Talk:Nordic race

GA Reassessment

This discussion is transcluded from Talk:Nordic race/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the reassessment.

The article fails criterias:

• 1a the article is written in choppy prose, no coherence between most of the sentence or between sections.
• 1b - the Lead is not an accurate summary of the article contents.
• 3a - it does not adequately describe the current scientific consensus about the nature of race. It does not describe the most relevant criticisms of the notions of Nordic race theory (generally considered pseudo-scientific racism). Several sections simply summarise specific Nordic theories without providing information about the criticisms levelled against it.
• 3b it goes into lots of undue detail in the sections about specific subdivisions and definitions of the Nordic race e.g. in the section about Coon (which is a completely discredited theory)
• 4. It is not neutral in that it does not adequately present the fact that the theory holds no scientific credibility in current scholarship, it leaves out many of the most vocal critics (the criticism section mentions only Arnold Toynbee and Benito Mussolini!), and it doesn't put the nordicism into its historical context of race based genocide. It refers to Nazi Hans F. K. Günther as a "shining light of nordicism" (no attribution). ·Maunus·ƛ· 18:40, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

..........

You are right but in case you have not noticed this article is dominated by a very suspicious bunch. Look luck. Boo. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 199.125.185.140 (talk) 00:11, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

No response. I am delisting.·Maunus·ƛ· 01:44, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

Maunus, some of your comments are valid criticisms of the way this article have been messed up, but I must object to the last statement, which outright misrepresents the article. It says that the Nazis considered Gunther to be a shining light of Nordiciam, not that he was, as a point of fact. Paul B (talk) 17:33, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

Rereading the statemnent about Günther I can see that you are right, although I still think the phrasing invites doubt about the actual sender of the message. "Such views were extreme, but more mainstream Nordic theory was institutionalized. Hans F. K. Günther, who joined the Nazi Party in 1932, was praised as a pioneer in racial thinking, a shining light of Nordic theory." (no source is given) - the point about no crticism other than mussolini and Toynbee also still stands.·Maunus·ƛ· 19:30, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

Obsolete statements

"The emergence of population genetics further undermined the categorisation of Europeans into clearly defined racial groups. A 2007 study using samples exclusively from Europe found an unusually high degree of European homogeneity: "there is low apparent diversity in Europe with the entire continent-wide samples only marginally more dispersed than single population samples elsewhere in the world."

This is just incorrect. Despite the low interpopulation differences, clustering within Europe can be clearly documented. You can start e.g. here: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18758442 Centrum99 (talk) 20:21, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Comments

Comments about this article: "http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18758442"

With all my respect but I think that this article is clearly manipulated and it´s absolutely wrong. You only need to see that the map divisions correspond to real countries not to genetic studies, countries division can't be considered as an equivalent to genetic ethnicity. For example: a real person, me, I'm a red hair and my parents looks like what anyone could call Mediterranean race "by the way that is an invented race" and many people like me are red hair in the south of Europe, (I took a genetic test and it proves me that my biological parents are my parents, and the doctors said that this is only an example that in Europe we are very mixed from the north to the south, they included me in a genetic project proving that I'm related with Scandinavian people and other Celtics tribes, it was amazing considering that all of my family ancestors were from Spain). comment added by (David) 04:04, 20 May 2011 (UTC)

Orphaned references in Nordic race

I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of Nordic race's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.

Reference named "nelis":

• From Fixation index: Nelis, Mari; et al (2009-05-08). Fleischer, Robert C.. ed. "Genetic Structure of Europeans: A View from the North–East". PLoS ONE 4 (5): e5472. Bibcode 2009PLoSO...4.5472N. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0005472. PMC 2675054. PMID 19424496. http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?tool=pmcentrez&artid=2675054. , see table
• From Genetic history of Europe: Nelis, Mari; et al (2009-05-08), Fleischer, Robert C., ed., "Genetic Structure of Europeans: A View from the North–East", PLoS ONE 4 (5): e5472, Bibcode 2009PLoSO...4.5472N, doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0005472, PMC 2675054, PMID 19424496. , see table

I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT⚡ 04:20, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

Distribution of I1 in Europe map

The I1 map is misleading because it does not show percentages. I1 is a minority Hap. in all the areas involved, in some actually very minority, yet the coloring in the map clearly suggests otherwise in some areas. Either the percentages should be shown, like in the R1b map, or it should be deleted. On top of that the map is also wrong because the Balkans show among the greatest concentrations of this Haplogroup and it is not shown. It is incredibly bad.

See: http://www.scs.illinois.edu/~mcdonald/WorldHaplogroupsMaps.pdf

Pook. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.74.163.240 (talk) 17:11, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

I had said I would recuse myself from this topic, but unfortunately I feel that I have to go back on this. I agree, this is a bad and potentially misleading map. However I will address a few points.

• The Balkans are (apparent) home to the male predecessor of I1, usually called I. I1 is addressed separately as a distinct clade and population group which arose from a single male of that group (I). We are all descended from someone else; the letter can be arbitrary, although I think the apparent origin in the Balkans is very ineresting for further study by geneticists, linguists, anthropologists, etc. However it does not belong in any way on this map.
• The map is not based on necessarily the most reliable or recent data. Neither is the McDonald map (which I personally like a lot, but its data is old and has graphic design issues of its own).
• There are serious questions about how any of this data is even collected. How are "native locals" identified and to what extent is such status ignored. All these maps and datasets can only offer an impression, hopefully a fair one, of what population genetics looked like when the ethno-linguistic groups emerged into our recorded history, or where people live today.
• The map is definitely misleading by not using 50% gray as an indication of 50% incidence (which would be the very highest except in isolated locations).

Despite these problems, I can only interpret the strong push against illustrations or mentions of I1 as indicating a strong POV against an exclusionary identity of what it means to be Nordic in modern society. I don't think that is the design intent of the maps or that it needs to be. I think it is important to somehow convey that these clades do exist and that groups like the Celts, Slavs and Nordic peoples, as self-defined, do have some marked elements of shared ancestry (R1b, R1a and I1 respectively). The sensitivity of this topic is heavily politicised and the scientists, even those backed by powerful orgaisations, must pussyfoot around a topic that does not need to be seen as exclusionary or racist in and of itself. It is merely informative. Hopefully with the most clarity and least bias possible. We should kep some map here and this one is "good enough". I would dedicate time to making a better but cannot. I hope someone with an impartial view on this will do so. Obotlig (talk) 09:41, 17 December 2011 (UTC)

It seems to me that if the map is misleading, then it shouldn't be in the article. I think that if we can't come up with a couple decent sources which link haplogroups to the supposed race, then we shouldn't take it upon ourselves to delve into particular haplogroups; it's original research if we do.--Brianann MacAmhlaidh (talk) 10:33, 17 December 2011 (UTC)

It is not original research to offer sourced material on the population genetics of the regions where people who identify as Nordic live. We are not offering unsourced conclusions or synthesis, merely providing relevant material. This map is potetially misleading as outlined above. It could be fixed without too much trouble. I do not believe the map is wrong though (a few localities may actually be wrong). To show the strongly prevalent clades which everyone agrees exist in certain regions is only informative. My question would be is where we gauge the intelligence level of the reader and how do we label this map to avoid the impression that most Nordic people are I1. Again, as someone who is I1 this is a sensitive topic to me and I struggle to reflect on my own bias. Do we remove a map that on the whole shows somehing true but which might be misunderstood, and is there a POV behind wishing to do so? I feel this article is a target of racism and bias against an ethnic group but I cannot step back and see what would be the neutral way to handle it. I wish that I had the time and resources to work on a map of adequate quality and clarity for this... Obotlig (talk) 18:31, 17 December 2011 (UTC)

11 Dec edits

The sequence of edits made by Taylor 2742 removed several citations, broke others (including reverting a fixed cite to a previously broken one), added material of dubious relevance to the lede, and added a spelling error (like one of the cites, one that had been fixed before). The reverts make no acknowledgement of these concerns and add unspecified claims of "poorley written" and "bad grammer" (sic for both). And no, I don't think there is any serious debate about the supposed superiority of the "Nordic Race", nor do I see why it is "important to note" some of the contributions of Scandinavians or agree that they are "the most talented people." I invite the editor to discuss these edits. Ergative rlt (talk) 23:04, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

I'd have to agree. Which sources are debating the supposed superiority of the Nordic race? Which sources are using that the Vikings discovered America first as an argument for the supposed superiority of the Nordic race? Which sources are using the climate in Scandinavia as an argument for the supposed superiority of the Nordic race? Blatant OR in my opinion. 2 lines of K₃₀₃ 11:06, 16 December 2011 (UTC)

I made major edits that I hope have eliminated the problem. Please point out anything that needs to be done further, or just go ahead and edit. Itsmejudith (talk) 12:27, 16 December 2011 (UTC)

I think we should strive against all POV pushing in the article. If edits are being made with the assumption that no population group could have on average a higher aggregation of mutations or other qualities that offer some advantage, it should be put in check, and that conversely ediing done to promote the view that a group does shoud be put in check. And so for every sensitive topic of the article. RS, NOR and NPOV are important things for all of us to reflect on in making this article as good as it can be. Let us keep in mind there is some group of people who call themselves Nordic and believe themselves to whatever degree to have loosely identifiable qualities. This article deserves the same respect as any other about a population group. Obotlig (talk) 09:51, 17 December 2011 (UTC)

I don't see this article as being about a population group at all. It's about an obsolete concept of a race. If someone said to me "I'm Nordic" I would interpret that to mean that they come from one of the Nordic countries, not to anything about their physical appearance. Itsmejudith (talk) 10:17, 17 December 2011 (UTC)

That is not how the label is used. If someone who was a black African said they were Nordic I don't think it would make sense to anyone, even if this person had been born in Sweden. On the other hand, no one would question someone with brown hair who was born in Sweden with 16 Swedish great great grandparents claiming to be Nordic. Similarly is everyone who is born or lives in England English? To some it may be so, to others it would be wrong or confusing. Even in the US terms like Anglo-Saxon are used (often completely incorrectly) but does that mean that the prerogative of people who have primarily that heritage to use it as their exclusive self-label has been revoked? Are we here to promote socio-political agendas against identities based on heritage and report on the perceptions of ignorant people, or provide encyclopedic material? "Race" is not a synonym in English for subspecies (or whathaveyou) nor is its meaning limited to 19th century anthropology. The title of the article itself is problematic. It is designed as a vehicle against racism but ends up targeting ethnic groups for dissolution. Obotlig (talk) 18:54, 17 December 2011 (UTC)

It should not be a vehicle against racism. It should certainly not "target ethnic groups for dissolution", which sounds like genocide. The solution is to remove any off-topic statements. Itsmejudith (talk) 07:53, 20 December 2011 (UTC)

Meditteraneanism?

Does Mediterraneanism merit its own article? It seems to be a reactionary counter-Nordicist movement. One of the earliest examples I can find is in an issue of The Fascist by the Imperial Fascist League (a British-Nordicist Fascist group). In issue #65, October 1934, it quotes Mussolini as saying: "We can afford to look with disdain upon these doctrines which are coming from the North. In the South we had Virgil, Cicero, and Augustus before the Germanic Race could either read or write." This seems to be a promoting a sort of Mediterraneanism -- the superiority of Mediterranean culture and civilization (though not necessarily race, although it might be implied) over the Nordic one. Mediterraneanism is also discussed by Aaron Gillette in his book Racial Theories in Fascist Italy. --ChristianHistory (talk) 06:11, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Are there reliable sources (meaning, more than one) that actually use the term "Mediterranianism" to mean a belief in the superiority of people from that area? I Googled the term and found that it has been used to refer to a number of different things, including the idea that there is an identifiable "Mediterranean" culture (without necessarily implying "superiority") as well as an artistic movement. It also appears to be the name of a current philosophical/cultural movement in Israel. So it would have to be an article about a phrase that has been used to mean different things, and each of them would have to be adequately sourced. Neutron (talk) 19:55, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

It's not a significant phenomenon as a racial concept. Mussolini was not an exponent of racial theory beyond the normal prejudices of his day. He specifically rejected race as a useful political concept. Current discussion of theories on the superiority of the Med peoples in a specifically racial rather trhan just historical/cultural sense is in the article on Guiseppe Sergi with some discussion in Mediterranean race. Paul B (talk) 20:15, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

I notice that the editor who started this thread has been indefinitely blocked (not having anything to do with this page.) But hopefully he will read this and see that the subject is indeed covered, just not under the title (and perhaps not in exactly the same way) he would prefer. Neutron (talk) 00:28, 3 January 2012 (UTC)