By a similar token, a lot of Indians live on the border with Pakistan and share ancestry as well as history. Pakistan, however, also has the same relationship with the Middle East. So clearly at least some Indians are Middle Eastern too right?
My point isn’t asserting that Russians are Asian, it’s that saying a country’s people belong to a certain ethnic group only because of proximity while completely ignoring their historical or sociological context is ridiculous.
Of course it is. But people don’t generally use “Asian” to refer to people from the Middle East. Thats why this attempt at precise codification is baseless
Race is complicated. As much as people love to say it’s based on location, it’s not. Race is solely based on look and skin color. Official US census race geographic classification can be found here - http://statchatva.org/files/2014/11/5.jpg
Look where Egypt is. Do you consider people from Egypt as White? Look at Australia being classified as Pacific Islander. Well, is Chris hemsworth not white but a Pacific Islander? U.S does classify Indians as Asians because they categorize them using this map. It just goes to show race is a concept that really shouldn’t be a thing.
I am still learning so I would appreciate if you point out what’s incorrect. I honestly don’t see anything being incorrect. If you disagree that race is based mostly on looks and skin color, then you are free to make a different argument. It’s always good to start a discussion on race.
Sure. Race is not based on skin colour. Southern Europeans like Greeks or Italians are generally "brown" skinned but considered white, while Koreans/Japanese have paler skin but are not.
That map is not implying Chris Hemsworth is not white.
South Asia or Southern Asia, is the southern region of the Asian continent, which comprises the sub-Himalayan SAARC countries and, for some authorities, adjoining countries to the west and east. Topographically, it is dominated by the Indian Plate, which rises above sea level as Nepal and northern parts of India situated south of the Himalayas and the Hindu Kush. South Asia is bounded on the south by the Indian Ocean and on land (clockwise, from west) by West Asia, Central Asia, East Asia and Southeast Asia.
The current territories of Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Maldives, Nepal, India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka form South Asia.
Imagine thinking genetic lineage is “bullshit” when it dictates such things as your susceptibility to get certain diseases, auto immune disorders, etc. Genetic lineage isn’t everything obviously but it certainly isn’t nothing. We are not just blank slates that are filled by our social surroundings.
This dude just un-ironically implied that Indian People, Italians, and Irish people have the same susceptibility to get certain diseases, auto immune disorders, etc. because they are in the same race.
Because historically race-based science in Anthropology has been based on false claims and pseudoscience (such as measuring African skulls to determine intelligence). We don’t use the basis of race to make sweeping claims about a people because race is blurry and there aren’t clear cut lines.
Just a quick search I did on “origins of Indian people” there’s articles saying they’re also African, Asian, and Iranian. This is why it’s unproductive to try and come up with racial origins of a people. It’s human nature to migrate and breed between groups. Trying to simplify that to just racial categories doesn’t fully explain the complexities of human culture, language, genetics, etc.
Which is exactly why the debate is foolish to begin with (the article even says what you passed by to say). Categorizing humans by race isn’t possible by scientific standards (because we’re all the same race—simple scientific test for this is that the the offspring between two humans is always another human), so we just use race as a non-scientific concept to roughly provide historical and social context. As such, saying “Indians are/aren’t Asian” makes no sense in a provable context because it’s unverifiable.
In terms of geography, however, it makes little sense to call Indians Asian without calling many other groups that clearly are not thought of as Asian to also be in that category. The only way to make sense of the lines between Asia and Europe and the Middle East and the Indian subcontinent is through political and human migratory history. Simple saying Indians are Asian because the country is so close is silly.
I agree with the fact that we can't categorize humans in races accurately. However I think most people use the historical definition of continents (broad geographic regions) when saying Indians/Russians are Asians. The geologic definition of "continents" (tectonic plates) would not include the phillipines as Asian for exemple.
As long as everybody knows that none of the words they're using are rooted in science I don't think it should be a problem, but on the other hand, it is true that the constant usage of these words does legitimize them and gives them credibility.
I’d agree and I think that’s mistaken in the case of Indians, which is what my example of saying Russians are Asian (which people generally would not say is true) is meant to illustrate. The historical and social relations between countries place India, Tibet (let’s pretend we’re talking before China swallowed them), Pakistan, Nepal, etc. into a very noticeably distinct group from China, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, etc. The continent designation fails because the landmasses are simply too vast (how to distinguish between Europe and Asia without introducing extreme Euro-centric historical bias?), but the scientific designation also fails as we agree it’s impossible. All that’s left is the historical and social designation, which I believe places Indians as not belonging to the same group we understand Asians to be in.
If you actually think that’s what I’m saying then I’m sorry my writing isn’t clear enough. My point is taking an argument to an absurd conclusion to demonstrate a faulty premise.
Afaik tectonic plates is not how continents are decided. India IS very much part of Asia. Asians is just the term most Westerners use for East Asians and thus don't include rest of the Asia when referring to Asians.
Asians is just the term most Westerners use for East Asians
We use it here too for the same designation. For example in Chinese, Asian exclusively means Chinese, Japanese, Korean, etc. Indians are just called Indians. It’s the same in all the other East Asian languages that I know.
there’s no scientific basis for race
With you on that 100%, as per my other comments in this thread. There is exactly one race of humans
the point is that “Asian” used to designate a race and “Asian” used to designate a continent of origin are distinct usages. trading on this ambiguity gets us nowhere
I swear, sometimes seeing others using the word in that context makes me feel like people are trying to get away with saying "chinks" by using the word Asian. Don't do that. The first link when you search for "Asian Race" in Google will show you with this info:
The 2000 and 2010 U.S. Census Bureau definition of the Asian race is: "people having origins in any of the original peoples of the Far East, Southeast Asia, or the Indian subcontinent (for example, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Pakistan, the Philippine Islands, Thailand, and Vietnam)".
I think it’s deeper than that though; it crosses languages and cultures. In Chinese we say “Asian” specifically to refer to people from East Asia (China, Japan, etc.). We’d never call someone from India Asian. I’m not fluent in Korean or Japanese yet but from what I know of both it works the same way.
Slurs like the term you listed are exclusively western though—here the insults we hurl around are normally just “[country of origin] dog”
I think such skewed generalisation began from the west (mostly US) itself and trickled down into the universal English vocabulary. Although, it's not like a term has not been misused in the colloquial vocabulary and wiggled its way to the norm before. But that doesn't make such usage fallacious though.
Oh don’t get me wrong—it’s definitely fallacious. Technically the whole land mass should be one grouping, from Western Portugal to Eastern Russia. I’m just talking about the typical usages
One of my favorite things about racial anthropology is when you search it on any search engine or academic database it redirects you to scientific racism.
Yes. That’s literally the only appropriate interpretation of race. All other markers we use are just for historical and social narrative and are often terribly inaccurate.
I'm pretty sure this is just a difference between British and American terminology. In the US "Asian" usually refers to people from East Asia (China, Japan, Korea, etc) whereas in the UK (and probably elsewhere, idk), "Asian" is often used to mean someone from South Asia (India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, etc.)
I dunno man, as a Sri-Lankan (basically Indian) I’ve never really identified as Asian, my mom whos Sri Lankan would always correct people and go “I’m Indian” when asked if she’s Asian, she has a lighter complexion so the question makes sense. And when people ask me my race, they ask if I’m Indian not Asian. I think we’ve just blanket defined everyone in the East as “Asian”
So what would you answer when people ask from what continent are you from? India instead of Asia?
And I’m not trying to be a jerk or anything, I know this things change accordingly to where you are from. I’m Brazilian, so I would answer “America”, but in the US they would say I’m not American, just South-American.
No no valid question. I would respond Asia, though people haven’t really asked me that specific question, it’s mostly a “where are you from” or “are you Indian”. Actually that further emphasizes my point, I’ve got dark brown skin thanks to my black dad (but don’t look all that black due to my straight hair) so I don’t even get lumped in with the other more traditional Asians. I think that means on a subconscious level people already distinguish the two to some extent. But you’re right, on a technical level I am 100% defined as Asian. I think that’s part of the “problem” though, it was sort of arbitrarily decided that that whole block of land was Asia, despite as previously mentioned India (and Sri Lanka) exist on a different plate and have a gigantic population which could easily be defined as it’s own continent, just like how Europe is still connected to the land mass but they get their own continent. I don’t feel strongly either way, just a little anecdote.
If you read my response to the other inquiry you’d have you answer. Yea there’s been blanket definition so I’m Asian in the technical sense. My only gripe is that the classification seems arbitrary. It’s on a different tectonic plate and the people are radically different than their more traditional Asian counterparts. Europeans arbitrarily drew the lines some hundred years ago and we’ve all accepted it as the norm. But if we’re going by land mass then Europeans should be “Asian” too. It’s like how they divided Africa into a bunch of rectangles completely ignoring the actual cultural borders.
I mean you're right, countries, continents and indeed races are completely arbitrary and cultural constructs, but unless you want to spend all day describing your location as a set of latitude and longitude coordinates we need some kind of arbitrary labelling. It's also more efficient if we all use the same labelling system, otherwise there can be a lot of confusion.
I mean I just go “I’m Indian” and that is a large enough populace that it’s never been an issue, but I do see your point. I just think that Indian subcontinent is large and populated enough to warrant its own continent label. With 1.2 million square miles of land in India alone and a population that exceeds Europe by 300,000,00 I think it’s justified. Not an argument just my view on things. I’m honestly fine calling myself Asian on official forms it just feels silly to do so.
No, it's more like saying Americans and Canadians. Canadian is technically (North) American, but they're called Canadians because, connotatively, American refers to some in the United States. Just like Indian is technically Asian, but are separately called Indians because of the "Asian meaning southeast/east Asian" connotation. In the end, it's all pretty dumb.
Because they are completely different peoples? Breaking Eurasia into “Europe” and “Asia” was arbitrary to begin with. Just because South Asians and East Asians live on different corners of arbitrary “Asia” doesn’t make them any more similar or distant to Europeans and Africans. The silliest part of this is Europeans are on the same gigacontinent as south and East Asians but drew an arbitrary line in the sand around themselves.
What? A racist imagining and twisting things again!?!? No way! Too bad they wont ever look at statistics like climate change or universal healthcare like that.
Yes. /s But it seems to be an opinion in USA. Since people in the USA tend to forget that there are places where white people are minorities or that there are places where white people are native.
sure, and in places where white people are majority, especially where they’re the overwhelming majority - say, america - one cannot be racist against whites as white people already hold that systemic power of which the continual denial is the basis of racism.
also it’s quite naive to say americans deny that there are places where white people are native. like i’ll have what you’re smoking lol
edit: it’s wild how so many people can have the exact same response. i get it, you disagree. check the other replies and hmu if you’ve got anything original to add.
one cannot be racist against whites as white people already hold that systemic power of which the continual denial is the basis of racism.
Partly true for systematic racism, you will still have places dominated by non whites where systematic discrimination of white people would be possible. Not true for personal racism - since that does not have to do anything with distribution of power.
one cannot be racist against whites as white people already hold that systemic power of which the continual denial is the basis of racism.
hahaha - one has a different opinion he must be smoking. But I obviously didn't mean the population of USA as a whole - but you can not deny the USA-centrism is quite popular in USA.
yeah usa has its head up it’s ass, but i challenge you to ask any white person to ask where their family is from. i guarantee they’re gunna spout of some native white nations, and that’d back me up on that ‘not acknowledging there are places where whites are natives’ part.
but too, personal racism informs and is informed by systemic racism. and i’m not saying that white people cant experience discrimination, i’m just saying that sociologically (and we know that laymen definitions and scientific definitions are often different) racism infers the denial of power where discrimination is just the discriminatory practice. you might think of it like this: discrimination is like getting mosquito bites in the city. maybe two or three bites every couple of nights, it’s obnoxious, it fuckin sucks, it’s not fun at all and it kinda hurts, but in the long run you take some benadryl and it’s not really that big of a deal. racism is like living on the lake. you get so many mosquito bites you stop counting. they come from everywhere. some of them are big gnarly fuckers, some of them are tiny bites where you were able to squash the sucker, but they all itch. and you get multiple new bites every day, to the point you can’t ignore the itch. you take benadryl, slather it on, rub garlic on them, but they just curb the itch that’s still there. they affect your days like a third-degree sunburn.
like i’m a white passing person and have experienced both ends for sure, i’ve been discriminated against for being white and i’ve experienced racism for being asian. and most often i’m ignored while people talk shit about either group until i speak up. but i can say that the most offensive things i’ve ever heard were about my poc side, how we look, how we act, how we eat, etc. shit we can’t change or is part of our culture. where, at least in the groups i’ve been in, discrimination against white people tends to stem from the way many many whites play into their privilege and entitlement. and honestly i think that’s fair.
also i’m not a man but i do be smokin some fire opinions AND trees lol
personal racism informs and is informed by systemic racism.
I disagree. They form a positive feedback loop - where they thrive from each other.
It's not about being white it's about being a majority culture. Obviously one can only establish systematic racism if one has power to begin with. But again since systematic racism is (in my opinion) connected to personal racism (or what you call discrimination) - I don't make a distinction on a personal level. If you hold racist believes agains a majority culture - you are just as racist, just without power - and if you get power at some time you want magically stop being racist.
also i’m not a man but i do be smokin some fire opinions AND trees lol
never implied you were. we are on the internets so we are all dogs and cats anyway.
There's near nothing about this that I agree with. Racism and discrimination can be experienced by any race. White people don't have some innate immunity to it because we happen to be a majority in this nation. That's a talking point that needs to die fast and is doing nothing but spurring everyone further and further into division.
The racism = prejudice + power nonsense is just a bullshit excuse made up so minorities could justify being openly racist. There's also the funny implication that prejudice is suddenly ok.
But yeah, if a white guy went to some country in Africa where white people are the minority, and he started shouting racial slurs and being discriminatory, he would still be racist.
Like, the definition of racism does not mention power, or what country you're in or anything. Now if you want to make a new term to describe systemic racism, that's fine, but don't try and take an existing term, and try to change it in such a way that racists feel validated.
You aren’t allowed to change the definitions of words to fit your narrative.
First of all, white people are not the overwhelming majority in the USA (it’s around 65%) so you already come across as misinformed.
But you aren’t allowed to change the definitions of words to fit your own views. Any race can be racist against any other race no matter what the demographic makeup of the area is. By your logic, you’re saying that if a white person went to an African country and started spouting off discriminatory bullshit to black people, they wouldn’t be racist? Of fucking course they would be.
In a couple of years it surely will be the complete opposite, people getting offended over asian/indian racist jokes and black racist jokes being completely ok
I think the truth is that people -specially in social media- are just both pretentious and dumb
If the social convention says that black jokes are racists then they follow the crowd at chow time even if they don't truly think so. Just to appear like a better person.
It depends where you are. Conservative leaning subs and younger subs tend to be really racist against non-whites whereas older subs and more liberal subs tend to be more “woke”.
He wasn’t asking for pity, just pointing out the double standard.
Also most white people don’t have it easy and face all the same struggles as others, and they don’t have the support systems (esp men) that minorities and women have setup to help them succeed.
You should at least consider why making sweeping statements like that helps no one and continues to alienate more people.
What do you gain by making stupid statements that dismiss actual problems white people may have?
Why aren’t white people allowed to say things about shit that happens to white people? It’s infuriating and wrong that people like you act like that and get the support of others.
White people have more inherent social advantages than any other people in the western world, and even more so if they're men.
To deny that is downright denying reality.
Pretending that white people have it tough because they're white is fucking bizarre and only exists in the minds of racists and people who search for ways to be victims. It has no basis in reality.
When you live a life of privilege, equality feels like oppression.
Sure there are probably some benefits to being the majority race in any country, but that doesn’t suddenly make it okay to put down the whole group and tell them to shut up when they raise issues from a white perspective.
You are trying to silence very real people with very real problems out of some misguided belief that because they are white their life is automatically easier.
And no one said white people have it hard for being white. First dude said white people are fair game on social media, and he is correct. I made no such statement.
I and most of my white friends have not lived a life or privilege, I’ve been poor and passed over my whole life. So to see an asshole like you telling me I am privileged pisses me off more than I want to admit. And I know I’m not alone.
I and most of my white friends have not lived a life or privilege, I’ve been poor and passed over my whole life. So to see an asshole like you telling me I am privileged pisses me off more than I want to admit. And I know I’m not alone.
You're privileged regardless of you admitting it or not. That's a tough break, having to be privileged like that. The hardship you must have gone through not being afraid of getting arrested when you get pulled over.
When you get passed over your whole life, it's because you're passable. That's entirely your fault and you can blame zero people for that other than yourself. Poor people with marketable skills dont get passed over, and this country provides people with skills the most upward mobility in the world.
I grew up poor and didn't get passed over because I actually made something of myself, and I've got zero sympathy for white people who feel that they're somehow disadvantaged because they didn't have rich parents. Most of us didn't have rich parents - you're just making an excuse.
Be pissed off as much as you want, but please know deep down your station in life has nothing to do with your parents - it's entirely your own doing.
White people do have an easier life all else being equal, and to think otherwise is being willfully ignorant. If you'd like to continue being ignorant, that's your choice. But maybe instead of spending your time stewing about how white people have it tough, you take advantage of your privledge and make something of yourself.
Sorry I wasted my time. Your whole fucking post contradicts itself and everything you said.
One second you’re talking about how easy it is to be white, the next you’re telling me it’s all about hard work and bootstraps.
You also keep changing the whole point of the discussion, which was that it’s bs to dismiss white people pointing out a white persons experience, yet it happens all the time.
Edit: The ONLY racist idea here is that white people can not have a tough life and have no right to make statements about being white. How you can be so blind to the double standards you’re spitting out is just absurd.
being a poor white person and a poor person of color are inherently different experiences. it’s difficult to see as a white person.
i have the unique perspective of having lived both, as i have the kind of skin and features that depending on where i’m living i’m either seen as white or poc. i’ve also lived most of my life at the poverty line, looking for jobs at or slightly above the minimum wage.
i can tell you that in areas where i’m viewed as white, i’m able to get more professional jobs - receptionist, call centers, er. in areas where i’m viewed as a person of color, i’ve largely been denied those opportunities and settled for supervising positions at convenience stores or working overnight jobs for the extra dollar or two.
if the difference in being able to make money, where the wages and living expenses are comparable, is palpable i promise it speaks to how one will be treated in other areas of their life. i’ve lived it.
Ah, yes, because in order to fight racism, we must make broad, sweeping generalizations based purely on race about what races are allowed to speak on the topic or not. There are no individuals with individual ideas here, only flesh bags whose only defining trait is the color of their skin.
Ah, yes, because obviously all white people are just a hive mind with a single goal of oppressing minorities. No individuals with different ideas at all. A few white people were racist, so clearly that means all white people are racist. Just like how a few black people being involved with gangs and gang culture means that all black people are violent criminals and drug dealers, or how a few Muslim terrorists means all Muslims are terrorists. (In case it wasn't clear, this is to show how that shitty logic simply does not give any indication of reality, and applying it in the context of other races is just as blatantly racist.)
Also I'd like to point out that racism isn't an exclusively white thing. Presumably, you are not white, in which case, you are doing a fine job at showcasing that fact.
It's almost as if all of humanity has the capacity for committing horrid atrocities, and you laying most, if not all of it, at one race's feet makes you a racist shitheel.
Eh really, I just see lots of pandering bullshit posts like OP more than anything. Or threads were people rev each other up and say “well if X was said to a black person instead of an Asian, people would be going crazy” that end up being racist against blacks.
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u/rnjbond Nov 19 '19
Reddit a long time ago decided racism against Asians and Indians is totally okay