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Yes.  It is kind of strange in places like America - and Britain to some extent too - you are either Black or White...and usually if you aren't 'fully white' then you are pretty much just black - nothing in between. :-/  Some people even call Asians (from the subcontinent) 'black'.
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:-[ :-[Yeah,calling everyone who isn't white "black"is trying a little too hard.I have English,French,Irish,Swedish,Polish,and Russian ancestry.Some of those countries were ruled by the Mongols,so people from there might not be totally "white".Plus a lot of English and irish,like Bill Clinton,have gypsy ancestors---I don't think anyone's decided exactly what they are.Cheers! :D :Dare.Cheers! 8) 8) 8)

Quoting:with a rule of decent assigning the "race" of the mother to the offspringEnd Quote

We do that?

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 There is only one race of homo sapians, ie the human race.  We can all be traced back to "Adam and Eve" through mitochondria and "Y" dna, the first passes from mother to daughter but not through sons, and the second from father to son, but not to daughter.

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Hear hear, Don Carlos!!

I think the teaching of evolution has done much to promote the idea that certain races are superior to others. Ernst Haeckel, for one, used evolutionary theory to justify racism, much to the delight of the Nazi party.

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There is only one race of homo sapians, ie the human race.  We can all be traced back to "Adam and Eve" through mitochondria and "Y" dna, the first passes from mother to daughter but not through sons, and the second from father to son, but not to daughter.
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To be pedantically accurate, DC, we cannot be traced back to a single pair of ancestors; we all (men and women, plants and animals alike) have mitochondrial DNA, but it's not passed on to our offspring - it's the same DNA as in the rest of you... they like using it for genetic testing, as you get 000s of copies in the mitochondria but only a few in the nucleus.  But technical inaccuracies aside:

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So race is a social construct.
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Absolutely right - though even some geneticists who recognize that 99.999 (or even more) of our genome is shared between all of us still manage to think they are in some way superior because  of the 0.001% of different genes they have.

But it is easy to underestimate the strength of the "like us/not like us" feeling which runs through pretty much all human behaviour.  People instinctively react differently to others who they see as being different to themselves - it happens not with skin colour, but that is probably the most obvious.  It takes rational, conscious thought for a person to overcome this instinct... unfortunately, there are a large number of people who prefer the laziness of simple reaction to the (rationally obvious) conclusion that people are basically the same irrespective of skin colour - you get nice people and nasty people; happy and sad people; good and bad people... all these are true irrespective of what colour, gender etc you happen to be talking about.

Phil

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I think the teaching of evolution has done much to promote the idea that certain races are superior to others. Ernst Haeckel, for one, used evolutionary theory to justify racism, much to the delight of the Nazi party.
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I think you'll find creationists and Christians were there long before Darwin came up with the idea of evolution...

The teaching of evolution and its logical extension back to a relatively small group of ancestors is probably the strongest argument against racism that there is.  But if you're rich and powerful enough, you'll always be able to find somebody to give you a "scientific" rationale for whatever wacky or even genocidal path you wish to tread.

Phil

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To start, we need to recongize that race does not exist in biology.  There is only one race of homo sapians, ie the human race.  
Comments?
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people are basically the same irrespective of skin colour - you get nice people and nasty people; happy and sad people; good and bad people... all these are true irrespective of what colour, gender etc you happen to be talking about.

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I agree 100%.

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I think all of us (with the exception of isolated groups in the Amazon or Africa) are basically mutts. I think we all have a list of ethnic groups in our pettigree. Myself, I have English, French-Canadian, Russian, and Polish. Most people think I look Italian but I do not have any Italian in me-but I diffentely have the Meditarrian look. That is from my Jewish haritage so who knows where my ansesters were before going to Russia or Poland.


Cat
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:Hi,Cat!French  is Mediterreanean,too.That's why people often think we;re italians.Cheers!

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I think you'll find creationists and Christians were there long before Darwin came up with the idea of evolution...


Phil
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Ah, touche Phil, and you are quite right.

The more I think about it, it seems that at the root of racism is a tendency to judge an individual by associating them with a group. We all form preconcieved notions about certain groups of people. Ethnic groups, religious groups, political groups. When we hear someone say "I'm a Christian" or "I'm a Democrat" we automatically lump them into whatever preconceived stereotype we believe about that group.

When it comes to ethnicity, we don't have to hear anything. We can pretty much tell by someone's appearance what their ethnicity is, and so we automatically judge them by what we believe about that ethnic group, rather than learn about what kind of individual they are before jumping to conclusions.

I agree, Phil, that it takes conscious effort to overcome this kind of automatic judgement we find ourselves making. But it is more than worth the effort.

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We do that?
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YES

We do that.  When I was born in New Jersey, the doctor looked at my mother's blue eyes and declared me white.  Had I been born in New York, my mother's hispanic maden name would have made me "non-white" - since you gringos still don't really know how to classify we Latinos.

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This is how I feel:

Im not a raciest, most of the world isnt raciest!  Racism is just in our heads.  Affirmative action, thats racism!  Remember, anything that places one ethnic group above another, reguardless of which group this is, is raciest!  Thank You.
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Racism isn't really the topic of this thread, but I will respond anyway.

You may not be racist in terms of your own personal prejudices, but you know?  Nobody cares.  The point is that the system is racist, and white people benefit from the racism that is imbedded in the system, in institutions.  White kids don't live in the ghettos, so they go to better schools...  You know, I'm just to tired to hash all this out again.  If you don't get that white people (even those at the bottom of the barrel) have advantages over people of color, you never will, and you will never understand the rage those of us who have suffered at the hands of white people feel.  So congrats, you're not a racist.  Who gives a flying...  Although your attitude about affitmative action suggests otherwise.

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There are 3 races:  

Negroid, Caucasoid, and Mongloid.  

So someone from India is the same race as someone from England, (Caucasoid) but they would not be seen as the same "race" by most people.

The reason "black" can be offensive is become so many negative things are associated with the word "Black" and "darkness".  Whereas "white" is always associated with goodness and purity in the English language.
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And what is your source for this "scientific" revelation?  The maping of the human genome projects indicate that there is more genetic variation within the three groups you mention than there is between them.  That means that the average "caucasion" is more similar genetically with the average "negroid" or "mongloid" than with another caucasion.  If these are seperate "races", how could that be?

And what of us who are mixed?  I have northern European ancestors, certainly Moorish acestors, maybe Taino ancestors, and quite probably African ancestors.

Your definition of race is a traditional U.S./Western European definition that bears no relationship to scientific reality.  It is a SOCIAL definition.

As to the social response of Europeans to dark skinned people, you are certainly correct.  In part (and only in part) this association of black with evil, filth, etc, (which is acknowledged in the Oxford English Dictionary) is the beginning of an explanation of racism.

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Hear hear, Don Carlos!!

I think the teaching of evolution has done much to promote the idea that certain races are superior to others. Ernst Haeckel, for one, used evolutionary theory to justify racism, much to the delight of the Nazi party.

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Yes!  You are absolutely correct.  Darwin's theory was perverted and used by those who tried to apply it to human society (Social Darwinism), and that led to the eugenics movement, which reached it's peak in Nazi Germany (and, by the way, led to William Jennings Bryant to prosecute the famous "Scopes Monkey Trial").  But these were perversions of Darwin, and have been roundly repudiated as aberations.  There is nothing in Darwin that justifies racism.

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To be pedantically accurate, DC, we cannot be traced back to a single pair of ancestors; we all (men and women, plants and animals alike) have mitochondrial DNA, but it's not passed on to our offspring - it's the same DNA as in the rest of you... they like using it for genetic testing, as you get 000s of copies in the mitochondria but only a few in the nucleus.  But technical inaccuracies aside:

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I did not mean to imply that "Adam" the source of the Y chromasom, and "Eve" the source of the mitochondrial DNA were mates, or even knew each other.  That is clearly not the case.  BUT, mitochondrial DNA is passed from mother to offspring, but not passed from son to offsring.  The Y choromasom is passed from father to children, but not from daughter to offsring.  So, by studying the mitochondrial DNA and the Y chromasom, genetisists are able to trace our ancestory into the distant past.  You might want to read Mapping Human History by Steve Olson on this.  And to say it again, we are all cousins.  And I love that ;D

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 White kids don't live in the ghettos, so they go to better schools...  You know, I'm just to tired to hash all this out again.  If you don't get that white people (even those at the bottom of the barrel) have advantages over people of color, you never will, and you will never understand the rage those of us who have suffered at the hands of white people feel.  End Quote

Hey Don Carlos. I have to disagree here. I work in some "ghettos", and there are plenty of white kids living there with their white (or black and white) parents. They go to the same public schools the poor black kids go to. And there are plenty of "non-whites" living in the affluent neighborhoods as well, going to the better schools along with the affluent whites.

Perhaps what began as a racist system against minorities has turned into a racist system against the poor. ???

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Racism isn't really the topic of this thread, but I will respond anyway.

You may not be racist in terms of your own personal prejudices, but you know?  Nobody cares.  The point is that the system is racist, and white people benefit from the racism that is imbedded in the system, in institutions.  White kids don't live in the ghettos, so they go to better schools...  You know, I'm just to tired to hash all this out again.  If you don't get that white people (even those at the bottom of the barrel) have advantages over people of color, you never will, and you will never understand the rage those of us who have suffered at the hands of white people feel.  So congrats, you're not a racist.  Who gives a flying...  Although your attitude about affitmative action suggests otherwise.
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You know what Don, neither of us should be talking about the other races because we're not included in them...but what do you think, whites are on easy street because theyre white?  Picture a white person, re-phrase that, a jewish person in Harlom hits a little african american boy with his car by accident, are you telling me that the entire black population is not gonna jump up and declare a murder?  Take Amaduel Dialo(Sp?), four white cops open fire because they believed he had a gun, and it was targeted as a raciest offence.  Now if four black cops did it to a white man, racism would be out of the question.  

I believe I got a Mallard Fillmore comic on my desk, let me dig through the mess, bingo.  It shows Mallard watching tv, and he says, "oh escuse me, I was just watching a fritos comersial where three black former NBA stars pick on a White former NBA star, and I was just wondering the media's reaction if it was the other way around!"  So true!  That you cannot deny.

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Plenty of non-whites?  Surely they are still in the extreme minority?
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Minority, yes. Extreme? Not so sure about that one.

I know that there is a large percentage of doctors around my area that have huge names that I cannot pronounce and speak with accents...

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You know what Don, neither of us should be talking about the other races because we're not included in them...but what do you think, whites are on easy street because theyre white?  Picture a white person, re-phrase that, a jewish person in Harlom hits a little african american boy with his car by accident, are you telling me that the entire black population is not gonna jump up and declare a murder?  Take Amaduel Dialo(Sp?), four white cops open fire because they believed he had a gun, and it was targeted as a raciest offence.  Now if four black cops did it to a white man, racism would be out of the question.  

I believe I got a Mallard Fillmore comic on my desk, let me dig through the mess, bingo.  It shows Mallard watching tv, and he says, "oh escuse me, I was just watching a fritos comersial where three black former NBA stars pick on a White former NBA star, and I was just wondering the media's reaction if it was the other way around!"  So true!  That you cannot deny.
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sarcasm alert

But, in the past, whites did this to the minorities so it's okay for them to do it back, now. ::)

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Hey Don Carlos. I have to disagree here. I work in some "ghettos", and there are plenty of white kids living there with their white (or black and white) parents. They go to the same public schools the poor black kids go to. And there are plenty of "non-whites" living in the affluent neighborhoods as well, going to the better schools along with the affluent whites.

Perhaps what began as a racist system against minorities has turned into a racist system against the poor. ???
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It always was against the poor.  But the fact remains that minorities are disproportionately poor in this country.  Certainly there are poor white people, the writer John Irving called them "trailer Park Trash".  And certainly things have improved for minorities since the '50s.  But another fact is that white people have benefited from the civil rights movement and the programs it spawned at least as much, if not more than minorities.

You are also right that there are more "mixed" marriages lately, which I think is a good thing.

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sarcasm alert

But, in the past, whites did this to the minorities so it's okay for them to do it back, now. ::)
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but Cheer, thats like punishing the decentants of slave owners for having slaves...it may be the same family, but its not the same people...the times have changed...

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It always was against the poor.  But the fact remains that minorities are disproportionately poor in this country.  Certainly there are poor white people, the writer John Irving called them "trailer Park Trash".  And certainly things have improved for minorities since the '50s.  But another fact is that white people have benefited from the civil rights movement and the programs it spawned at least as much, if not more than minorities.

You are also right that there are more "mixed" marriages lately, which I think is a good thing.
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Take away the poverty and open the doors of univerities and I think you will see discrimination evaporate. Education has a way of making people less prone to accepting outdated hate. I wonder how many people in the KKK are college educated? The more one lives, the more they see we are all the same, have the same wants and desires to be free, happy, intellectually stimulated, loved, fed, and sheltered. I think race will eventually be as meaningless as sex so far as employment/dignity/respect.

Modified to add: Race means nothing to me. I do not even think about it anymore, just like I do not think about what color my living room is painted except once every five or six years. I am more curious about the person, if we share any common interests.

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I always thought that a race was when people lined up and then they try to get to the finish line first.  ;)
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Boom Boom  ;D

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TV's  response on page 2 is where I'm at, but there is still a long way to go to get there, as some previuse posts suggest.  And while the blending of races is, I have said, a good thing, there also has to be a blending of culture, and at the same time a preservation of cultures and appreciation of cultural diversity.  I will not give up my "hispanismo" for anything.  It is part of who I am.
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I agree with you. I think different cultures have many great things to share with "outsiders". Every now and then, I will head into different ethnic neighborhoods. It is almost like a vacation trip. Different smells of food, different language spoken, different things to see. Suburbia is so different than Chinatown, which is different from the Irish corner of the city. They all offer very different atmospheres, but what they share in common is there friendliness.

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Boom Boom  ;D
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That's "bada boom" bobby  ;D

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I agree with you. I think different cultures have many great things to share with "outsiders". Every now and then, I will head into different ethnic neighborhoods. It is almost like a vacation trip. Different smells of food, different language spoken, different things to see. Suburbia is so different than Chinatown, which is different from the Irish corner of the city. They all offer very different atmospheres, but what they share in common is there friendliness.

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Absolutely.  Everwhere I I traveled people have been eager to share their culture and try to understand mine.  I think that ethnic neiborhooding is an excellant mini-vacation.  Not one readilly available in homogenious Vermont, but certainly cool in big cities.  Loved to go to NYC during the Chinese newyear, or the Italian religious parade - forget what Saint's day it was, but it was cool.

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I always thought that a race was when people lined up and then they try to get to the finish line first.  ;)



Cat
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Me too!  Either that or a funny guy I know ;)