise or James Loewen was until I left college. Are you trying to reclaim champion for bullsh*t assumption of the week? It’s not fair though, with your “ethnic” background, you have an unfair advantage.
HA I hope it was directed at me. It’s pretty much how you ended our previous discussion.
“Only problem. “whiteness” is not exclusively a function of DNA composition, rather a large component is socially defined. The irish weren’t considered white when they emigrated, did they some how transform their DNA to gain acceptance?”
Well, you’ve certainly read your Ignatiev! I’m sure Scarlett O’Hara would’ve been surprised to learn that she wasn’t white in the antebellum South.
White isn’t a precise category, but neither is brown, and I still need to type it in every time I comment here. Show me 10 Swedes, 10 Italians, 10 Austrians, 10 Nigerians, 10 Liberians, 10 Kenyans, 10 Japanese, 10 Chinese, 10 Koreans, 10 Gujaratis, 10 Keralans, and 10 Tamils. I will amazingly score 99%+ on putting them into the nonexistent groups white, black, brown, and yellow. I will not score anywhere close to 100% within each of those groups. Externally, then, the groups have meaning — not perfect meaning, but meaning.
And the internal, we are finding out, mirrors the external. Here’s a post on this:
http://infoproc.blogspot.com/
scroll down one post to:
Thursday, January 04, 2007 Metric on the space of genomes and the scientific basis for race
HMF: Your professors lied to you, man. Race exists.
What you’re telling me is you can follow socially constructed norms as to what defines white, black, brown yellow. Whop-de-do. The post you quoted dealt more with whether racial differences were superficial in nature or rather implied deeper differences. No one denies race’s existence, but I contend it’s existence began in an American context, in the 1600s for the purpose of distinguishing people on American soil who were of European descent and non-European descent.
HMF — here is a famous NYT piece that explains the reality of race:
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/14/opinion/14leroi.html?ex=1268456400&en=b3dac786e0583b4e&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt
“What you’re telling me is you can follow socially constructed norms as to what defines white, black, brown yellow. Whop-de-do. The post you quoted dealt more with whether racial differences were superficial in nature or rather implied deeper differences. No one denies race’s existence, but I contend it’s existence began in an American context, in the 1600s for the purpose of distinguishing people on American soil who were of European descent and non-European descent.”
No, what I’m telling you is that the concepts of race are somewhat fuzzy around the edges, but both meaningful and hard-wired, i.e. not primarily socially constructed but rather geneticlly derived.
The categories of race began when humanity had gotten to travel around the world enough to see the extremely obvious differences among peoples who’d spent the past few tens of thousands of years evolving in different environments, in response to different selection pressures. It has nothing to do with America per se; the differences are so clear, important, and interesting that they were noticed before the Pilgrims ever hit Plymouth Rock.
yawn
“It has nothing to do with America per se; the differences are so clear, important, and interesting that they were noticed before the Pilgrims ever hit Plymouth Rock.”
Sorry, I misspoke, whiteness is what “I contend it’s existence began in an American context, in the 1600s for the purpose of distinguishing people on American soil who were of European descent and non-European descent.” Whiteness hit the Native Americans the same time Plymouth Rock did.
HMF,
Evidently early European settlers noticed racial differences between themselves and the indigenous peoples they found in the New World. But so were racial differences noticed and commented upon by Marco Polo when he visited China, and Arab traders when they visited the southeastern coast of Africa, and Arab Scholars when they traveled through barbarian Europe. The differences are so clear that no one would have been able to overlook them, and so interesting and important that no one could have failed to comment on them. There is no reason to selectively claim that early Americans noticed this before anyone else.
You really do seem to selectively stick it to whitey, pointing out traits everyone exhibits but only holding European feet to the fire.
I posted 319, typed in wrong thing!
Whitey O’Whiterstein
In the US, I contend it was more than an innocous “noticing” That is, the socialized creation of the “white race” in America had, and continues to have severe implications on equity and dispersion of resources in this country. It’s interesting, the thesis set forth by the NYT article, but it’s all in hindsight.
The key is, in the US, race has meant something other than what alleles you have. Yes, skin pigment is a salient feature, observable immediately, just as other facial features are – but show me some precedent here. Where else were people included into a race by active decisions they made collectively?
If you look at history, you will see the browns and blacks never ever ruled over whites, heck not even invaded. But whites still seem to think all the brown and blacks are out to get them.
european countries are notoriously nationalistic; how many times have you heard brits complaining about smelly french people or spaniards complaining about drunken brits? the lines of nationalism, religion, gender and racism border very closely, but the point is that they are all used to divide and conquer. why do you think european nations are only now exploring the rhetoric of multiculturalism?
if nationalism is genetic affinity on a national scale, well then, thanks, you can tell that to my US passport.
I have to go, guys. Briefly — MyTake, agreed, but it’s reasonable to guess that Indians and Africans would have attacked Europe if they’d had the ability and tech to do so. Genghis Khan could and did; the Ottoman Turks could and did; the Arabs could and did in Spain. Why w think South Asians or Africans would’ve acted otherwise, or that Atahuapa wouldn’t have sailed across the Atlantic and killed Philip II instead of vice versa?
HMF — people have gone back and forth on the margins of races since we left Africa 50k years ago, and people have assimilated into groups constantly during this time. New genetic results are yielding more and most history of long-lost conflicts between nameless migrations. Don’tknow what you mean by “it’s all in hindsight” re the Leroi piece in the nyt? He is explaining why all your profs (and my profs) who got their view of humsn groups from Dick “Dickface” Lewontin, who is a liar and an ideoloically-motivated scientist (although a very bright man), and why this view of races is false. There’s is even a phrase called Lewontin’s fallacy that shaped your profs’ views as well.
Anyway, they lied, Lewontin lied, we know that now. Races exist.
“Besides, unlike the intelligent ashkenazi jews who were unassimilable in Germany, Poland, Russia etc, indians are tested as being well below the global average in IQ. High IQ people are therefore a scarce resource in India. Its obscenely selfish to suck in the scarce resources of an impoverished, backward country like India for the marginal benefit of a wealthy, advanced nation like America that has far more of said resource.”
I hope you’re not implying that intelligent people are scarce in India. IQ tests are not unbiased, objective measures of intelligence.
Ideology, nationalism, religion etc have historically trumped genetic similarity over and over again. Blond nordic soviet soldiers fought side by side with turco-mongols from central asia against blond nordic nazis. How can you claim with a straight face that ideology and nationalism did not trump genes in this case? History and current news is filled with such examples glaring you in the face. Shia arabs are killing sunni arabs and vice versa, and their genes have no say whatsoever in this murderous conflict.
The numerous intra-racial wars based on nationalism, ideology and religion make a mockery of your gene-centric worldview. What they show instead is that mind trumps matter. Dawkins your hero thinks matter is the only reality, hence his thesis that all human behaviour can be explained by how it benefits genetic survival. His conclusion is false on at least two counts: firstly because observation tells us that genetic survival does not explain much of human behaviour; and secondly because he starts with an unproven premise: that matter is the only reality. Genes can only build something material, they cannot explain the immaterial mind and consciousness. Science remains utterly clueless about the nature and origin of consciousness. Until science can explain consciousness it has no right to claim it has the final word.
I see, indians abandoning their own race to serve a foreign one is right in line with your claim that “we aim to help those whose DNA is most like our own”? Utter nonsense. Try and think logically and you will see the fallacy of your views. Besides the obvious fact that helping to keep a foreign race alive while your own dies disproportionately from lack of medical care contradicts your “law”; there is also the fact that the indian doctors are endangering their genetic continuity by exposing their descendants to intermarriage with the host race. If genetic survival was their motivation they would have stayed in India.
Your “key point” makes the point against you, which you are too irrational to realise. Where do you think the chances are greater that “their kids marry other South Asians”? In India or America? Give it up WhiteGuy, you got no ground to stand on.
It was too easy. He cant be a truly great scientist until he recognizes the limitations of science. Science can only explain the world of matter-energy. It cannot explain consciousness. Genes cannot explain the mind. Its just plain idiotic of him to think that he has explained human behaviour when he remains utterly clueless about the nature and origin of human consciousness.
Relatively scarce compared to East Asia and Europe. Thats what the IQ tests tell us. That the IQ tests objectively measure some mental abilities is undeniable. It is also undeniable that they do not measure all aspects of human intelligence. Indians fall short in what they do measure though.
StillboredwithWhiteGuy, Your eloquence and sharp wit almost made me feel like I was watching a great debate…absolutely great points, and I don’t even know how to express gratitude. I, for one, don’t come close to how you put the truth about India, but I am glad you did and told this white guy off for his obvious ignorance veiled by a conceited sense of trivial knowledge!
yawn get some perspective, mate. If Germany’s reputation among foreigners now is a little undeserved, that doesn’t exonerate them from war crimes 50 years ago. Please.
As a child, all I wanted was to change my name to Frederick Algernon Trotville. But, my Dad was such a killjoy and would have none of that. I think one day I’ll sire a son and name call him Frederick Algernon Trotville. That’ll teach my Dad a lesson.
Whiteguy:
You still haven’t answered this question:
The hindsight comment means, the proof stating clusters of genetic similarity of people who were already classified to a certain race (through socialized self-selection) is largely irrelevant if people of race A have experienced steady barriers to opportunity and resources as compared to Race B (maybe i should use race B and race W). My profs were busy teaching me Fourier Transforms and Gaussian distributions, they wouldn’t know a Lewontin if it hit them in the face.
This is the perenniel white-man fear. And it’s entirely reasonable, a society is most likely to believe everyone else acts as they do, bringing it back to the original post, this is why Barack Obama has little to no chance of a presidential nomination. White America’s irrational fear of “we fcked them so long, so once a black guy gets in power, he’s gonna fck us” will totally deluge any logical thinking thats happens to be kicking around in the collective white consciousness.
Additionally, according to this Genghis Khan’s empire never spanned what we’d consider Europe.
Its just plain idiotic of him to think that he has explained human behaviour when he remains utterly clueless about the nature and origin of human consciousness.
Dawkins claims no such thing.
UMM,
Don’t do that. Go halfway and use a street name every now and then for comic relief, like when you they ask for your name at a pizza joint. The confused expression when the employee tries to connect your fobby face to ‘Bob’ is priceless.
WORD!
And your average present day German citizen is in no way responsible for Hitler’s Nazi regime (except for the few that may still be living who actively and willingly supported and participated in it), but then they are not considered “average”.
Modern day Germans live in shame of the history of their country. They regret it. Don’t blame them.
Generally speaking, Indians are considered “white” in America. By white I mean for the most part they live in middle to upper middle (or just plain filthy rich) suburban neighborhoods and hold jobs like doctors, engineers, lawyers, etc that are considered primarily “white occupations”.
Most of their neighbors are white. They move in social circles of other Indians first, then whites second.
The exception to these rules would be Indo-Caribs and finacially lower class Indians from Desh, who may live in lower income neighborhoods. As a rule, Indians from the Desh try to avoid the HOOD as much as possible.
I have yet to see many middle to upper class Indians from the Desh making African Americans their second social circle after other Indians.
Maybe the men want to prevent their women from discovering – “once you go black, you never go brown!”
Just joking!
Threw that in there for a little much needed humour.
It’s all good!
And another good point that was raised is why are all the educated and professional people in India eager to leave that country? Why are they not enthused to remain in India and offer their much needed services there to their own peeps?
I know an Indian man who said he was earning more (money and respect) here as a nurse than in India as a doctor.
I have noticed a double standard among some on this and other topics whenever I’m on this website.
Many don’t have a problem blaming Whites from America or Europe for the things that was done 50, 100 or 200 years ago.
Yet when the shoes on the other foot, and when regular muslims or brown people are blamed for things that have been done that last 10 years by few muslims and brown people. Some here lose it and start saying the actions of few should not blame an entire group or race.
Oh my holy left effing foot.
Ask victims of “Dotbusters” if they’re considered white. Ask Navroze Mody if he felt white right before he was kicked to death. Ask Charanjit Aujla if he felt white before police shot him down
What IS true, is many desis are granted class privelages for buying into the white world view, ie revile blacks, blame them exclusively for their problems – and thats possible through a state selected immigration process (ie letting people who’re capable of those “white” jobs) giving rise to the much taked about, model minority.
I know an Indian man who said he was earning more (money and respect) here as a nurse than in India as a doctor.
Since we’re trading anecdotes … my mother recently went back to India for a med school reunion. She said that most of the doctors from who remained back did very well – some had bustling private practices, others were teaching and getting ample opportunities to travel abraod and attend conferences. No two million dollar homes, no Exeter-Harvard children, but still, some satisfaction in remaining behind. Most people come here, flatly, for the money, and so long as they can, they will.
my name has caused me so much crap over the years. it’s not just my 14-letter last name being mispronounced in every way possible, and back in school whenever the teacher paused while taking attendance, immediately interjecting “yep, that’s me” before they could even begin to mangle it.
OMG- can totally relate to this! I grew up in a diverse place, but no hardly any desis, so this always happened to me. Why do you think for last 5 yrs everyone calls me “Emma”? My real name is “Nusrat”- yup there’s “rat” in it! LOL now, but it was terrible as a kid (when I was VERY shy).
2) speaking of jokes, star trek ii is my bane!
One of my HS P.E. teachers sometimes called me “Wrath of Khan”!
Talk about changing the goal post. So it really IS the color of your skin – and not the content of your character.
I can ‘feel’ some of whiteguy’s pain- I don’t want to see what I deem as my/America’s [Christian] ethos totally obliterated in a multicultural morass that I see every day in the UK. I also get the impression that some Desi’s feel they must choose which side (black/white) that they are on. I for one, am not asking you or any one else to make that choice.
Wheather white guy likes it ,or indeed even acknowledges it,I know for a fact that I also had relatives that fought on both sides in the civil war, and that my history as an “American” is just as long as his- probably longer thanks to the Seminoles of Florida and Choctow of Alabama mixing it up with my African ancestors. I fully claim my contributions to this ‘great society’ he’s built with my help.
It is disheartening to see that you feel the only way you are seen as somebody of worth is to declare yourself as “white.” Seems contradictory to what you said earlier. I would have thought that your great occupation, nice home, Ivy league education, filthy riches would have given you more a sense of self worth than attempting to bridge a racial gap that white guy has “scientifically” proven exists. It’s cool that you do avoid “the HOOD”- the people there probably won’t be upset if you don’t open another much needed liquor store on the corner. And while it might offend white guy to know that he is the second best choice for inclusion in your social circle or as a a marriage partner- it won’t come as a shock in the HOOD- recent episodes of ER not notwithstanding.
love peace and
coconut oilhair grease!As a bengali we have the added humiliation of having daak naam (nicknames) which are generally required to be ridiculus both in sound and meaning so as not to tempt providence. Often they mean things like fatty or stupid, even old geezer (buro). Family members will freely use these names in front of friends and outsiders which only serve to increase the wierdness of the whole name situation. It gives me some insight into why early Europeans anglicized names.
Same w/ us Bangladeshis! My dak naam is “Emma” BUT now I use it ALL the time. My parents gave it to me b/c I was born in UK.
LOL. First time I heard this one. Yet another delusional desi. Is it something in the genes ……or in the spices? 🙂
FYI, the desi stereotype also includes cabbies, 7-11 clerks, newspaper vendors, small store owners etc. Desis have a higher rate of poverty in America and lower rate of home ownership than whites (according to an article posted and discussed here at SM a few weeks ago).
I think it’s fair to say Indians are considered Indian in America. I guess some Indians consider themselves white and there’s intersting subculture of young Indians who consider themselves black (usually of the hip hop kind), but I think most Americans just consider us–if they consider us at all– Indian; neither black, white, latino, or Chinese…which is the all-emcompassing term for all pacific islanders 😉
Hey, the vendors and small store owners make some $$$ (usually unreported) and the 7-11 people include more than a few franchise owners, as Joe Biden likes to remind us. Not exactly a negative sterotype, as you imply.
If you go by skin color alone, of all the ethnic minorities in America its desis who are the closest to african-americans. By far.
If it isnt a negative stereotype why the put downs of desi cabbies and 7-11 clerks?
HMF — my point that “Indians and Africans would have attacked Europeans if they’d had the technology and capability” wasn’t meant to be particular to Indians and Africans and Europeans. Instead, I was saying that almost any group historically that’s been able to subjugate or wipe out another group has chosen to do it, especially if it brings great benefit to their own group at acceptable cost. I provided three example of large groups that have (successfully) attacked Europe in the past 1,000 years (Arabs in Spain, Turks all the way to the gates of Vienna, and, if you click your own wikipedia link and scroll down to the red-shaded map, you’ll see the Mongol empire got all the way up to and included parts of modern day Poland. Jack Weatherford’s book on Genghis is excellent, btw.) And believe me, they didn’t stop there because they felt they’d taken their share and should leave some for other tribes. It was amoral all the way.
So it’s not just a “white man’s fear” to be attacked, it’s universal. And why wouldn’t it be? No one wants to be wiped out.
I didn’t mention desi cabbies and 7-11 clerks, only vendors, small store owners, and 7-11 owners. Be that as it may, I don’t find anything particularly objectionable about cabbies and clerks either and I didn’t hear anyone on this thread put them down, except you (by implication).
whiteguy — how did we get from “Anyway, they lied, Lewontin lied, we know that now. Races exist.” to
“So it’s not just a “white man’s fear” to be attacked, it’s universal” ? It seems like race in this case is being used to create division where necessary and then just as quickly negated when discussing war.
Dilettante –
I was not speaking for myself. I’m speaking for what I have observed amongst Indians here in USA.
My social circles are mixed with just about everything. Something I don’t see much amongst the suburban Indians, even the ones who criticize whites and claim to be a suffering majority and in idealogical line with African Americans.
Regarding Seminoles mentioned in your post.
What is a Seminole?
Some pan-africanists say that seminoles are African slaves who went further south and hid in Indian communities down in the deep south when they were escaping.
Ask a “seminole” Indian if they call themselves “seminole” or not.
Should read “suffering minority“
Door wrote:
“Blond nordic soviet soldiers fought side by side with turco-mongols from central asia against blond nordic nazis. How can you claim with a straight face that ideology and nationalism did not trump genes in this case? History and current news is filled with such examples glaring you in the face. Shia arabs are killing sunni arabs and vice versa, and their genes have no say whatsoever in this murderous conflict.”
Well, what happened after 1991 when the USSR fell? The blond Russians who lived in the Muslim provinces (or even the Baltics) hightailed it back to mother Russia. Why? Ethnicity. Ideology isn’t enough to bind a country together. The Koreas will reunify, as the Germanys did, as Vietnam did, ethnic lines in all three cases trumping ideology.
Re the tribes in Iraq, “genes have no say in this murderous conflict” — on the contrary, genes have almost everything to do with it! Again, you’re citing an instance of two members of the same group fighting as proof that genes have no say in the conflict. But ~50% of Iraqis marry a first or second cousin, and as a result their clans/tribes/extended families are tight. So this example is the same as Japan vs. China or England vs. Germany in WWII — just because two brothers fight doesn’t mean they won’t team up against the family across the street.
Namitabh–
Not sure I understand your question. Re Lewontin, for ideological reasons (ethnic reasons, if we’re being honest) he chose to twist science to delude American intellectuals and the public into believing there is no genetic basis for the concept of race. Well, race is a fuzzy concept, but so is beauty, so is intelligence, so are most concepts. Lewonting intentionally fuzzed it up to make people think there was no there there. But there is!
If I am hearing you right, then we have the double standard Clueless brings up: it’s evil for people of European descent to call themselves white, but it’s A-OK for South Asians to have a website where I have to type “brown” in to comment. Come on: if this isn’t a double standard then what would be?
HMF keeps saying that whites invented the concept of race (i.e. the largest logical ethnic grouping under the banner “homo sapiens”) to oppress other groups. But the differences between the several large human races are so obvious and important that, even if the black death had eliminated every white person on the planet, the other groups would still, upon traveling and learning about each other, grouped humans in the same way.
It only makes sense that the smaller differences between same-group members fade in importance when they come into contact with another large group, especially if there is conflict (which there almost always is).