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I'm quite late to all this obviously but anyways.
OP: you can't expect African Americans to not be offended by some of the things you've posted esp your views on AA women. They may be based on your experience and you are of course entitled to your opinion but it can easily be seen as offensive and hurtful to a member of that group. Not being attracted to AAculture is not a crime but it is odd considering it forms one part of your heritage.I've actually never heard of that in my life. Meaning someone immersed in a culture since birth that repulses them. I can understand rejecting or disliking parts of your culture, but a wholesale rejection definitely is unusual.
Not being American or even having lived in the US the whole one drop thing is odd to me too. But I think similar things hold for minorities elsewhere. In the Caribbean we tend to call mostly white looking people(think Soledad OBrien) white, not even mixed race. Shed just be lumped in with the rest of the white minority. Sometimes even Middle Eastern Caribbean people get thrown into white here. The majority in any country is far less able to see the diversity of the minority.
The funny part is "Ebonics" didn't start in Africa; it was lower class WHITE English of 400 years ago. I'm mostly Irish but the word is my Scots Irish ancestors spoke what would sound like Ebonics. There ain't nothing "African" about it except many Blacks here in the US claim it as "their" own. Speaking proper English WILL help a lot especially for Blacks and dark skin Hispanics. Sounds racist but it is what it is.
That's interesting. Four hundred years ago the majority of the 'labor' in the colonies was white Irish and poor English with some imported Africans who were generally housed together.
There was a discussion of BBC dramas and some complained you couldn't understand a lot of it so why couldn't they just have them all speak 'normal' English. Its normal policy there to record dialect from Cornwall in the Cornish dialect and use subtitles, or cockney or others. It would sound odd to hear a cornish man sound like he was from some other part of england. I suspect as Americans routinely make fun of local American dialects, we don't value them.
Language changes. It's intersting that some of the rhymes in Shakespeare don't rhyme even if they are clearly meant to. But the predominant accent of the time was more like something you'd hear in small town North Carolina than what is *now* a proper accent, which is quite a change. When read in that accent and dialect, those mystery rhymes do rhyme.
How you look and sound *does* matter. One exlandlord of mine was hispanic. His wife looked very Spanish, far lighter in skin and hair as brown as black. The husband said one day, talking to me, that he hated working outside in his job, that her family barely accepted him but in the summer he turned dark enough they didn't want him around. They reflected the old division between Spanish and mostly native Mexicans, the Spanish looking ones being the ones who owned most the land. Attitudes die had, and hange around for a long, long time.
Lower class white culture has had more of an influence on African American culture than Africa. This is really common knowledge for those in the know.
Lower class white culture has had more of an influence on African American culture than Africa. This is really common knowledge for those in the know.
Yea, seems i remember reading something like that from Thomas Sowell once. I'm not sure because it was years ago, but i remember being a little surprised by it.
comming from an absolute non-racist up-bringing, this has just got to stop. The freedom we have is in result of all race and color giving up lives, helping each other in battle....for this? we just gotta stop.
I'm white and a total mix of white. We've got family who have married and had kids and the more in the mix, the more the contribution in specific talents and so forth by DNA. Its how its supposed to be, but the arguing and upsets over guess what? who has value...is ridiculous because we all have value for different things.
I really enjoy the talent which is specific to different blood lines...you can see it...its great...why argue over what I just reduced to an engineered by 1000's of years , better at something else...
some are great at technology...we know that, some are great at art-cooking-music, creative things..there are many varieties and implications going on here including right and left hemisphere brain participation which is impervious to color or race.....can we get some good feedback going here away from the negative.
I will start...some people I find are fantastic at technology which would suggest tremendous creative ability....the question is, why...do I find myself disliking their choice in music...i think this is on topic and assists in a path away from looking at differences in a negative....when a difference in ability is an opportunity for the evolving process over generations....no I'm not dating a Black girl , the un-happiness it seems to me out of the thread topic generally speaking has got to turn a corner somehow, why?...we are programmed for progress and will strive toward common sense and good will for everybody...why, well for starters it feels a heck of alot better.
You know many blacks say I act white and do not fit into the norm for most black people. I have a different taste in music for anybody, I speak very different, and have different interest than most other blacks. But never did I once feel the need to stop being black.
Truth is I know white society, as a whole, will not accept me anymore than black people will. You have to go your own way in life and stop worrying about what ignorant people of ALL RACES say about you. Just live your life and stop worrying about this stuff, geez.
Thats a great point. ( one way or another feeling good about being unique, is good for everyone because it is truth...we are all, unique non-repeatable events and important for it.
I'm quite late to all this obviously but anyways.
OP: you can't expect African Americans to not be offended by some of the things you've posted esp your views on AA women. They may be based on your experience and you are of course entitled to your opinion but it can easily be seen as offensive and hurtful to a member of that group. Not being attracted to AAculture is not a crime but it is odd considering it forms one part of your heritage.I've actually never heard of that in my life. Meaning someone immersed in a culture since birth that repulses them. I can understand rejecting or disliking parts of your culture, but a wholesale rejection definitely is unusual.
Not being American or even having lived in the US the whole one drop thing is odd to me too. But I think similar things hold for minorities elsewhere. In the Caribbean we tend to call mostly white looking people(think Soledad OBrien) white, not even mixed race. Shed just be lumped in with the rest of the white minority. Sometimes even Middle Eastern Caribbean people get thrown into white here. The majority in any country is far less able to see the diversity of the minority.
Probably because where snow white people are rare; even light brown ones get counted as white. In places where MOST people have light skin like Ireland; even "brown anglos" are more likely to be thrown in with full on Black ones. Maybe racism, I don't know.
American Black culture is mostly a real old "white culture" there's very little "African" about it.
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