Because AAs are a minority therefore the survival instinct is strong, They may think that if more and more mixed-heritage people reject their AA identity, after a while , there might not be an AA identity at all, which is not wrong, because alreay AAs are "quite mixed" compared to the average African in Africa.
I've heard precisely that argument from an African-American supporter of the ODR. I'd consider too the possibility that some African-Americans fear that they will "lose" accomplished mixed-race individuals of whom they are proud, e.g., Obama.
Posted: Fri 17 Jul 2009 23:29 Post subject: "self-preservation"
fwsweet wrote:
EraMera wrote:
Self-preservation maybe?
You must mean "group-preservation," not "self-preservation." I see no way that person-A's choice of self-identity can affect person-B's survival. Such loss of members can affect the survival only of person-B's group.
EraMera wrote:
Because AAs are a minority therefore the survival instinct is strong
Again, you must be talking about group survival, not the survival of any specific individual. I am not sure that a group's drive to expand or to avoid shrinking is an "instinct." As far as I know, only individual organisms can have instincts. To be honest, I am not really sure about this. Honeybee hives, termite mounds, and ants colonies seem to have group instincts. But I do not think that mammals work that way.
Still, I think that you are helping the thread boil down to a perception of threat to the group whenever someone seems to abandon the group. This may also explain why Hispanics are exempt. A Euro-looking person born to A-A parents who chooses a different self-identity is seen as someone who "is really African-American" (in JoshH's charming terminology) but is denying it, While a Puerto Rican of visible Afro ancestry was never "really" A-A to begin with.
American Indians and Asians are both far smaller "minorities" than AAs, yet they aren't wedded to forced hypodescent when defining their members.
Posted: Tue 28 Jul 2009 17:00 Post subject: Re: "self-preservation"
Powell wrote:
American Indians and Asians are both far smaller "minorities" than AAs, yet they aren't wedded to forced hypodescent when defining their members.[/quote]
Unless I'm in error, neither Native Americans nor Asians were ever legally constrained by the one drop rule. And whites with fractional NA or Asian blood have frequently been deemed white. So I think the historical background is substantially different.
I believe there is a great deal of hostility and/or intrusive curiosity on the part of AAs and I feel the hostility is largely indulged by many liberals of all colors. I'm 3/4's Southern Italian and a quarter Dutch, and I would rate the level of inadvertent racism and borderline nasty probing questions and assertions ("well, you look black to ME...") about my racial identity as much higher with AA than whites. Granted, in my life time I've seen it shift from evenly split between whites and AA's to almost all AA's. Public transit is particularly bad on occasion. I've never had one AA person EVER smile and be polite when I tell them I'm white.
Many famous Italian Americans in the media eye's are only half or a quarter Itl. and few are of true Southern stock. plus as many Ilts. assimilated (my grandparents on both sides changed their names to appear more Irish) we are in perhaps the grayest area of all Euro immigrants and easily the one group most at odds with AAs for obvious reasons-Silvio Berlusconi is not helping!
I think that many white liberals (not true Leftists) have been very careful to not step on anyone toes so their prevailing attitude is:
" the vast majority of black people, especially when it comes to middle-class black people with a bigger, more "normalized" slice of the pie, are not "blatantly racist." and " Because whites don't have any historical REASON to hate or resent blacks, but blacks DO have a reason to resent whites, I find it impossible, and ridiculous, to try and equate the two sets of ill-will, on some kind of equal moral footing. That is just white people looking for someone else to blame for their own sorry history of mistreating minorities. It is ALWAYS the moral responsibility, in my mind, of the majority, to take lone responsibility for its cruelty to the minority, and not instead gripe about the resentment expressed by that same minority, and demand that the minority join it in pretending that everything is equal, and has been for a long time, and that any complaints from the minority against the majority are "racist." Hogwash."
The above quote is from a white friend of mine regarding a debate where I felt that blacks can have just as much blatancy in regards to racism and whites and she disagreed. To me it be speaks of liberalism and it's apologies for black on white racism. White liberals are simply to scared to ever question AAs on the ODR because they feel it is an AA's right to be "proud of their heritage" and that if extends to AAs labeling of someone else's heritage incorrectly and unjustifiably, that they deserve that free pass because of what "they've suffered"
I don't think I'd go so far as to offer a free pass, but I'm among those who do make allowances. How could I do otherwise, given the very overt and officially-sanctioned white racism in the United States even in my lifetime?
If you kick a guy, you shouldn't be surprised if he kicks back -- and if you have to be especially nice to his kid to heal the wounds and convince the kid that you've turned over a new leaf.
Perhaps it helps to be in late middle age. People born more recently have seen only a much-improved and much less racist America. For them, the days when black Americans couldn't live in the same neighborhoods or attend the same schools as whites are matters of history, rather than memory, and it's easy to forget that many alive were victims of those practices.
If you kick a guy, you shouldn't be surprised if he kicks back -- and if you have to be especially nice to his kid to heal the wounds and convince the kid that you've turned over a new leaf.
I am confused. Have you or anyone you know been kicked by a multiracial person and kicked back? Was this supposed to be an analogy? If so, it is very confusing.
Yes, I intended it as an analogy or figurative description, the implication being that if one group hurts another group, the members of the second group are likely to respond in kind.
Yes, I intended it as an analogy or figurative description, the implication being that if one group hurts another group, the members of the second group are likely to respond in kind.
Your thesis, as I understand it, is that some people who self-identify as "African-American" today are hostile to people of sub-Saharan ancestry who do not self-identify as "African-American" today, because some of the ancestors of those who self-identify as "African American" today were mistreated by Whites in years past. Is that correct?
In other words, group-A (past Whites) mistreated group-B (past self-identified A-As), and this explains why group-C (present-day self-identified A-As) are hostile to group-D (present-day Americans of some SSA who reject A-A self-identity).
Yes, I intended it as an analogy or figurative description, the implication being that if one group hurts another group, the members of the second group are likely to respond in kind.
Your thesis, as I understand it, is that some people who self-identify as "African-American" today are hostile to people of sub-Saharan ancestry who do not self-identify as "African-American" today, because some of the ancestors of those who self-identify as "African American" today were mistreated by Whites in years past. Is that correct?
I hadn't intended to make an assertion here, but rather to confirm, on a personal and anecdotal level, whiteisbeautiful's hypothesis that some of us liberals make allowances for some actions by black Americans on the basis of a sense of social responsibility. And I think the criteria for doing so are much looser than the criteria needed to make an assertion of this sort.
Anyway, on a personal level, it does seem to me that in the absence of black slavery and white racism, the ODR wouldn't be an issue today. But I wouldn't insert that "because" -- those conditions may have been necessary, but I don't think they were sufficient, as witness the fact that the ODR didn't take hold in other nations. I still haven't seen a satisfactory answer to the question you posed here a while back, namely, why the one drop rule attained importance in the United States but not in other nations in which Africans were enslaved.
I still haven't seen a satisfactory answer to the question you posed here a while back, namely, why the one drop rule attained importance in the United States but not in other nations in which Africans were enslaved.
I think it was clearly the newness and bigness of the states. The Anglo-Saxons were really clear about how to invade and spread out and wanted no one else to have that ability. A big country meant more places for "undesirables" to hide, migrate and potentially grow in numbers thus they were sectioned, relegated and labeled long after slavery was abolished.
Indians were virtually wiped out and with all due respect to A.D. Powell and the double standards that she so succinctly points out, you will go places where they are still known by racists today as "Timber N*ggers", the wiped out race is not a threat anymore, Hispanics have straight hair and lighter skin but AAs are a "huge threat". I think its as simple as that.
The one drop is perhaps the last vestige of slavery and the fear that blacks would 'become white' ironically, many of the white supremacist websites feel anti-racist follow the rule more than they do. Many posters believe someone such as say Danzy Senna or Lynda Carter, as long as they have no physical or social ties to the AA or Latino world respectively and they don't know about their past, is ostensibly white. Whereas as many multi/anti-racist boards have postings similar to this
Quote:
...the growing strength of the Black community is such that binds us all together and gives us all something to be very proud of. We are such a strong people and I want everyone even remotely associated with it to at least have an opportunity to embrace, know and love what is a part of us all. Now if there are other cultures in your gene pool, then by all means, we can love that too, and teach our children while we‘re at it.
The collective spirit tends to equate perhaps unintentionally with bullying and circular logic. "Don't tell us who we can be but I feel we should absorb others." Or bogus history written mostly by white racists:
Quote:
In some way the ODR was very important. If not for the ODR and there was a 3 tier system I think the Mulattos wouldn't really care about the blacks; since back in the day alot of mulattos distanced themselves from blacks and dark skinned people. Also they often tryed to associate with whites more then blacks and where alot of times trying to be whiter then white kinda like the Coloureds of South Africa and the Louisiana Creole of Color.
Quote:
In every story I've read about an Afro-descended American person "passing" back in the day, it always began with them admitting they were doing so for selfish reasons. They made a conscious decision not to be associated with the families that raised and cared for them their entire life up til that point they chose to "pass" all to appease "White" citizens who didn't even view their darker kinfolk as true hue-mans.
The occasional glimpse of very brave logic that one wishes many in the AA community could share or at least admit and move on from:
Quote:
The Blacks that don't want to be black themselves are the ones that enforce the one drop rule upon someone they know damn well doesn't look black ( I'm sorry if you as a black person have to ask a mulatto(a) what they are then they cant possibly look like what is commonly seen as a black phenotype cause if they did you wouldn't be asking that question you would just know) , These are the particular blacks that you see attack a biracial/mulatto person that's identifies as biracial They do this with people that have some black or even a drop of black blood ( can any one say Mariah Carey),
Quote:
It seems like some blacks look at being black as inferior and are pissed off cause they cant pass for anything but black while most biracial/mulatto people come out looking like something other than JUST black. (most mixed people you can tell they are mixed, and there are some blacks that are pissed off by that, just WONT SAY IT). Why do u think more than half of Black American's enforce the one drop rule ? A lot of blacks would rather embrace black blood being looked at as a contamination then let biracial black/white mixes be recognized as what we are? if blacks cant escape i.e blackness then they want to make sure we cant either, hence for why the one drop rule is imposed on us by blacks before a white person even says anything about one drop.we are treated As if by US wanting to be looked at as biracial ( what we really are mind you) means we want to escape our black heritage or something, that's so not the case and most black people know this but want to make it as if we're ashamed and try and make us feel guilty for it because secretly they're really ashamed of being black themselves)
Why else would you as a black person embrace a concept that says black blood in a contamination? this is the other reason why you have so many blacks saying "Well all black people are mixed" (and or biracial) when they know damn well most blacks are not mixed enough to be considered biracial. I'm sorry but a couple drops of some other race in you doesn't make you biracial
Why don't we see any blacks challenging the one drop rule since it is saying that black blood is so dirty that just one drop of it is enough to erase anything else you are mixed with. No black person challenges it because they want to keep it just the way it is, they don't want it to change, they don't want to be black all by themselves. it's very clear, why do u think they always bring up the one drop rule to a mixed person even before a white person does? They want to make sure we are seen as just black and nothing else.
There was this CNN show i was watching when Obama was running for pres. and it was a panel of 5 people with one black guy on the panel and one of the white guys says: "We could possibly have our first "Biracial President" and guess what the black guy did? he interrupted the white guy and said "First Black President, One drop, One Drop remember" he said this shit!!! so he made it a point to one drop Obama while the white panelist gave recognition to the fact he was biracial, and after that the white guy corrected himself and said " I'm sorry, the First Black President'
Posted: Wed 07 Oct 2009 05:04 Post subject: Re: "self-preservation"
fwsweet wrote:
Honeybee hives, termite mounds, and ants colonies seem to have group instincts. But I do not think that mammals work that way.
Biologist E.O. Wilson has written on the topic of a human superorganism in his book On Human Nature.
Powell wrote:
American Indians and Asians are both far smaller "minorities" than AAs, yet they aren't wedded to forced hypodescent when defining their members.
I think this is a very good point. I would add that hypodescent is not a feature of American Indian or Asian identity. It is an inherent feature of AA identity. Indeed, without hypodescent there would be no "black" or "white" identity and thus no "black" ethnicity.
JoshH wrote:
Anyway, on a personal level, it does seem to me that in the absence of black slavery and white racism, the ODR wouldn't be an issue today
The descendants of "white" slaves do not have this issue. Nor do the descendants of Chinese exclusion act victims nor Jews, nor other victims of excessive American racism. It would make more sense to consider that it is not black slavery nor white racism, per se, as much so as the labeling of certain people as "black" itself that has created this issue.
JoshH wrote:
I still haven't seen a satisfactory answer to the question you posed here a while back, namely, why the one drop rule attained importance in the United States but not in other nations in which Africans were enslaved.
In relation to many or most old world nations, Americans do not have a single defined sense of national racial-ethnicity. in fact, it is truly queer that anyone but the child of two immediate immigrant parents can trace their entire genetic ancestry to only one old world European or African (or otherwise) racial-ethnic group. So "white" Americans and "black" Americans are not "Europeans" and "Africans" but persons with mixed ancestries. Approximately 1/3 of "white" Americans have recent African ancestry. Nearly all others are some amalgam of a variety of European and/or other multiple racial-ethnicities that are thought to be distinct in the old world. Nearly all "blacks" or AAs have a mixture of recent African and European ancestry.
Given this setting, compounded by the general ignorance of most Americans about their own and each others' actual ancestral origins. More importantly, given America's class driven economic system, it seems inevitable that a caste system would emerge. And caste systems demand racial classification, however superficially constructed. Of course, this has changed somewhat since the civil right era and "black" and "white" are more than just caste groups. But many of the historically based caste elements remain.
Humans have a certain way of clinging to identities as if they were the most important things in the universe, even when those identities are not good for them individually or collectively. This must have something to do with the human mind's obsessive preoccupation with ideas and the powerful bond between the reflective self and kinship identification.
Posted: Wed 07 Oct 2009 19:48 Post subject: Re: "self-preservation"
erasmusinfinity wrote:
The descendants of "white" slaves do not have this issue. Nor do the descendants of Chinese exclusion act victims nor Jews, nor other victims of excessive American racism. It would make more sense to consider that it is not black slavery nor white racism, per se, as much so as the labeling of certain people as "black" itself that has created this issue.
Well, as I said, I don't consider black slavery or white racism to be sufficient causes for the one drop rule, as opposed to necessary ones. If nothing else, there would likely have been a much smaller African-American population had it not been for the forced importation of people from Africa.
That being said, I'm not sure I follow you here. You mention labeling as a possible cause, but some people were labeled Jewish or Chinese as well, and as you point out the ODR wasn't applied to them.
Off the top of my head, I can think of several reasons why that might be the case:
- Discrimination against Jews was in many though not all cases a matter of religious as opposed to ethnic or racial discrimination
- Hypodescent served the economic interests of slaveholders who wished to maintain ownership of the fair-skinned children of their female slaves
- Suppositions of African racial inferiority were more prevalent than suppositions of Jewish and Chinese racial inferiority
- Black slavery as practiced in the US left a legacy of uneducated former slaves who engaged in behavior that was objectionable to many in the white majority
And perhaps some others as well.
If I've misunderstood you, let me know.
Quote:
In relation to many or most old world nations, Americans do not have a single defined sense of national racial-ethnicity. in fact, it is truly queer that anyone but the child of two immediate immigrant parents can trace their entire genetic ancestry to only one old world European or African (or otherwise) racial-ethnic group. So "white" Americans and "black" Americans are not "Europeans" and "Africans" but persons with mixed ancestries. Approximately 1/3 of "white" Americans have recent African ancestry. Nearly all others are some amalgam of a variety of European and/or other multiple racial-ethnicities that are thought to be distinct in the old world. Nearly all "blacks" or AAs have a mixture of recent African and European ancestry.
I think it's worth pointing out thought that in parts of Europe and the Middle East SSA admixture appears to be extremely common. See for example the discussion at
To the best of my knowledge, most of these people aren't any more aware of their SSA heritage than Americans.
Quote:
Given this setting, compounded by the general ignorance of most Americans about their own and each others' actual ancestral origins. More importantly, given America's class driven economic system, it seems inevitable that a caste system would emerge. And caste systems demand racial classification, however superficially constructed. Of course, this has changed somewhat since the civil right era and "black" and "white" are more than just caste groups. But many of the historically based caste elements remain.
I think you're right that the treatment of African-Americans has significant similarity to a caste system. However, slavery excepted, the American economy would seem to me to have become and to have remained significantly less class-driven than the European one.
Quote:
Humans have a certain way of clinging to identities as if they were the most important things in the universe, even when those identities are not good for them individually or collectively. This must have something to do with the human mind's obsessive preoccupation with ideas and the powerful bond between the reflective self and kinship identification.
I've long suspected that group identity was functionally related to mating preferences that arise in the course of speciation, social or memetic evolution here substituting partly for genetic evolution. In short, an evolved tool for maintaining group diversity.
Whatever the cause, group identity is certainly powerful, and carries with it both powerful instincts and the cognitive distortions that to which they give rise, e.g., confirmation bias.
That being said, I'm not sure I follow you here. You mention labeling as a possible cause, but some people were labeled Jewish or Chinese as well, and as you point out the ODR wasn't applied to them.
Jewish persons are members of a religious group who might or might not have some vague sort of ancestral lineage. "Chinese people" are generally defined as people from China. "Black" Americans, on the other hand, are not a religion or meaningfully a people from a particular geographic locale, except vaguely as far as ancestral DNA has some vague role in colorism. They aren't "Africans" per se.
"Black" and "white" are categories of American persons who are of diverse mixtures. Historically, "white" was a flexible label that came to represent whoever was included as socially dominant. And this changed over time. "White" is not itself an ancestry, but a label that tells us which detectable ancestries are allowed to join the socially dominant in-group. "Black" has been the label for those who were socially excluded.
So, it is not that the ODR was applied to "blacks," as if "blackness" were some sort of fixed ancestral population. It is that the ODR is a feature of "blackness" itself.
JoshH wrote:
I think it's worth pointing out thought that in parts of Europe and the Middle East SSA admixture appears to be extremely common. See for example the discussion at
To the best of my knowledge, most of these people aren't any more aware of their SSA heritage than Americans.
Good point and interesting link.
I suspect that the main reason for the US black-white dyad stems most fundamentally from our economic system and it's unprecedented scale of inequity. And because wealth is so largely inherited in the US, it seems to me inevitable that whatever kinship groups happen to be formed will become stratified and that the class structure will thus become a caste structure.
Also, the scale of global mixture is much greater in the US than any large area in the old world. As many as half of Americans have a mixture of recent African and European ancestry. Nearly all parts of Europe, Africa and Asia are represented within the US racial mix in varying proportions, and most all non-indigenous new world populations are from somewhere else. Europeans are not Americans any more so than Africans, as certain historical populations are more so established within certain geographic regions in Europe and Africa. For example, if a Frenchman is supposed to be a Gaul then an American is supposed to be a what?
JoshH wrote:
I think you're right that the treatment of African-Americans has significant similarity to a caste system. However, slavery excepted, the American economy would seem to me to have become and to have remained significantly less class-driven than the European one.
Why?
JoshH wrote:
Whatever the cause, group identity is certainly powerful, and carries with it both powerful instincts and the cognitive distortions that to which they give rise, e.g., confirmation bias.
I agree that F. James Davis, Who is Black?: One Nation's Definition (University Park PA: State University of Pennsylvania, 1991) is an outstanding book. Bear in mind, however, that it is not the best source for molecular data. It was published years before the genome was decoded and over a decade before ancestry-informative DNA markers were discovered.
kendo wrote:
most other blacks in america do not have any admixture at all.
Incorrect. The overwhelming majority of African Americans carry Euro DNA markers. Count the dots in the second cluster from the left. How many are NOT on the bottom axis? Only those dots on the bottom axis depict A-A individuals who lack Euro markers.
I am curious as to where you got your data, as it contradicts all of the serious studies that I have seen. Either way, look closely at your wording.
kendo wrote:
since then however recent studies studies suggest the average % of white blood in african americans is around 17% i think.
most other blacks in america do not have any admixture at all.
To say that the average AA has 17% "white" blood, is not the same thing as to say that all but 17% of AAs do not have any European ancestry at all. Or as you put it, that "most other blacks in america do not have any admixture at all." It does not make sense as leaving us with an 83% figure of AA persons not having any European ancestry at all.
To the contrary, your 17% figure would suggest that most, if not nearly all, AAs have a meaningful percentage of European ancestry. To that exact figure, having on average somewhere between one entirely European grandparent and one entirely European great grandparent.
Further examination of the data from which you obtained a 17% figure would be needed to ascertain how wide of a spread there is from this average of 17%-accross the broad population of AAs. For example, is it that there are as many AAs with 0% European ancestry as there are with 34% European ancestry that create this average of 17%? Or is it that there are as many AAs with 8% European ancestry and as many with 26%? Or some with 5% and half as many each with 23% and 29% to create the 17% average? There would be many possibilities.
Are there any studies taking class and/or region into account?
I would expect professional people identifying as AA to have more white ancestry simply because black-identified professionals were more likely to seek marriages with the old "Mulatto Elite." I would expect poor and/or uneducated people identifying as AA to have much lower degrees of non-SSA ancestry.
I would strongly suspect that official whites in states with significant mixed populations such as Creoles, Melungeons, Redbones, etc. would be more likely to carry significant amounts of SSA ancestry.
I believe there is a great deal of hostility and/or intrusive curiosity on the part of AAs and I feel the hostility is largely indulged by many liberals of all colors. I'm 3/4's Southern Italian and a quarter Dutch, and I would rate the level of inadvertent racism and borderline nasty probing questions and assertions ("well, you look black to ME...") about my racial identity as much higher with AA than whites. Granted, in my life time I've seen it shift from evenly split between whites and AA's to almost all AA's. Public transit is particularly bad on occasion. I've never had one AA person EVER smile and be polite when I tell them I'm white.
Where do you live if I may ask? Where did you grow up?
The AAs who ask those probing questions probably "see" sub-Saharan African ancestry in you and assume you must be hiding something. They probably think you really are one of "them" but trying to act like you're "something else". Consequently, they feel they can take those liberties with you.
To the extent that liberals indulge this behavior is probably due to the notion that black people are perpetual victims and therefore, the standards that apply to whites shouldn't apply to black folks. Some flexibility is in order when judging what black folks say and do because of their history.
Posted: Tue 17 Nov 2009 16:50 Post subject: Re: DNA
Powell wrote:
Are there any studies taking class and/or region into account?
No studies as to class that I am aware of. Of course, new studies are always being done.
Regarding A-A regional variation, the national average is about 17 percent Euro markers, but it varies from 25 percent Euro in Philadelphia to virtually zero Euro among the Geechee/Gullah people of the Sea Islands (as I recall, OnlyHuman tested something like 98 percent Afro markers.)
Regarding White regional variation, the national average is under 1 percent Afro markers, but it varies from virtually nil in the northeast to 5 or 6 percent among the Melungeons and Redbones. (Seminoles, Lumbees and other mixed groups have more Afro markers, but they do not consider themselves "White".)
'
FAQ
Search
Register
Log in
