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Are non-whites generally perceived as whites still non-whites ?

"White" is a fluid concept, though. For example, if I stood next to an Italian, as a pale Chinese person, I would not be considered white while the Italian probably would be. Yet, the he and I both have black hair, and I probably have lighter skin.

But if you take that guy and stand him up next to, say, Chris Evans, there's a much higher chance he will be identified as Italian instead of white.
 

Hopeford

Member
I am legit surprised that so many people seems to live that situation.
I used to think i was special. :(
;)

Haha, I feel like that sometimes too.

I think a big part of it is that to be honest a surprising amount of people--even progressive ones--seem not to know about white people coming from Latin-America. Plus every time we are represented anywhere in media, people usually follow it up with "But his skin should be darker though, that's not good at all!"

And it's like...well, I understand that darker skinned Latinos have it rougher and therefore I understand and approve of the feeling that they should be represented more in fiction. That said, it is a little disheartening sometimes when I get excited for a white Latino character and even more liberal communities just go like "Ehhh, this character shouldn't be white."

Guess it bugs me because like, a darker skinned Latino telling me "Yo, I got it rougher, I deserve this tiny victory more" is like, fair enough bro. But generally when it's a wave of white people who don't even think about the fact that white Latinos exist complaining that he's not up to their standards, I guess it feels a little...patronizing? I don't know! I'm just rambling.
 
I'm Latino and a light brown in skin, but very clearly not 'white' as in look like a 100% caucasian. But I act so un-latino I'm so inoffensive that I'm sure every racist fuck who has met me and never said anything probably considers me 'one of the good ones'.

It's not like I am particularly against my heritage, it's just that I came to this country in my early teens and hung out with americans exclusively, while my younger and older sister hung out with other hispanics. They ended up more latino, I ended up more American.
 
I didn't know that, that is hilarious because on the opposite end, some indigenous and mixed people don't consider themselves Latinos either. It's a post colonial term, so they see white people as the Latinos. Who the fuck are the "real" Latinos?! We should just get rid of that term...and Hispanic...i hate them both

I think that every word have the sense people give them. Saying for instance "latin america" is outright scandalous for me since we are saying we are "latin" and not "african/indigenous" (which constitute the majority of our heritage). But i recognize that the meaning of the words changes. I try to say "south america" rather than "latin america" though.
 
"White" is a fluid concept, though. For example, if I stood next to an Italian, as a pale Chinese person, I would not be considered white while the Italian probably would be. Yet, the he and I both have black hair, and I probably have lighter skin.

But if you take that guy and stand him up next to, say, Chris Evans, there's a much higher chance he will be identified as Italian instead of white.

Italians are White though, at least in America. Is it different elsewhere?

Asians will probably never be considered White in America regardless of their skin color.
 
"White" is a fluid concept, though. For example, if I stood next to an Italian, as a pale Chinese person, I would not be considered white while the Italian probably would be. Yet, the he and I both have black hair, and I probably have lighter skin.

But if you take that guy and stand him up next to, say, Chris Evans, there's a much higher chance he will be identified as Italian instead of white.

at the end of the day, all races are fluid. But we're too invested in this race thing, no going back now ;)

I don't like how we use race in the US today, because you're either white, black, Asian, or american Indian.

Using white and black as races are confusing for the exact reason you mentioned. To my understanding, most Indians (as in from India) are actually of the white race, but because they do not have white skin an are from the continent of Asia, they fall under the Asian race. Do Indians look like east/south east Asian? Not to me.

I prefer these terms:

Caucasian
Negroid
Mongoloid
Australoid

but what do I know, I didn't study anthropology
 

Hopeford

Member
I think that every word have the sense people give them. Saying for instance "latin america" is outright scandalous for me since we are saying we are "latin" and not "african/indigenous" (which constitute the majority of our heritage). But i recognize that the meaning of the words changes. I try to say "south america" rather than "latin america" though.

I always figured that "Latin America" referred to our languages(Portuguese/Spanish) being closely derived from Latin as opposed to our heritage. Like, Portuguese and Spanish both directly evolved from Latin dialects so I always took Latin America to mean "The America that speaks Latin."
 
Haha, I feel like that sometimes too.

I think a big part of it is that to be honest a surprising amount of people--even progressive ones--seem not to know about white people coming from Latin-America. Plus every time we are represented anywhere in media, people usually follow it up with "But his skin should be darker though, that's not good at all!"

And it's like...well, I understand that darker skinned Latinos have it rougher and therefore I understand and approve of the feeling that they should be represented more in fiction. That said, it is a little disheartening sometimes when I get excited for a white Latino character and even more liberal communities just go like "Ehhh, this character shouldn't be white."

Guess it bugs me because like, a darker skinned Latino telling me "Yo, I got it rougher, I deserve this tiny victory more" is like, fair enough bro. But generally when it's a wave of white people who don't even think about the fact that white Latinos exist complaining that he's not up to their standards, I guess it feels a little...patronizing? I don't know! I'm just rambling.

I think we can separate the "whites reaction" (who, most of the time, are disguntigly just crave for exotism) and the reaction of non-whites latinos. I can totally understand why a mexican or a brazilian can be mad that 95 % of the character in their national production look whiter than the vast majority of the country. Even in Bolivia/Peru !

White supremacy is crazy in our countries, sadly.
 

Rest

All these years later I still chuckle at what a fucking moron that guy is.
Italians are White though, at least in America. Is it different elsewhere?

Asians will probably never be considered White in America regardless of their skin color.
Italians have long dealt with racism in the US for not being white, Sicilians especially, since they may have dark olive skin.
 

Fat4all

Banned
8CVyYFC.png


huh
 
I always figured that "Latin America" referred to our languages(Portuguese/Spanish) being closely derived from Latin as opposed to our heritage. Like, Portuguese and Spanish both directly evolved from Latin dialects so I always took Latin America to mean "The America that speaks Latin."

In reality, i learned that it was invented by France in the 19th century to make us distance ourselves with United States and especially the UK:

(wiki)

The idea that a part of the Americas has a linguistic affinity with the Romance cultures as a whole can be traced back to the 1830s, in the writing of the French Saint-Simonian Michel Chevalier, who postulated that this part of the Americas was inhabited by people of a "Latin race", and that it could, therefore, ally itself with "Latin Europe" in a struggle with "Teutonic Europe", "Anglo-Saxon America" and "Slavic Europe".[8] A further investigation of the concept of Latin America is by Michel Gobat in the American Historical Review.[9]

So again, we let others define us.
 
Italians have long dealt with racism in the US for not being white, Sicilians especially, since they may have dark olive skin.

Italians are whites. We're not speaking about the tone of the skin but the racial construct. They were/are just "lesser" whites in the eyes of the WASP elites.

In the early 20th century, you even had anti-italian pogrom in the south of France, called "bear hunting". That don't make them non-whites and french still considered spaniards/italians as whites, as it was expressed by the infamous discourse of Charles de Gaulle.
 
Haha, I feel like that sometimes too.

I think a big part of it is that to be honest a surprising amount of people--even progressive ones--seem not to know about white people coming from Latin-America. Plus every time we are represented anywhere in media, people usually follow it up with "But his skin should be darker though, that's not good at all!"

And it's like...well, I understand that darker skinned Latinos have it rougher and therefore I understand and approve of the feeling that they should be represented more in fiction. That said, it is a little disheartening sometimes when I get excited for a white Latino character and even more liberal communities just go like "Ehhh, this character shouldn't be white."

Guess it bugs me because like, a darker skinned Latino telling me "Yo, I got it rougher, I deserve this tiny victory more" is like, fair enough bro. But generally when it's a wave of white people who don't even think about the fact that white Latinos exist complaining that he's not up to their standards, I guess it feels a little...patronizing? I don't know! I'm just rambling.

If it's a White Latino playing an American with an American accent, then ultimately it's just another White guy, because it's your ethnicity that sets you apart not your skin color.

at the end of the day, all races are fluid. But we're too invested in this race thing, no going back now ;)

I don't like how we use race in the US today, because you're either white, black, Asian, or american Indian.

Using white and black as races are confusing for the exact reason you mentioned. To my understanding, most Indians (as in from India) are actually of the white race, but because they are brown they fall under the Asian race.

I prefer these terms:

Caucasian
Negroid
Mongoloid
Australoid

but what do I know...I studied computer science in college..I don't know much about anthropology

Those are terms that are associated with a lot of outdated scientific racism . LOL @ India being of the White race. Sounds like you've bought into White supremacy. Indians fall under Asians, not because they're brown, but because they're from..... ASIA. LOL Yes, what do you know? Scientifically, there's no such thing as RACE.
 

Astral Dog

Member
If you are white you are white.thats the tone of your skin unless you believe in some kind of genetic superiority wackiness
 

kswiston

Member
"White" is a fluid concept, though. For example, if I stood next to an Italian, as a pale Chinese person, I would not be considered white while the Italian probably would be. Yet, the he and I both have black hair, and I probably have lighter skin.

But if you take that guy and stand him up next to, say, Chris Evans, there's a much higher chance he will be identified as Italian instead of white.

There's a ton of overlap in the mediterranean ethnicities when it comes to physical appearance, so it's sort of funny that some are considered white while others are not. How many Americans can differentiate between an Italian, Greek, Persian, and Turkish man if there were no cultural identifiers present to tip them off? All four ethnicities have a pretty large range of features.

Here are some quick Google Image grabs with the order mixed up.

 

Violet_0

Banned
Italians are White though, at least in America. Is it different elsewhere?

Asians will probably never be considered White in America regardless of their skin color.

no
in Europe, people will differentiate between those from South, East and Central Europe if they can. They're all white anyway, discrimination happens because of nationalism not racism. I've never seen anyone discuss or question the degree of whiteness of another person. I'm German/Polish and I can go to any country in Europe and people assume that I'm a native, including Turkey
 
Italians have long dealt with racism in the US for not being white, Sicilians especially, since they may have dark olive skin.

Italians dealt with discrimination by "superior" Whites, but they were always considered White in America. Our Laws that applied for Whites applied to Italians, Jews, and Irish. Our laws that applied specifically to Non Whites didn't apply to Italians, Jews, and Irish.
 

Stencil

Member
I never know how to feel about this. All my life, in Minnesota, I've considered myself white. But now in this current America, I feel as though my 1/4th Filipino heritage shows through more, and I'm no longer white. I don't know how to feel.

I'm proud of my heritage and I stand by it, but I'm technically 1/16th more German than I am Filipino, so... Idk how to identify.
 
Italians dealt with discrimination by "superior" Whites, but they were always considered White in America. Our Laws that applied for Whites applied to Italians, Jews, and Irish. Our laws that applied specifically to Non Whites didn't apply to Italians, Jews, and Irish.

I think it's the best criteria to speak about races in the western context.
 

Hopeford

Member
If it's a White Latino playing an American with an American accent, then ultimately it's just another White guy, because it's your ethnicity that sets you apart not your skin color.

No, I mean stuff like characters actually being from south america who are white, then people criticizing them for being white.

In reality, i learned that it was invented by France in the 19th century to make us distance ourselves with United States and especially the UK:

(wiki)



So again, we let others define us.

Huh, interesting.

I think we can separate the "whites reaction" (who, most of the time, are disguntigly just crave for exotism) and the reaction of non-whites latinos. I can totally understand why a mexican or a brazilian can be mad that 95 % of the character in their national production look whiter than the vast majority of the country. Even in Bolivia/Peru !

White supremacy is crazy in our countries, sadly.

Oh yeah, like media in South America is insanely white. Like whiter than white. So anyone complaining about that is more than justified. I meant more like, white Americans complaining about white Latinos kinda thing.

I don't think they are craving for exoticism, to be honest. I think people are very well-intentioned and just assume that white immigrants don't face any difficulties. I don't even blame them for assuming as much! It's like, sometimes that's even true. I think it's just one of those things people don't think about too much, so they can say some hurtful things while trying to do good. And because I assume it's coming from good intentions, it doesn't bug me much. I mean it doesn't feel great but it's usually like "They didn't mean it the way it came across. I have to tell myself that."
 
Those are terms that are associated with a lot of outdated scientific racism . LOL @ India being of the White race. Sounds like you've bought into White supremacy. Indians fall under Asians, not because they're brown, but because they're from..... ASIA. LOL Yes, what do you know? Scientifically, there's no such thing as RACE.

LOL HAHAHA

anyways,

why do we use "Asian" as a race and not American? Not African? Not Australian? Why do Indians and Koreans get lumped into the same RACE? Why do we use both a color and continent as races? Please tell me (I am going to believe you because I assume you have a doctorate in anthropology or biology)
 

Rest

All these years later I still chuckle at what a fucking moron that guy is.
Italians are whites. We're not speaking about the tone of the skin but the racial construct. They were/are just "lesser" whites in the eyes of the WASP elites.

In the early 20th century, you even had anti-italian pogrom in the south of France, called "bear hunting". That don't make them non-whites and french still considered spaniards/italians as whites, as it was expressed by the infamous discourse of Charles de Gaulle.
I'm not saying they're not white or that their skin tone should affect what other people should think of their race, I'm talking about the reality of how they've been treated. "Lesser white" is the same as non white.

Italians dealt with discrimination by "superior" Whites, but they were always considered White in America. Our Laws that applied for Whites applied to Italians, Jews, and Irish. Our laws that applied specifically to Non Whites didn't apply to Italians, Jews, and Irish.
And are we discussing the law or society? I don't recall any mention of laws in the OP. Even so, laws protecting whites have not always applied to Jews in the US.
 
I don't think they are craving for exoticism, to be honest. I think people are very well-intentioned and just assume that white immigrants don't face any difficulties. I don't even blame them for assuming as much! It's like, sometimes that's even true. I think it's just one of those things people don't think about too much, so they can say some hurtful things while trying to do good. And because I assume it's coming from good intentions, it doesn't bug me much. I mean it doesn't feel great but it's usually like "They didn't mean it the way it came across. I have to tell myself that."

Maybe you're right in some cases, but i can tell you that white people want the evil drug baron and the pretty mexican/colombian girl to have a certain phenotype.
The same can be said about italians though. You won't find many mobsters in mafia movies with red/blond hair and green/blue eyes (and many italians have those features!). They have to fit the exotic stereotype.
 
I'm not saying they're not white or that their skin tone should affect what other people should think of their race, I'm talking about the reality of how they've been treated. "Lesser white" is the same as non white.

Not at all. You're lesser white you'll get yourself discriminated in relation to the majority white group. You're non white, you're just an item, a property. It's legally and practically totally different.

And are we discussing the law or society? I don't recall any mention of laws in the OP.

Law are part of society. Law in the american context have totally articulated race.
 

mdubs

Banned
Well, you get to experience racism from both ends of the spectrum; racism from whites for not being white, and racism from whatever your other half is for not actually being like them.
 

Man God

Non-Canon Member
Italians have long dealt with racism in the US for not being white, Sicilians especially, since they may have dark olive skin.

Yep. Had a friend who was FBI in high school that was the blackest kid in school that wasn't from Nigeria. He got extra dark in the summer months.
 

Rest

All these years later I still chuckle at what a fucking moron that guy is.
Law are part of society. Law in the american context have totally articulated race.
Well then there's something of a conundrum to deal with, since Arabs are not considered white in American society but are considered white under the law. How do we deal with that in this conversation?
 

KonradLaw

Member
Races are more about superficial appearances than any real genetic ancestry, so if you are percieved as white you are white.
 
I'm not saying they're not white or that their skin tone should affect what other people should think of their race, I'm talking about the reality of how they've been treated. "Lesser white" is the same as non white.


And are we discussing the law or society? I don't recall any mention of laws in the OP. Even so, laws protecting whites have not always applied to Jews in the US.

Here let me help you out:

Sorry, but the Irish were always ‘white' (and so were Italians, Jews and so on)

”Whiteness studies" is all the rage these days. My friends who teach U.S. history have told me that this perspective has ”completely taken over" studies of American ethnic history. I can't vouch for that, but I do know that I constantly see people assert, as a matter of ”fact," that Irish, Italian, Jewish and other ”ethnic" white American were not considered to be ”white" until sometime in the mid-to-late 20th century, vouching for the fact that this understanding of American history has spread widely.

The relevant scholarly literature seems to have started with Noel Ignatiev's book ”How the Irish Became White," and taken off from there. But what the relevant authors mean by white is ahistorical. They are referring to a stylized, sociological or anthropological understanding of ”whiteness," which means either ”fully socially accepted as the equals of Americans of Anglo-Saxon and Germanic stock," or, in the more politicized version, ”an accepted part of the dominant ruling class in the United States."

Those may be interesting sociological and anthropological angles to pursue, but it has nothing to do with whether the relevant groups were considered to be white.

Here are some objective tests as to whether a group was historically considered ”white" in the United States: Were members of the group allowed to go to ”whites-only" schools in the South, or otherwise partake of the advantages that accrued to whites under Jim Crow? Were they ever segregated in schools by law, anywhere in the United States, such that ”whites" went to one school, and the group in question was relegated to another? When laws banned interracial marriage in many states (not just in the South), if a white Anglo-Saxon wanted to marry a member of the group, would that have been against the law? Some labor unions restricted their membership to whites. Did such unions exclude members of the group in question? Were members of the group ever entirely excluded from being able to immigrate to the United States, or face special bans or restrictions in becoming citizens?

If you use such objective tests, you find that Irish, Jews, Italians and other white ethnics were indeed considered white by law and by custom (as in the case of labor unions). Indeed, some lighter-skinned African Americans of mixed heritage ”passed" as white by claiming they were of Arab descent and that explained their relative swarthiness, showing that Arab Americans, another group whose ”whiteness" has been questioned, were considered white. By contrast, persons of African, Asian, Mexican and Native American descent faced various degrees of exclusion from public schools and labor unions, bans on marriage and direct restrictions on immigration and citizenship.

You can also get a sense of who was thought to be white by considering whether Americans considered a particular marriage to be an interracial marriage; only 4 percent of Americans approved of interracial marriage as late as 1958. Yet Anglo-American whites were not ostracized by polite society for marrying Irish Americans or Italian Americans. Famous Jewish Hollywood stars such as George Burns not only married Gentiles, but openly partnered with them in their careers. We know that light-skinned Cubans were considered white at least as of 1950 because (despite the trepidations of the studio) the public accepted Lucy and Ricky, in a way they would never have accepted a black-white or Chinese-white couple. American Indians were considered non-white, but if they assimilated and married whites their children were generally accepted as part of white society. Did you know that Will Rogers was 9/32 Cherokee?

When I've pointed this out to people, they often rejoin that people in the late 19th and early 20th centuries often referred to the ”Irish race," the ”Italian race," the ”Jewish race." That's true, but they also referred to the ”Anglo-Saxon race," and the ”Teutonic race," the latter two generally considered to be superior. The racist pseudo-science of the day divided Europeans into various races by nationality or perceived nationality, and often created a hierarchy among those groups. But that was a racist hierarchy within the white group, not evidence that these groups weren't considered to be white. This point is often obscured by the whiteness studies crowd, because racism within a white hierarchy conflicts with their understanding of American racism solely being about ”whiteness."

One can also find racist literature attacking ”ethnic" Americans in terms that are consistent with the more conventional form of American racism, such as references to the need to exclude ”swarthy" Jews and Italians from the United States. But these critics focused on perceived swarthiness precisely to try to persuade Americans that contrary to accepted norms, these groups were not in fact ”white" and should be treated like non-whites.

Note that this does not mean that the Irish, Italians, Jews, Poles, Arabs, and so on didn't face discrimination, hostility, assertions of inferiority and occasionally even violence. They did. But historically, they were also considered white.

UPDATE: The comments are interesting, and show that the whiteness studies view has had such strong influence that many people can't conceive of the idea that Irish, Italian, Polish, Slovak, Jewish, Greek and other immigrants to the United States could have faced a tremendous amount of discrimination from the Northeastern European establishment and yet still have been considered white. Nor do folks seem to understand that ”ethnic" whites could have been considered to be white, but also been subject to racism, because people believed that there were subraces within the white category.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...alians-jews-and-so-on/?utm_term=.ed5e665b25b5
 

Man God

Non-Canon Member
That also ignores the very real religious discrimination that existed. But yes, they were treated as white by the law. You were always better off being Italian/Irish/Eastern European than a Latino just as you were always better off being a Latino than black.
 
Also as a sidenote, passingGAF, you guys ever had people appear legitimately uncomfortable once they realized you weren't "white"? That happened to me once. Still undecided if it was hilarious or sad.

I've been called a liar as an adult. Hell, I look very white. As a kid I had people try to convince me I was adopted because I didn't have the same skin, hair, and eye color as my mom or brother. I was called Casper a lot. My mom is mixed Native American and Czech(Bohemian), I got all the recessive genes with regard to pigmentation. So I look white but also have fun childhood memories like*redacted, shouldn't put family stuff out there like that*


But to answer the OP, I'm considered white. I'm more white than native, so I'm considered a mixed race white guy, I suppose.
 

Disxo

Member
Also as a sidenote, passingGAF, you guys ever had people appear legitimately uncomfortable once they realized you weren't "white"? That happened to me once. Still undecided if it was hilarious or sad.
Well, that actually never happened to me, but I had comments from argentinians, spanish and many other europeans about my "whiteness", the way I act and my pale skin even though I am latino/uruguayan.
Would be nice to surprise americans someday.

Demographics are very diverse.
 
I'm half Latino, and look white. People see me as white, but I don't really identify with white identity.

Some massive brainwash shit has been done to people of latin american origin in the US that they now think latino is a race instead of someone that comes from the region of the Americas where Latin derived languages are predominant.
 
Italians are White though, at least in America. Is it different elsewhere?

Asians will probably never be considered White in America regardless of their skin color.

White is the most exclusive club in the US. Asians will never be part of that club. If you have a readily identifiable feature that can be used to put you in the "others" category, they will put you there no hesitation.

For Asians? Obviously the epicanthic folds
 
White is the most exclusive club in the US. Asians will never be part of that club. If you have a readily identifiable feature that can be used to put you in the "others" category, they will put you there no hesitation.

For Asians? Obviously the epicanthic folds

No doubt. It's why you have the "bamboo ceiling" and the current issues with Asian representation in American films, but we're more than happy to cast Europeans to play Americans.

I'm not American and I never knew hispanic/latino people weren't considered 'white'.

Half of all Latino/Hispanic Americans are considered White.

So if i mine ancestry is 10% black 5% middle eastern and 15% jews and 70 % European so that make me mixed race?

What do people think you look like? Plenty of people have mixed ancestry and pick a side.
 
Well, that actually never happened to me, but I had comments from argentinians, spanish and many other europeans about my "whiteness", the way I act and my pale skin even though I am latino/uruguayan.
Would be nice to surprise americans someday.

Demographics are very diverse.

Hey hermano, vamos arriba UruGAF ;)


Not everywhere, check the souther cone: Chile, Argentina and Uruguay.
Those places are whiter that even the US.

Chile definitely not since a good chunk of the population clearly look "mestizo".
Argentina yes, if you don't take in consideration the north of the country.
Uruguay is the definitely the whitest country of South America, but 10 % auto-identify as afro-uruguayo. It's very uneven though.
 
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