3 ms·

You're not wrong, but it's worth saying that contemporary racism is qualitatively quite different from, say, Greek ideas about their own superiority or tribal c

You're not wrong, but it's worth saying that contemporary racism is qualitatively quite different from, say, Greek ideas about their own superiority or tribal conflicts generally. It's very nearly a caste system- you can be born next door, speak the same language, eat the same food, think the same way, and you will be treated differently based on racial judgements. That's quite different from "we Hill People hate the River Folk and always will!" The modern notions of race come from a specific historical moment: the invention of the African slave trade by Western European powers. If the slave trade had not happened, ideas about race would probably be radically different. Chattel slavery on an industrial scale was a new idea and its echoes will probably always be with us.

Mediterraneo10 9y ago
"It's very nearly a caste system- you can be born next door, speak the same language, eat the same food, think the same way, and you will be treated differently based on racial judgements." Caste systems are nearly as much an anthropological universal (at least for civilizations) as the suspicion of outsiders that the OP mentions. Across the world you can find examples of two neighbours brought up in virtually identical conditions, but with restrictions on one due to ancestry.
- roywiggins 9y ago
  One difference from a caste system- foreigners are assigned the same racial categories as locals, whereas if I visited a society with a caste system, I simply wouldn't have a caste, at least not by default. Black Africans in America are considered the same race as black Americans, regardless of sharing absolutely no recent ancestry whatsoever, and white Africans are the same race as white Americans, again without sharing any meaningful recent ancestry. A white Hispanic person will be treated as white (see: Ted Cruz) but a black one will be treated as black, even if they're literally siblings. Racial categories mean that a white American can feel more common ground with a white Russian than his black American neighbor. American white nationalist fellow-feeling toward Russian nationalists suggests to me that it's not really about suspicion of outsiders. Racial categories cut across borders, ancestry, language, and culture. Feeling confident that one can judge what category someone is in on sight without seeing their clothes, hearing them speak, learning their name, or knowing their ancestry is maybe not quite unique to modern racial ideas, but it certainly makes it stand out.
golemiprague 9y ago
What do you mean by "speak the same language, eat the same food, think the same way"? It is pretty evident that this is not the case, there are a lot of variations between different groups of people and in many time it is divided by racial lines. Cast systems on the other hand is exactly the opposite, it is a system that divide people on family lineage even though all else is similiar.
WillReplyfFood 9y ago
I wonder - why the suprise? We strip humanity of the old caste system- which was beeing defined by there jobs- and they go and search for new definitions, and we - the shivas, the destroyers of worlds, stand in the ruins and wrench our hands? The priest beeing shocked on the existance of untoucheables.. We crafted this moment, this is what we worked for all along. If you can not accomplish anything in life as a commoner, you will draw meaning from what as who you where born and who your ancestors where.. You can not shake a world in its foundations and expect for good things to magically appear. Also, the africa situation debunked a lot of left myths. All that aid, all those campaigns and ralleys, and in the end, some cultures rise and shine (china, korea, japan) from the ashes, while others just stagnate and decay, often with a painfully strong contrast existing nearby (israel). If one does not discuss culture, and does not offer a powerfull alternative explenation, just leaving a discourse hole- people will find a answer for themselves. The islamic worlds decay and the african mess, spilling out in all directions- sometimes the world produces the racism by just show and tell. And yes, i know the usual explenations- africa is exploited, the islamic world has one huge conspiracy against it- but honestly they are as hollow as a bell. South korea had a conspiracy against it, china was exploited. Yet there they are. India is independent as long as china. At the same time, the western culture has proofen itself to be unsubstainable, with a giant economic footprint demographically dwindling away, another fact conveniently never discussed to avoid unsettling the holy cows of the sun god. It would be a miracle if with all those holes in the narrative, the old working defaults wouldnt rear there ugly heads.

Mediterraneo10 9y ago

"It's very nearly a caste system- you can be born next door, speak the same language, eat the same food, think the same way, and you will be treated differently based on racial judgements." Caste systems are nearly as much an anthropological universal (at least for civilizations) as the suspicion of outsiders that the OP mentions. Across the world you can find examples of two neighbours brought up in virtually identical conditions, but with restrictions on one due to ancestry.

roywiggins 9y ago
One difference from a caste system- foreigners are assigned the same racial categories as locals, whereas if I visited a society with a caste system, I simply wouldn't have a caste, at least not by default. Black Africans in America are considered the same race as black Americans, regardless of sharing absolutely no recent ancestry whatsoever, and white Africans are the same race as white Americans, again without sharing any meaningful recent ancestry. A white Hispanic person will be treated as white (see: Ted Cruz) but a black one will be treated as black, even if they're literally siblings. Racial categories mean that a white American can feel more common ground with a white Russian than his black American neighbor. American white nationalist fellow-feeling toward Russian nationalists suggests to me that it's not really about suspicion of outsiders. Racial categories cut across borders, ancestry, language, and culture. Feeling confident that one can judge what category someone is in on sight without seeing their clothes, hearing them speak, learning their name, or knowing their ancestry is maybe not quite unique to modern racial ideas, but it certainly makes it stand out.

golemiprague 9y ago

What do you mean by "speak the same language, eat the same food, think the same way"? It is pretty evident that this is not the case, there are a lot of variations between different groups of people and in many time it is divided by racial lines. Cast systems on the other hand is exactly the opposite, it is a system that divide people on family lineage even though all else is similiar.

WillReplyfFood 9y ago

I wonder - why the suprise? We strip humanity of the old caste system- which was beeing defined by there jobs- and they go and search for new definitions, and we - the shivas, the destroyers of worlds, stand in the ruins and wrench our hands? The priest beeing shocked on the existance of untoucheables.. We crafted this moment, this is what we worked for all along. If you can not accomplish anything in life as a commoner, you will draw meaning from what as who you where born and who your ancestors where.. You can not shake a world in its foundations and expect for good things to magically appear. Also, the africa situation debunked a lot of left myths. All that aid, all those campaigns and ralleys, and in the end, some cultures rise and shine (china, korea, japan) from the ashes, while others just stagnate and decay, often with a painfully strong contrast existing nearby (israel). If one does not discuss culture, and does not offer a powerfull alternative explenation, just leaving a discourse hole- people will find a answer for themselves. The islamic worlds decay and the african mess, spilling out in all directions- sometimes the world produces the racism by just show and tell. And yes, i know the usual explenations- africa is exploited, the islamic world has one huge conspiracy against it- but honestly they are as hollow as a bell. South korea had a conspiracy against it, china was exploited. Yet there they are. India is independent as long as china. At the same time, the western culture has proofen itself to be unsubstainable, with a giant economic footprint demographically dwindling away, another fact conveniently never discussed to avoid unsettling the holy cows of the sun god. It would be a miracle if with all those holes in the narrative, the old working defaults wouldnt rear there ugly heads.