Talk:White people

Black People are more important???

Why the article "Black People" is blocked and "White People" not? Or both should be blocked or both shouldn't.

Lebanese in Australia, Caucasoid versus "White":

Why is it that Australia is probably the only country in the Western World where Lebanese have a "stigma" status attached to them? Australia still has a Nordicist view of what "white" is and socialy the term is restricted to Anglo-Celtic, Germanic, Nordic and other kindred people of similar phenotype. Southern Europeans are often referred to as "Wogs" which indicates to a degree that they are not seen as being "white" on the same level as Northern Europeans.

Here is an image of the Australian far-right politician James (Jim) Saleam: http://www.theage.com.au/ffximage/2008/02/02/PM_australia_wideweb__470x278,0.jpg

Saleam is said to be born to an Anglo-Celtic mother and a Lebanese father (others say Turkish). Aesthetically he looks "white" (i.e. fair skinned, blue eyes, Caucasoid features and brown hair which turned grey) and in anyone's language he is still fully Caucasian. However, both left and right wingers have criticised him for being an advocate of white nationalism due to his part Lebanese ancestry. To those of you push the POV that Middle Easterners are equally white as Swedes, why is it that Saleam's Lebanese ancestry is something that has not been dismissed and ignored and he is criticised for his political beliefs because of his background? I surmise that Australian society's restricted identification of "white" has something to do with it. Interesting considering that Lebanese are classed as "white" in U.S., South American cencuses and were accepted as white in South Africa during Apartheid.

While that’s an interesting question you ask (and, personally, I’d be interested in learning more about it and discussing it), I would like to direct you to this message at the top of the page:

Unfortunately, it seems you have come to the wrong place with your question. So unless you are discussing a change to the article, your comment will have to be deleted. Also, please remember to sign your comment with four tildes (~~~~)-- Irn (talk) 03:14, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

My point of this statement is that there have been people deleting sections of the article about the restricted definitions of the term "white". Non-European Caucasoids and Southern Europeans are not always socially percieved as white.

The article already says this though doesn't it? The very second sentence states "It often refers narrowly to people claiming ancestry exclusively from Europe." So why pretend that the article doesn't say it? Alun (talk) 13:07, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Oh and it also says "According to John Tehranian, among those not considered white at some points in American history have been: the Irish, Germans, Jews, Italians, Spaniards, Hispanics, Slavs, and Greeks.", which covers the European groups that have sometimes not been considered white. Ont he whole the article does cover a great many different points of view regarding where and when different groups have been included or excluded from the category. It's certainly not clear cut or anything like universally accepted which groups the term actually applies to. Alun (talk) 05:51, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

SOUTHEAST ASIA

South-East Asians are neither Caucasoid, Aryan or Indo-European. Why are they listed as white in the first paragraph? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 121.223.196.39 (talk) 13:03, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

I don't know. I agree with you, the citations mention south Asia but not south east Asia. It's true that people from the Indian subcontinent are often classified as Caucasian, but our cites don't mention south east Asia. It's missleading because it looks like the citations support this claim, but they don't seem to.Alun (talk) 13:11, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Bad Footnote

The term "white race" or "white people" entered dictionaries of the major European languages in the 1600s.[6] Unless there is a good reference this needs to modified. English (a major European language) didn't even have dictionaries in the 17th century. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Nitpyck (talk • contribs) 05:45, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

According to sources from the dictionary article, what you wrote isn't true; English had dictionaries in 1600s. -- Irn (talk) 03:44, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

"ends with a list of 8000 "hard words". Mulcaster does not define any of them." This 1- hardly constitutes a dictionary and 2- would not have included white race or white people. The cite should be to the first dictionary to include and define white people or white race. In fact the footnote [6] has nothing to do with dictionaries.Nitpyck (talk) 03:34, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

Washed-out photograph, Werner Heisenburg

Is Bar Refaeli white?

Why on earth did Arjacent (talk · contribs) find it necessary to remove the photograph of Bar Refaeli and add a washed-out image of an apparently non-notable unidentified person, File:Blonde girl from Poland.jpg, to this article, with the explanation "Did not feel Israeli model represented the European ethnicity, replaced with a Slavic model." [1]? May I be forgiven for inferring that concerns over both correct exposure and notability have been subordinated to an Antisemitic agenda? By any reasonable anthropological criteria, Bar Refaeli is obviously white. I particularly note her blue eyes, light complexion, freckles, and Caucasian facial features; see this image from her website for further evidence. Indeed, if her name were "Jane Smith" from Fargo, North Dakota, USA, instead of "Bar Refaeli", from Hod HaSharon, Israel, I doubt we would be having this discussion. Since this is Wikipedia, not Führerpedia, the wacky "the Jews are not white" theory promoted by Adolph Hitler and contemporary neo-Nazi activists has no place here.

Furthermore, the fact that Werner Heisenberg was criticized as a "White Jew" by proponents of "Deutsche Physik" due to his support for the theory of relativity and quantum mechanics very much does "belong with main discussion", despite Arjacent's contention to the contrary [2]. This article is describing "whiteness" as a sociological concept, not just as a genetic phenomenon. That Heisenberg's "whiteness" was impugned by elements of the German physics community due to a professional disagreement, with support from the SS, is a compelling example of some of the bizarre ways in which "whiteness" has been socially constructed, particularly by societies that were obsessed with race. Erik9 (talk) 04:03, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

By the way, to editors worried about ridding this article of photographs of anyone "Jewish", you're going to have to remove File:John Key National Party2.jpg too: see John_Key#Personal_life... Erik9 (talk) 04:15, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

ARJACENT'S RESPONSE

According to the definition of white race, found on Wikipedia, the term refers to people of primarly European ancestry. Bar Rfaeli, being from an Asian country, does not meet this criteria. John Key, being an Ashkenazi Jew, may and you will note that no attempt was made to remove his picture. The 'may' part is dicussed below.

From both a sociological and genetic point of view, "white people" most commonly refers to people of European descent and not merely those with white pigmentation. For if it did, the defintion would be too general to be of any use. Afterall, some oriental, Semitic, and African people share similar phenotypes such as fair skin and light eyes and would likewise have a claim. Common experience should also tell you that Europeans differ in appearance (height, complexion, etc) and culture (language, food, etc) from other fair skinned peoples, and there is genetic evidence that suggests they are unique. I invite you to read on haplogroups and other indicators of race at the genetic level, here are some links to get you started: http://www.eupedia.com/europe/european_y-dna_haplogroups.shtml http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Y-DNA_haplogroups_by_ethnic_groups http://www.scs.uiuc.edu/~mcdonald/WorldHaplogroupsMaps.pdf Broadly speaking, RA1 is an indicator of who is European

Next, even if we went under the assumption that Israeli people were white they represent less than 2% of the white population. Why should such a small fraction be represented so disproportionately, if at all? They are a poor indicator of what white people and white culture is, by numbers alone and by their proximity to other semitic cultures. This brings me to the topic of Ashkenazi Jews. Because they are a mixture of european and semitic people, they are unique from whites in that they posses a J haplogroup (see links above). Likewise, a lot of them choose to adopt Jewish culture and identify themselves as being Jewish. However, there are others that chose to adopt european culture and physically resemble whites. For these reasons, whether Ashkenazi Jews are regarded as being white varies across individuals and is open to debate. Had John Key been removed your appeal would be warranted.

I feel the picture I chose is appropriate because only Western Europeans (R1b) appeared on the page. The Polish model represents Eastern Europeans (R1a) and the blonde/blue eye phenotype common to northern whites. Both of these groups are a more accurate descrption of what is generally meant by white people. To me, an Israeli model seems to be more of a political attempt at correctness than of exatcness. What is more absurd is claiming she is more notable. Putting aside the fact that notability has no bearing whatsoever when dicussing a general topic like 'white people', by what criteria is she "more notable". Because she has a website and a name? I personally never heard of her and only noticed her because of a picture that I suspected was in the wrong place.

Lastly, on a personal note, I find your charges of implied racism and neo-nazism most offensive. I would appretiate it if you tone down such remarks.

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Regarding Deutsche Physik, I also feel it diverges from the main topic. It is not an example of "social whiteness" but rather one of "Jewish hate", and as such more approriately belongs to a thread on antisemitism. At the very most, it deserves a mention via external link. For these reasons I am reverting the picture I had chosen.

Contradictory statements

In the second paragraph under "Origins of Light Skin", these two statements appear:

"This probably explains the greater variety of skin color found outside sub-Saharan Africa.[28]" "Though African populations are relatively dark, according to a recent study[citation needed] they possess a greater diversity in skin complexion than all other populations."

These appear to be a direct contradiction. The second statement has no citation, so perhaps it is unfounded, but it may just be sloppy editing. Be that as it may, both statements cannot be true; if they are conflicting views supported by different academic authorities, that should be stated. However, I don't feel I know enough about the subject to edit, so if someone who knows about this can clarify the situation it would be helpful.

CattOfTheGarage (talk) 20:37, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

Question

So why is there no mention of the Ainu of Japan? They have white skin. And early anthropologists were perplexed over their anomalous existence, some of them hypothesizing (IIRC) that there was a prehistoric white which connected them to Europeans. -- llywrch (talk) 21:17, 10 June 2009 (UTC)