One-drop rule racist?
The expression is based on the erroneous notion that human mating involves the co-mingling of blood. So one drop refers to one drop of blood. The theory is that any offspring of a mating of a "white" person and a "black" person is "black".
It is a view that is not only racist but based on an erroneous view of how inheritance of characteristics works.
ruveyn
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Razzing racism topic
With the advent of blood transfusions, the notion of the one-drop rule became garbage.
It lingers because some humans like to feel superior to others. Totally fallacious.
We all know this, but the foolishness lingers. ![]()
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In the Americas, it seems to be a Protestant thing. Where there are Catholics, you have the notion of metis, mestizos, mulattos, creoles and so on who are very numerous particularly in Latin America. Protestant America has this idea that if you are slightly black, you are entirely black... Obama is a mulatto...
Thus, if you are 80% white, 20% black, you are considered to be black. Colin Powell appears to me to be more white than black. The thing is, as these mulattos are classified as black, and are and were treated as black, they end up really identifying themselves as black and they are united with other blacks. In a place like Haiti, mullatos consider themselves to be a superior ruling race over the blacks there.
That's an interesting concept. I always thought they were divided by sex.
It is said that a large American corporation, back in the '70s, sent out a memo to its department heads, asking them to list the number of employees in their departments, "broken down by sex."
Reportedly, one department replied, "Alcohol is really more of a problem around here."
With the advent of blood transfusions, the notion of the one-drop rule became garbage.
It lingers because some humans like to feel superior to others. Totally fallacious.
We all know this, but the foolishness lingers.
Obviously some humans are superior to others. Race, of course, is not a factor.
I think this term is kind of racist because it suggests that the "white race" is a "pure" race and once you add "colour" to it, you are no longer "white." First of all, no one is actually "white", aside from albinos I guess. Secondly, even among whites, there are different shades of skin colour.
Another problem with one drop rule is that it will create a false illusion of demographics especially when it comes to "the white race disappearing fast" because of interracial mixing. Well, you know what? Interracial mixing also results in other races disappearing if you really care about keeping each ethnicity distinct. Because in a sense, interracial mixing has resulted in "blacks disappearing" by blacks getting "whiter" too, aside from whites getting "colourized".
I think I understand where you are coming from, but I don’t really agree with your reading of the situation.
Race is about kinship, which is a completely objective concept. What is down for “society” to decide is where to draw lines (if at all), and it is usually going to be the dominant group in society who gets to draw the line with regards to who belongs to their group and who doesn’t. The fact that Whites in America made such an apparently strict decision does not necessarily imply they considered themselves more “pure” than other races. “Racial purity” is a straw man; it’s a colloquialism, and few people even use it these days.
(As a sidenote, I’d point out that the Japanese practice discrimination against Koreans living in Japan. To me, Japanese people and Korean people look alike. I could find a Japanese person and demand he tell me what he thinks makes his people so special, but I’ve got better things to do.)
Now, you say “Interracial mixing also results in other races disappearing if you really care about keeping each ethnicity distinct”. I think you would find that most white advocates are perfectly aware of this. (1) The interest a person might have in preserving human biodiversity all over the world is not the same thing as the interest a person might have in preserving their own group. A person can have an interest in both things, but from the point of view of pure biological adaptiveness, the latter takes precedence over the former (2) Blacks in America would hardly be in danger of getting “whiter” if those Whites who had advocated racial separation in past decades had got their way, (3) Blacks in Africa are hardly getting “whiter”, nor are Indians in India or the Chinese in China. In world terms, it is only white nations that are undergoing major demographic transformations. (It should be pointed out that these transformations might well have a detrimental effect on established non-white populations in these countries, such as Blacks and Native Americans in the US, and Aborigines in Australia.)
I would also add that I think one reason people feel so uncomfortable seeing the white race referred to as “pure” is that they are dimly aware that there is a sense in which it seems to be the case, although it is really an illusion produced by recessive physical traits. You will rarely see an Indian or Black woman have a child with blonde hair and blue eyes for instance.
The idea that one gene inherited from an "inferior" race some how sullies the offspring of a "superior" race is total nonsense.
ruveyn
What a surprise – ruveyn again with his usual mantra.

