"most of them are white or pale" Pale? Pale?? WTF is this writer talking about? Could s/he mean Indian (so not quite black)? Or East Asian (paler than Indians

"most of them are white or pale" Pale? Pale?? WTF is this writer talking about? Could s/he mean Indian (so not quite black)? Or East Asian (paler than Indians but not "quite white"). This obsession with skin colours of founders is getting absurd.