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MrTwosheds wrote:

There's more to just race than skin colour. It may well be that Asians are better at mathematics than Caucasians, in turn better than African-Americans. Whether those differences are biological or cultural is another matter.

The statistical measurements show a "racial" difference, These are actually mostly cultural. Biologically race is an insignificant factor, Early life nutrition is far more important, hereditary factors also play a huge role. The use of "Race" in statistical measurements is an entirely flawed concept. Students are being prejudged by a non scientific process known as looking at them and applying a culturally determined bias.

Culture is as much a part of racial identity as biology is.

The only thing I attribute to race is general overall attractiveness. Everything else just seems kinda.... unneeded.

Culture is as much a part of racial identity as biology is.

Human cultures can diversify far more rapidly than biology does. The essential problem with this discussion is that biologically there is actually only one race. What we do when we pretend there are more is a mix of visual and/or cultural indicators.
A racist see's no difference between an African or a British black, culturally they couldn't be more different, if that British black just happens to be one from a line that has been here since medieval times, then they will have a culture that is 100 % British and about as much in common with a Zulu as you have.
Biological racial differences have little to do with the cultural differences and culture is a complex and constantly changing thing.

The only thing I attribute to race is general overall attractiveness.

It has nothing to do with the actual racial differences Zeno, Just your perception of them. This is built into all of us at subconscious level way beyond an individuals intellectual control. It is the body expressing its biological opinion, the immortal within us giving its instant opinion on their suitability as a mate/friend/foe, generally it prefers someone like itself. It is this subconscious process that gives racists their instinctive fear of people who are different from them. It is a quite natural defensive response to people unlike themselves, people either learn to overcome it or they don't.
And here is the problem with going round branding people as "racist" A racist is someone who embraces this fear response makes it a virtue in their own mind and then expresses it as hate. Not wanting to be put in a school group with a bunch of kids who don't speak English is not racist. Lots of things that are not racist get seen as racist.
If you got dropped into some primitive tribes village tomorrow, you would almost certainly be scared, so would they, does not make either of you racists. The person who chooses to hate because of that fear is the racist.

Race means nothing. The more people both A: say it does and implement things that say it does, and B: prevent humor that says it does, because humor is satire, not fact, we are existing in a world of racism.

It will be a great day, when a black man, or woman, is elected President of the United States, and no one sees fit to mention his race but as a method of physical description, and in that case that it be used for physical description no one decry it as racism.

I believe in what Martin Luther King Jr said. And I mean the full scope of what he said, not the tiny excerpts ppl use. Also, I despise how history is so easily revised, with conservatives now blamed as the enemy in the social reforms of the past. Ironically, they were some of the most helpful, and many liberals were those making attacks against black Americans. History may be written by the victors, but it is revised by the attrition of the losers.

MrTwosheds wrote:

Culture is as much a part of racial identity as biology is.

Human cultures can diversify far more rapidly than biology does. The essential problem with this discussion is that biologically there is actually only one race. What we do when we pretend there are more is a mix of visual and/or cultural indicators.
A racist see's no difference between an African or a British black, culturally they couldn't be more different, if that British black just happens to be one from a line that has been here since medieval times, then they will have a culture that is 100 % British and about as much in common with a Zulu as you have.
Biological racial differences have little to do with the cultural differences and culture is a complex and constantly changing thing.

You've missed the point I was trying to make and I'm not sure how else to explain it right now.

The point, is that there is no "racial identity". Racial identity is what racists try to create and what their victims often create as a response to racism. There is only one humanoid race, all the others died out.

Aah, I see.

I was talking about cultural anthropology, not biological. Differences exist in both, and since people of different races naturally gravitate towards one another, they remain correlated.

Imprisoned for holding an opinion and choosing to stand up for the right to do so.
Meanwhile many in the nation are preparing to vote for a man who has stated publicly that he intended to massively increase emissions of dangerous gasses into the atmosphere.
You don't have the right to remain silent, but deliberately endangering the entire planet is ok right?

There is no freedom, only derision.

Zenophas wrote:http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/cap ... _blog.html

While still a soft vacuum, he's well in the region where his blood would boil as well as fluid in his lungs if exposed to the atmosphere.

My question is what it felt like to break mach 1 in a flexible craft (his suit). I may be wrong, but I believe it may be the first time a human has been exposed to >mach 1 in a non-rigid 'airframe' in anything other than hard vacuum. . .well. . . and lived.

Must've been amazing.

One giant leap for a man, another small step for mankind

MrTwosheds wrote:Meanwhile many in the nation are preparing to vote for a man who has stated publicly that he intended to massively increase emissions of dangerous gasses into the atmosphere.
You don't have the right to remain silent, but deliberately endangering the entire planet is ok right?

I rolled my eyes so hard they got stuck.