Can black people become "white?"

[TheLastEmperorReurns]

Broadly, internationally, yes.

Not so much when the lens begins to focus toward current white nationalism (or whatever you want to call what is happening). In modern white identity, Italians are the outermost boundary, and they only secured their spot within the past few decades. Spaniards and Persians are othered. Greeks are between Italians the the others.

I think that depends on the white nationalist circle.

There are some prominent Greeks that played big roles in white supremacist activities in the 1960s and 1970s.

Appearance-wise it's tempting for some white nationalists to completely fetishize Nordicism but alienating Greek and Roman history literally cancels out the claim of white intellectual superiority.

 

[Gregolian]

Greek ethnic identity in the States is especially interesting considering that white imperialism would never have arisen without the innovation and strength of the Greeks (which I guess may also depend on your categorization of Persians). In many ways, the Greeks were the birthplace of Western dominance millennia later.

I think the Greeks quite often get rolled in with the Italians given they come from a similar area geographically.

 

[TheLastEmperorReurns]

Germans, Irish, Jews, Italians were never seen in the same light as Native Americans, Blacks and East Asians. Yes their 'whiteness' wasn't always as robust as Anglo-Saxon Whiteness but it was just political and nationally rooted disagreements, not racial.

Um- the differences between English and Germans might have been political but the differences between Southern Italians/Jews and Anglo-Saxons is most certainly physical, and by extension, racial.

 

[revoltub]

Whiteness has been somewhat changing but the change has only ever applied to European and geographically close Caucasoid groups.

Germans, Irish, Jews, Italians were never seen in the same light as Native Americans, Blacks and East Asians. Yes their 'whiteness' wasn't always as robust as Anglo-Saxon Whiteness but it was just political and nationally rooted disagreements, not racial.

So, no Black Americans will never be considered White, and frankly I very much doubt they would want to be seen as White anyways. What I noticed about America is that mixed Black people in the US really don't try to pass themselves off as White or attempt to curry favor with Whites by acting White. Whereas mixed people from Latin America , the MiddleEast and some Eurassian/Asian groups will try to be seen as kinda White or align themselves with whatever group is dominant in their area .

Sure they are european but that doesnt degrade the amount of differences they saw in each other in the past. Italy and France might as well have been Africa and sweden.

Also, in the past groups like iranians and some Asians/orientals were considered white.

 

[TheLastEmperorReurns]

I think Americans are largely clueless and dumbfounded about race and ethnicity.

When my family immigrated from Russia we were classified as white even though we look as Asian as Chinese/Japanese people.

We come from the European part of Russia too but I guess the immigration officers weren't well-read on the topic of the Golden Horde and the Tatar-Mongol domination of Russia that lasted for 1/2 a millennium and the countless Turko-Mongolic invasions, raids, and conquests that predated Genghis Khan.

 

[Cubo de Sangre]

Sammy just stopped getting that sweet sweet Chicago sunshine. Dominican Republic my ass.

 

[TheLastEmperorReurns]

Sure they are european but that doesnt degrade the amount of differences they saw in each other in the past. Italy and France might as well have been Africa and sweden.

Also, in the past groups like iranians and some Asians/orientals were considered white.

Iranians are considered white today according to the government census.

The US government recognizes all nations of Europe, North Africa, the Middle East, and Central Asia as white.

It essentially equates being white with being a Caucasoid [an anthropology classification] minus the people of Southern Asia who are mostly Caucasoid.

There's also ethnolinguistic base-trees.

For example; Iranians are Indo-European and trace their ancestry closer to Germans and Swedes than Jews do- who are more closely linked to Arabs.

Finnish people are ethnolinguistically categorized with East Asian Eskimos, even though they don't look much different from Germanic Swedes.

These ethnolinguistic histories might be even more important than physical appearance but it has real effects on the mental characteristics of people.

Finns and Estonians are the most academically gifted people of all of Europe according to standardized test data and this might have something to do with their linguistic connectedness to people of Central and East Asia- because politically and racially, there shouldn't be a marked difference between Swedish/Finnish and Estonian/Lithuanian performances.

 

[V-2]

Hm. Interesting that Franklin noted the difference in complexion between the English and Germans.

I wouldn't have thought that there were differences and even observed that as a whole, Germans are more Nordic-looking than the English because of the pool of pre-Germanic genes in the British Isles.

As far as I'm aware, the comparatively dark "indigenous" people of the British Isles were largely absorbed into what later came to be known as the 'Anglo-Saxon' ethnicity.

It's bewildering nonsense from Franklin but genetics beyond Mendel's 19th century work on inheritance wouldn't come into real play until Watson and Crick's paper on the structure of DNA in 1953, modern field of genetics and the bio-tech era itself by the late 1970s and early 1980s in earnest. It's still a big statement coming from one of the principal founding fathers of the United States where the whole concept of 'whiteness' really took root.

Germans in America faced abhorrent discrimination as late as the 1910s, during and in the immediate aftermath of World War I with at least 30 people getting lynched in mob attacks; the persisting ethnic enclaves stretching from Pennsylvania to the north midwest were eradicated in part at the hand of the US government but you couldn't say it was racial so much as ethnocultural. All of the European immigrant groups had pretty much bought in (or were strongarmed) to the base white identity circa World War II.

 

[Gregolian]

I think Americans are largely clueless and dumbfounded about race and ethnicity.

When my family immigrated from Russia we were classified as white even though we look as Asian as Chinese/Japanese people.

We come from the European part of Russia too but I guess the immigration officers weren't well-read on the topic of the Golden Horde and the Tatar-Mongol domination of Russia that lasted for 1/2 a millennium and the countless Turko-Mongolic invasions, raids, and conquests that predated Genghis Khan.

When Americans think Russia this is what we think generally I think:

 

[ShinkanPo]

Back in my elementary schooldays I told my teacher that when I grew up I will go to the Unitedstates and become white!

 

[MicroBrew]

Um- the differences between English and Germans might have been political but the differences between Southern Italians/Jews and Anglo-Saxons is most certainly physical, and by extension, racial.

It depends on what your definition of race is . Jews and Southern Italians are both Caucasoid. You could say Semites are a Caucasoid sub-race.
It's physical to only a degree and only in some Jews and Southern Italians. A lot of Jews look just like gentile European peoples, because they have mixed a lot.
I do agree though that the difference between Anglo-Saxons and Germans is negligible when compared to the difference between Anglo-Saxons and Jews or Southern Euros. Anglo-Saxons are just a Germanic ethnic group.

 

[Gregolian]

It depends on what your definition of race is . Jews and Southern Italians are both Caucasoid. You could say Semites are a Caucasoid sub-race.
It's physical to only a degree and only in some Jews and Southern Italians. A lot of Jews look just like gentile European peoples, because they have mixed a lot.
I do agree though that the difference between Anglo-Saxons and Germans is negligible when compared to the difference between Anglo-Saxons and Jews or Southern Euros. Anglo-Saxons are just a Germanic ethnic group.

So, this is where I get confused historically.

We know for a fact that the Romans were in England. We ALSO know that the Saxons arrival in England at least SOMEWHAT lines up with the timing of the Romans leaving. But then we had the Danes (aka the Norsemen) appear and fight the Saxons.

Ultimately (not having the Romans in this) the Saxons and Danes are ESSENTIALLY from the same "racial"/ethnic group right?

 

[MicroBrew]

Sure they are european but that doesnt degrade the amount of differences they saw in each other in the past. Italy and France might as well have been Africa and sweden.

Also, in the past groups like iranians and some Asians/orientals were considered white.

Italy and France were never as different from each other as Africa and Sweden are to each other. I presume when you say Africa , you mean SubSaharan Africa? Even if you mean the Maghreb, the difference between the Magreb and Sweden is a lot larger than the difference between Italy and France.

Never heard Oriental/Far Eastern Asians ever being considered White. Iranians are White according to US government census. The average American won't necessarily see them as White, unless they can pass for a European.

 

[TheLastEmperorReurns]

It depends on what your definition of race is . Jews and Southern Italians are both Caucasoid. You could say Semites are a Caucasoid sub-race.
It's physical to only a degree and only in some Jews and Southern Italians. A lot of Jews look just like gentile European peoples, because they have mixed a lot.
I do agree though that the difference between Anglo-Saxons and Germans is negligible when compared to the difference between Anglo-Saxons and Jews or Southern Euros. Anglo-Saxons are just a Germanic ethnic group.

Most Indian people are technically Caucasoid too.

 

[MicroBrew]

So, this is where I get confused historically.

We know for a fact that the Romans were in England. We ALSO know that the Saxons arrival in England at least SOMEWHAT lines up with the timing of the Romans leaving. But then we had the Danes (aka the Norsemen) appear and fight the Saxons.

Ultimately (not having the Romans in this) the Saxons and Danes are ESSENTIALLY from the same "racial"/ethnic group right?

Anglo-Saxons are supposed to be composed of Angles (Anglia in Northern Germany), Saxons (Saxony) and Jutes (Jutland Peninsula) . Danes are from Jutland. So yeah they are more or less Germanic .

 

[MicroBrew]

Most Indian people are technically Caucasoid too.

People used to think that, but that isn't true. The overwhelming majority of South Asians are mixture of Western Eurassian and indigenous South Asian groups, with the later not being Caucasoid, or being related to any other race. I mean is a Hapa or Mulatoo or Mestizo a Caucasoid person? With Mestizo it can be arguable depending on their admixture %

 

[Gregolian]

Anglo-Saxons are supposed to be composed of Angles (Anglia in Northern Germany), Saxons (Saxony) and Jutes (Jutland Peninsula) . Danes are from Jutland. So yeah they are more or less Germanic .

Cool beans.

It's always confused me because I never really got to learn about that time period.

 

[JbModest]

I think Americans are largely clueless and dumbfounded about race and ethnicity.

When my family immigrated from Russia we were classified as white even though we look as Asian as Chinese/Japanese people.

We come from the European part of Russia too but I guess the immigration officers weren't well-read on the topic of the Golden Horde and the Tatar-Mongol domination of Russia that lasted for 1/2 a millennium and the countless Turko-Mongolic invasions, raids, and conquests that predated Genghis Khan.

Pics or it didn't happen.

 

[IDL]

That is basically the same question as 'Can anyone be considered white' but if anyone can be considered white then the word becomes meaningless and then other words would be used for general differences / groupings.

 

[MicroBrew]

Cool beans.

It's always confused me because I never really got to learn about that time period.

What's really interesting right now is Cheddar Man.