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https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/US/PST045222 https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/US/PST045222 About half of Americans (59%) are not white

by smugma 3y ago

https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/US/PST045222 https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/US/PST045222 About half of Americans (59%) are not white and it’s still becoming more diverse. Quick Google search shows Italy to be 92% white, Sweden 86% (80% Swedish!), France 85%, and England 82%.

PabloRobles 3y ago
Diversity goes beyond skin color.
- throwawayyy9237 3y ago
  This is an important point. Take a look at Switzerland with four different official languages (five if you include English for many official settings), something not found in the US.
- c0pium 3y ago
  I bet that sounded good in your head, but if your country is +80% people who have lived there for generations you are lacking in diversity.
  - kergonath 3y ago
    There is no need to be condescending. Plenty of visibly white people living in a given European country are immigrants. There are flows of people within the EU as well, it’s a big place with a lot of different countries. Quantifying cultural differences is a bit of a fool’s game, but to me it’s not obvious that e.g. Poles or Hungarians are much closer to Spaniards than Moroccans are to the French. Skin colour is just an indication of actual diversity, which includes many other factors.
    - badpun 3y ago
      Poles, Hungarians and Spaniards share a thousand-long common history of being part of Christian Europe, under Roman Christianity. That was the leading and unifying cultural force in Europe up until the XX century (with common philosophy, Latin as the lingua franca, obviously with shared religious beliefs etc.). Moroccans and the French don't have anything that ties them that strongly.
      - dieortin 3y ago
        Sorry but that is not true. Morocco and France have a very close connection, while Spain and Hungary do not.
      - kergonath 3y ago
        > Poles, Hungarians and Spaniards share a thousand-long common history of being part of Christian Europe, under Roman Christianity Not at all. That's a mirage in which some people want to believe. Spain went through the gothic kingdoms, the emirate of Granada, the Reconquista, the Habsburg dynasty, to name a few. Poland saw nothing of that, and was not even part of the Roman Empire in the first place. They went through various wars and conquests with theirs own neighbours, some of the various bits of the Holy Roman Empire, the various baltic and Russian states, and Sweden, but there is almost no overlap with what was going on in Spain. Hungary was a very fringe frontier province in the Roman Empire and the cultural consequences are very different. And again, they were in very different situations, being much closer to the Ottoman Empire for a while and having to deal with the various bits of what is now Romania. Russia is a European country, but again the local culture looks very different. On the other hand, Spain has a couple of centuries of history in common with North Africa. Ties between Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia on one side and France on the other are strong because of the shared history and the number of binational individuals and families. This is the same everywhere: countries have strong ties with their neighbours, and this does not stop at the EU's boundaries. Even the supposedly close religious beliefs created a deep chasm in most of Europe. Large regions of Europe are muslim, there always has been a Jewish minority across the whole continent, and even amongst Christians, how many wars fo religions were fought over the centuries? Europe makes no sense from an ethnic point of view. It is a collection of very diverse people even though there are some cultural and historical aspects in common, and a belief that the future is better if we stop fighting each other. This is why European nationalism is not a thing.
  - DoughnutHole 3y ago
    I’ll make sure to let India know that they’re not diverse despite their 23 official native languages and their massive religious divisions. You’re basically trying to define “diverse” as “amorphous immigrant melting pot”, a society that only exists in the new world where the native population was nearly wiped out.
- turquoisevar 3y ago
  It definitely does go beyond skin color. There’s also the issue of definitions. The concept of “race” as defined in the US is not used in Europe to begin with. Instead often times what is used is “ethnicity” and even that typically boils down to one’s “origin” and doesn’t take skin color into account. A lot of European countries prohibit the government from registering skin color, ethnicity, religion etc. out of fear of a repeat of the 1940s. So you won’t find US-style self-report questions on government forms w/r/t “race” or “ethnicity”. In fact many go as far as limiting themselves to “citizen” and “non-citizen”, with the exception of immigration services maintaining the necessary information until naturalization of course. So according to American race definitions most people in Europe will be white, but that doesn’t say much about diversity. In fact the US definition of White is very broad [0]: > White. A person having origins in any of the original peoples of Europe, the Middle East, or North Africa. It includes people who indicate their race as "White" or report responses such as German, Irish, English, Italian, Lebanese, and Egyptian. The category also includes groups such as Polish, French, Iranian, Slavic, Cajun, Chaldean, etc. So for example people from Morocco, Turkey and countries like Iraq and Iran (arguably some of the bigger sources of non-European immigrants to Europe) would be considered “White” implying a lack of diversity, even though there are significant cultural differences between those people and, say, native Germans. 0: https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/note/US/RHI625222 https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/note/US/RHI625222
jiri 3y ago
So the word "diverse" is another word for "not white"? Is this a subtle way to state that "non-white" has big effect for overall productivity?
- hx8 3y ago
  I called out several ways the US is more diverse, and ethic is one of them. Yeah, it can be a challenge to integrate every cultural background into our society and it is something we fail to do with equal success.
- red-iron-pine 3y ago
  "not white" isn't a race or demographic. african americans aren't the same as african-africans, and those are different from mexican, indian, asian, native american, etc. and given how indians and east asians tend to be the overall wealthiest demographics, plus the "hispanic paradox", suggests that this is a way more complex issue then you're framing it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hispanic_paradox https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hispanic_paradox
- ddd00001 3y ago
  [dead]
bilbo0s 3y ago
But that's exactly the difference. In Europe, the idea that a white Spaniard or white Costa Rican is not white is considered laughable. In the US we don't count them in that stat you gave. That's how we do things and that's fine. But they do count them as white in Europe. So the white population seems larger, because in Europe it is not segmented the way we do in the US.
- badpun 3y ago
  Wait, a native Spaniard emigrating to US is not counted as "white" there? Are you sure?
  - bilbo0s 3y ago
    Nope. Not if they put themselves down as hispanic or latino. Which they are free to do. There is no check or validation on the whole process either. Which is another part of the problem. You're from Brazil or Spain, but you're white as the day is long? No problem. You can mark down hispanic/latino and be entitled to all the benefits that a white Uruguayan or Venezuelan are entitled to once you get citizenship. Personally, I think it's all ridiculous, and none of them should be entitled to be considered anything other than white. But I don't get to make that call. In any case, yes. All of these people will be counted as latino rather than white in a census for instance. Whereas in Europe, they would laugh if anyone tried to pass themselves off as hispanic/latino but not white.
    - dieortin 3y ago
      > Personally, I think it's all ridiculous, and none of them should be entitled to be considered anything other than white. But I don't get to make that call. The wording makes it seem like it’s a privilege to be considered non-white, and by extension that it’s worse to be white.
      - badpun 3y ago
        Isn't that the case? There are plenty of initiatives (both public and private) which favor non-whites, while I don't think there's even one which favors black people. So, people who get to put non-white in their papers are privileged by the system.
nobodyandproud 3y ago
According to the census: 59% are non-Hispanic and white. 75%, if white-hispanics are included.

by smugma 3y ago

PabloRobles 3y ago

Diversity goes beyond skin color.

throwawayyy9237 3y ago
This is an important point. Take a look at Switzerland with four different official languages (five if you include English for many official settings), something not found in the US.
c0pium 3y ago
I bet that sounded good in your head, but if your country is +80% people who have lived there for generations you are lacking in diversity.
- kergonath 3y ago
  There is no need to be condescending. Plenty of visibly white people living in a given European country are immigrants. There are flows of people within the EU as well, it’s a big place with a lot of different countries. Quantifying cultural differences is a bit of a fool’s game, but to me it’s not obvious that e.g. Poles or Hungarians are much closer to Spaniards than Moroccans are to the French. Skin colour is just an indication of actual diversity, which includes many other factors.
  - badpun 3y ago
    Poles, Hungarians and Spaniards share a thousand-long common history of being part of Christian Europe, under Roman Christianity. That was the leading and unifying cultural force in Europe up until the XX century (with common philosophy, Latin as the lingua franca, obviously with shared religious beliefs etc.). Moroccans and the French don't have anything that ties them that strongly.
    - dieortin 3y ago
      Sorry but that is not true. Morocco and France have a very close connection, while Spain and Hungary do not.
    - kergonath 3y ago
      > Poles, Hungarians and Spaniards share a thousand-long common history of being part of Christian Europe, under Roman Christianity Not at all. That's a mirage in which some people want to believe. Spain went through the gothic kingdoms, the emirate of Granada, the Reconquista, the Habsburg dynasty, to name a few. Poland saw nothing of that, and was not even part of the Roman Empire in the first place. They went through various wars and conquests with theirs own neighbours, some of the various bits of the Holy Roman Empire, the various baltic and Russian states, and Sweden, but there is almost no overlap with what was going on in Spain. Hungary was a very fringe frontier province in the Roman Empire and the cultural consequences are very different. And again, they were in very different situations, being much closer to the Ottoman Empire for a while and having to deal with the various bits of what is now Romania. Russia is a European country, but again the local culture looks very different. On the other hand, Spain has a couple of centuries of history in common with North Africa. Ties between Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia on one side and France on the other are strong because of the shared history and the number of binational individuals and families. This is the same everywhere: countries have strong ties with their neighbours, and this does not stop at the EU's boundaries. Even the supposedly close religious beliefs created a deep chasm in most of Europe. Large regions of Europe are muslim, there always has been a Jewish minority across the whole continent, and even amongst Christians, how many wars fo religions were fought over the centuries? Europe makes no sense from an ethnic point of view. It is a collection of very diverse people even though there are some cultural and historical aspects in common, and a belief that the future is better if we stop fighting each other. This is why European nationalism is not a thing.
- DoughnutHole 3y ago
  I’ll make sure to let India know that they’re not diverse despite their 23 official native languages and their massive religious divisions. You’re basically trying to define “diverse” as “amorphous immigrant melting pot”, a society that only exists in the new world where the native population was nearly wiped out.
turquoisevar 3y ago
It definitely does go beyond skin color. There’s also the issue of definitions. The concept of “race” as defined in the US is not used in Europe to begin with. Instead often times what is used is “ethnicity” and even that typically boils down to one’s “origin” and doesn’t take skin color into account. A lot of European countries prohibit the government from registering skin color, ethnicity, religion etc. out of fear of a repeat of the 1940s. So you won’t find US-style self-report questions on government forms w/r/t “race” or “ethnicity”. In fact many go as far as limiting themselves to “citizen” and “non-citizen”, with the exception of immigration services maintaining the necessary information until naturalization of course. So according to American race definitions most people in Europe will be white, but that doesn’t say much about diversity. In fact the US definition of White is very broad [0]: > White. A person having origins in any of the original peoples of Europe, the Middle East, or North Africa. It includes people who indicate their race as "White" or report responses such as German, Irish, English, Italian, Lebanese, and Egyptian. The category also includes groups such as Polish, French, Iranian, Slavic, Cajun, Chaldean, etc. So for example people from Morocco, Turkey and countries like Iraq and Iran (arguably some of the bigger sources of non-European immigrants to Europe) would be considered “White” implying a lack of diversity, even though there are significant cultural differences between those people and, say, native Germans. 0: https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/note/US/RHI625222 https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/note/US/RHI625222

jiri 3y ago

So the word "diverse" is another word for "not white"? Is this a subtle way to state that "non-white" has big effect for overall productivity?

hx8 3y ago
I called out several ways the US is more diverse, and ethic is one of them. Yeah, it can be a challenge to integrate every cultural background into our society and it is something we fail to do with equal success.
red-iron-pine 3y ago
"not white" isn't a race or demographic. african americans aren't the same as african-africans, and those are different from mexican, indian, asian, native american, etc. and given how indians and east asians tend to be the overall wealthiest demographics, plus the "hispanic paradox", suggests that this is a way more complex issue then you're framing it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hispanic_paradox https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hispanic_paradox
ddd00001 3y ago
[dead]

bilbo0s 3y ago

But that's exactly the difference. In Europe, the idea that a white Spaniard or white Costa Rican is not white is considered laughable. In the US we don't count them in that stat you gave. That's how we do things and that's fine. But they do count them as white in Europe. So the white population seems larger, because in Europe it is not segmented the way we do in the US.

badpun 3y ago
Wait, a native Spaniard emigrating to US is not counted as "white" there? Are you sure?
- bilbo0s 3y ago
  Nope. Not if they put themselves down as hispanic or latino. Which they are free to do. There is no check or validation on the whole process either. Which is another part of the problem. You're from Brazil or Spain, but you're white as the day is long? No problem. You can mark down hispanic/latino and be entitled to all the benefits that a white Uruguayan or Venezuelan are entitled to once you get citizenship. Personally, I think it's all ridiculous, and none of them should be entitled to be considered anything other than white. But I don't get to make that call. In any case, yes. All of these people will be counted as latino rather than white in a census for instance. Whereas in Europe, they would laugh if anyone tried to pass themselves off as hispanic/latino but not white.
  - dieortin 3y ago
    > Personally, I think it's all ridiculous, and none of them should be entitled to be considered anything other than white. But I don't get to make that call. The wording makes it seem like it’s a privilege to be considered non-white, and by extension that it’s worse to be white.
    - badpun 3y ago
      Isn't that the case? There are plenty of initiatives (both public and private) which favor non-whites, while I don't think there's even one which favors black people. So, people who get to put non-white in their papers are privileged by the system.

nobodyandproud 3y ago

According to the census: 59% are non-Hispanic and white. 75%, if white-hispanics are included.