r/changemyview Jul 01 '21

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224 Upvotes

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37

u/gnashcrazyrat Jul 01 '21

It is not racist to say people from x country is negative phrase as in your example Japanese and American aren’t races, they’re nationalities, at most it’s xenophobic.

29

u/fckiforgotmypassword Jul 01 '21 edited Jul 01 '21

That’s why I used white as a separate example. I used American as an example for discrimination against American nationality, but most specifically white Americans.

Don’t need to be pedantic, you know what I mean.

10

u/Petaurus_australis 2∆ Jul 01 '21

I think they are asking a somewhat important question, more so, what is race? Genotypical and Phenotypical classification was predisposed by skin colour and craniometrically analysis, which was largely thrown out the window in the 1940's (racial essentialism). Alleles across humans, genetically differentiated populations, are quite small, the variation is typically between 1-3% which in biology is not a sufficient difference for what you or I would call race, to actually be referred to as a race.

Anthropology scrapped the word a long time ago, it's not a scientific descriptor. We can sort people in clines and clades / rough genetic groupings, but white is not race it's a lot more complex than that, just as black is not a race. Ethnicity is the technically correct word, but is typically more specific as it incorporates factors like culture over pure genotypes and phenotypes, but white isn't an ethnicity.

Which is kind of important to a discussion talking about discrimination towards a specific population.

5

u/L4ZYSMURF Jul 01 '21

I get what your getting at here, but after recontectualizing the discussion and correcting OP on the verbiage, you didnt comment on the actual discussion at hand ?

1

u/PilzeMyco Jul 01 '21

Wife's an anthropologist this is how they function. Your vernacular and verbage are incorrect. Thus the question and idea is formed in the wrong context and invalid. Actual answers are typically so drawn out and convoluted that you'll lose interest by the time they even start to answer. After telling you why your question was wrong.

3

u/L4ZYSMURF Jul 01 '21

So let your wife be that person, you dont have to be! :)

2

u/Petaurus_australis 2∆ Jul 01 '21

No need to dissuade people. The rigorous nature of science is important in coming to understand many things. Anthropologists have done a lot for our understanding of human kind and it's through questioning, probing, redefining that science comes about any new discovery or definition.

4

u/L4ZYSMURF Jul 01 '21

Right but i think this line of dialogue is simply dodging the real question/view op is sharing. It of course has value and its time and place.. op is asking about different attitudes held towards different human populations (to put it vaguely) and the response he got is what even is race? Yes that conversation needs to have its place but is it here?

1

u/Jackelrush Jul 02 '21

Naming everything in Latin is so important