It's a sign of how privileged blacks are in our society nowadays that a white man like the appropriately named Ben Jealous would want to throw in his lot with them.
Netanyahu pledges 'action' on Africa migrants Sun, 20 May, 2012 ca.news.yahoo.com
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday highlighted the dangers of an uncontrollable influx of African migrants to the Jewish state while vowing he would act to resolve the issue.
The phenomenon of "illegal work infiltrators" is "very grave and threatens the social fabric of society, our national security and our national identity," he told ministers at the weekly cabinet meeting.
If Israel did not prevent illegal African migrants from entering, the current "60,000 illegal infiltrators could easily grow to 600,000 illegal infiltrators.
"This would inundate the state and, to a considerable degree, cancel out its image as a Jewish and democratic state," Netanyahu said in remarks relayed by his office...
Every time I see the name "Mark Ruffalo", all I can think of is that soft-core pr0n flick which Meg Ryan made right before she disappeared into menopausal obscurity.
Ben Jealous' elite leftist white background is a lot like Obama's and he probably similarly struggles with issues of "authenticity".
Ben Jealous'? wikipedia article says he grew up in Monterrey, CA which is 0.5% black.
He went to an elite Episcopalian day school in Monterrey (York) for high school where 43% of seniors were National Merit Finalists, Winners or Commended students.
He then went onto Columbia (poly sci) and later as a Rhodes Scholar to Oxford where he studied comparative social research.
Here's a picture of Benjamin Todd Jealous and his wife and Colin Powell and his wife at an NAACP image awards meeting. Is there enough African-American heritage between the four of them to make one actual African-American? Hard to say.
Elizabeth Warren and Ward Churchill are in contention for Person With Least Claim On Being Native American To Do So Nonetheless, but I'd be curious who holds that distinction for claiming to be black. Benjamin Todd Jealous would have a shot, and I've seen pictures of female heads of Black Studies departments who would also be strong candidates.
A blacktivist talk radio personality in Memphis has been openly mocking the NAACP's irrelevance for years. This highlights his point that it is not only out touch with blacks, doesn't really practically do anything for them anyway, and the singing of "We Shall Overcome" at NAACP events is done to allude to the perils blacks experienced prior to and during the civil rights era. He states that blacks have overcome, so what's their next move as a people? The NAACP has no real answer, so they just keep rahashing old grievances.
I continue to be amazed by how obviously wimpy guys get to wear facial hair designed to convey toughness. Shouldn't these people be ridiculed into shaving? On the other hand, I could see how, having to deal with blacks every day, he'd feel like he needs something to hide the babyface.
I agree with TontoBubbaGoldstein, Reverend (I-look-white) Wright takes the cake for self-hating white guy. If most American blacks are 20% white, he is only 20% black.
Even Wiegel is giving up on this one. Granted, he throws out every face-saving accusation of evil intentions he can, but clearly even he doesn't think zimmerman is guilty of anything anymore.
With regard to entertain news, though, Steve here makes the great point that Ruffalo's turn as Bruce Banner/Hulk in The Avengers was really a break-out role.
The best performances from "In The Cut" came from Patrice O'Neal and the random ex-cop amateur who was cast as the villain. Ryan and Ruffalo were a chore to watch. The latter also seemed a bit generic and anachronistic in "Zodiac" but I never finished it, too boring and I knew the ending.
"Steve Sailer said... National Association for the Advancement of Certain People"
I´ve been thinking lately about the new term "people of color". Isn´t that the exact same thing as colored people, or colored for short? Liberals are now using colored to describe blacks, just like the signs in the segregationist south. How ironic...
What if Mario Monti pledged action on Africans? Then it would be an NYT thread, and WashPost thread, and a Forward thread, and a Slate thread, and a Commentary thread, and a WSJ thread, and an LATimes thread, and a Newsweek thread, and a Time thread, and a... well you get it.
That's because of the scientific contribution of noted population geneticist Quentin Tarantino.
To their credit, from what I can tell on the race boards, Italians can take it when people suggest some of their kind are admixed. They never try to duck it by claiming "that's a gypsy" or "he's an immigrant" or "he's only half Italian." You see this sort of thing from other euro ethnic groups all the time.
African admixture in Southern European groups, including Italians, is very minor. It is unlikely in the extreme that someone with typical Italian ancestry would look like a full-blown mulatto. If someone Italian inherits a stray physical characteristic unusual among Europeans, it does not necessarily signify either much or recent non-European ancestry. For the record, I am not of Italian ancestry.
"To their credit, from what I can tell on the race boards, Italians can take it when people suggest some of their kind are admixed. They never try to duck it by claiming "that's a gypsy" or "he's an immigrant" or "he's only half Italian." You see this sort of thing from other euro ethnic groups all the time."
Their glory days were the Roman Empire, which had North African provinces. So Italian pride doesn't really revolve around racial purity to the same degree. Mussolini never gave race much credibility until he had to cozy up to Hitler.
He reminds me of the actor Michael Lonsdale playing Hugo Drax in the 1979 Roger Moore James Bond film Moonraker. Don't let him board the International Space Station.
I just watched the first minute of an interview with Benjamin Todd Jealous.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7tBc0G5gMSA
Asked about what the Brown decision means to him, he explains that his first experience with it was on the desegregation bus.
"The irony is that I was the only black kid on the white bus."
He goes on to explain that he wanted to learn about computers and the black school was supposedly the only one that had one. That is his explanation of how he, a black kid, ended up on the white bus.
He relates how surprised the bus driver allegedly was on the first day about him as an obviously black kid wanting to board the white bus.
Always Italians, isn't it? Never Greeks, never Spaniards, never Portuguese, never Jews, they always go for the Italians.
But it's true! Steve himself just compared this Jealous person to an actor of Italian ancestry. But, Greeks are a possibility. Here is a picture of two Black politicians. The one on the left looks Greek; the one on the right...Italian.
To their credit, from what I can tell on the race boards, Italians can take it when people suggest some of their kind are admixed.
Italians are some of the most mixed folks in Europe, thanks to the Romans. The Romans did a pretty thorough job of replacing the native populations of Italy with the immigrants from all over the Empire, mostly from the East and South.
The ancient authors' accounts cannot be taken to be completely accurate. Principal component plots based on autosomal DNA studies do not show Italians to be far outside the range expected based on their geographic location. Moreover, some of what you attribute to admixture may reflect the Neolithic demic diffusion 6-8,000 YBP that had a greater impact on the population genetics of the Italian peninsula than it did in Northern Europe. But that is all pre-Roman. Now that there is autosomal DNA data, we know that the level of sub-Saharan admixture in Italians is in the low single-digit percent range.
I think Italians (at least some Italians) have both generally curlier hair and wider, more rounded faces than occur together in the Spanish, Greeks or Levantine types. Which makes them more suitable. (Or maybe I'm just conditioned. Perhaps Super Mario could just as easily be Super Stavros or Super Miguel).
Some Italians, particularly from Sicily, do look quite dark. This may be rooted in history and geography. Everything from the Roman empire to being in the center of the Mediterranean sea. When i first saw the movie REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE, I thought the guy who played "Plato" (Sal Mineo) was supposed to be a Mexican character in the story.
I have been around many Italians, mostly southern, and don't think I've ever seen any that look like "full-blown mulattos." I do remember one girl who used to make fun of her sister's puffy lips. Then there was Big Pussy in the Sopranos, but he looked Arabish, not mulatto. And his looks were unusually extreme in the direction, I think. A common Italian countenance, even in the south, is a narrow featured, aquiline face, a look that is almost diametrically opposed to a negroid phenotype. Think of those Roman coins with the profiles. The people really look like that.
Ben Jealous, President of the NAACP, is as white as – you’ll pardon the expression – a sheet. He looks like he should be President of the National Association for the Advancement of Sort of Vaguely Colored People. Get thee to a tanning salon and don’t worry about Obama’s new 10% tanning tax, Ben, because your pasty pallor and lack of melanin must be wreaking havoc with your street cred.
"Italians are some of the most mixed folks in Europe, thanks to the Romans. The Romans did a pretty thorough job of replacing the native populations of Italy with the immigrants from all over the Empire, mostly from the East and South.
People love to exaggerate the presence of blacks just about everywhere except Africa. Very few sub-Saharan Africans left Africa before the Arab slave trade became extensive around 1000 AD. The admixture from the "south" one finds in Italy is mostly middle eastern. There is no evidence (and no reason) that they imported large numbers of blacks. Indeed, most of non-Italians who ended up living in the Italian peninsula during the days of the Roman empire were from other parts of Europe (most), northern Africa (like St. Augustine), Anatolians (current day Turks) and Syrians of various ethnicities, mostly Jews. You will find more Jewish dna in the the med make up than black. A few years ago a spanish geneticists made a splash claiming black dna in Greeks. I am not sure why they grasped onto this like burrs. What on earth about ancient Greek culture or representation in art, makes one think of Negroes? I wonder if it was part of some sort social engineering project--forcing us find blacks everywhere in our own lineage, whether it makes any sense or not. Anyway, in recent years this Spanish geneticist (about whom we know little) has been proven fraudulent. There is next to zilch sub-Saharan dna in Greeks, and there was even less 2500 years ago.
My memory of Italians is mainly of those in Florence and I saw some of the most breath takingly gorgeous people I've ever seen--definitely not "mulatto." Brunettes and blonds. Children who looked like Botticelli angels and a policeman with green eyes who should have been in pictures. Another think common among Italians in Italy is the great quality of their hair. Think, glossy, no spilts ends, very smooth. Shortly after I came back the U.S. I saw a blond with perfect, silken hair, walking up the street and I thought she looked Italian from the back--sure enough, I got close and she was speaking Italian. I don't know whether that hair is genese or olive oil. Maybe both.
I´ve been thinking lately about the new term "people of color". Isn´t that the exact same thing as colored people, or colored for short? Liberals are now using colored to describe blacks, just like the signs in the segregationist south.
"People of color" means "non-white." It can refer to anyone who is not a non-Hispanic white.
Genetics says that Italians have exactly the same heritage than all the other europeans (in diverse proportions)and that the average Italian don´t have more "Black" than the average English. Genetics also says that the blondest etnic group in Europe( Finns)is also the one with more non "white"(east asian). Genetic is not funny... Besides, stop imigration and start marry Blacks; in the end of the century they all will look like this guy; in the next, millions of Blonde "Blacks" will march in Martin Luther Day...
I want to second a previous commenter's point. Jealous looks more like an octoroonish Vince Vaughgn than Mark Ruffalo. Vaughn btw is one of the few big name conservative actors in Hollywood.
"By the way, has anyone noticed that some light-skinned Indians look English? Fit´s in with the English having some Indian admixture..."
This comment makes no sense. Italy is geographically close to North Africa, so it stands to reason that there would be some admixture, and it is apparent in the features of some Italians, as it is in the features of some other southern Europeans.
I don't regard this as a bad thing, by the way, as I like the dark Mediterranean look. And, unlike some people here, I don't regard having some African blood as some kind of shameful sin.
Steve's post supports my supposition, by the way, since he compares a guy with a small amount of African blood to an Italian-American.
"Italians are some of the most mixed folks in Europe, thanks to the Romans. The Romans did a pretty thorough job of replacing the native populations of Italy with the immigrants from all over the Empire, mostly from the East and South."
That's false. Foreigners were mostly European and small in numbers. There was no population replacement.
I don't regard this as a bad thing, by the way, as I like the dark Mediterranean look. And, unlike some people here, I don't regard having some African blood as some kind of shameful sin.
Hey, you won't find a bigger aficionado of the dark med look than me. (Which is just as well for me, since that's the look I sport.) But I'm afraid one can't be (too) nonchalant about the issue of african admixture. The reason is that it's used as a weapon against. You're told that you're "already mixed" or that you "already have some african in you," with the obvious implication that you shouldn't resist accepting more. The question then ought to become how much more? But that question never gets asked, or if asked, is never answered. You're told to shut up and accept mixing. Whether your kind (however you define it) can "survive" mixing more or less intact depends wholly on the numbers involved. There's a world of difference between a little and a lot. But the conversation never gets that far.
Even more curiously, the race that can least afford mixing -- northern/northwestern europeans -- tends to be the most fiercely determined to people's mouths. That attitude is mostly an outgrowth of the most urgent social engineering project of the latter half of the 20th century, the "Taming of the Teuton," but we can see that over time the emphasis has shifted inexorably from racial non-aggression to racial non-existence. Why should I want to follow in their footsteps?
For an odd example of Africans in Italy, one of the Medici dukes of Florence was 1/4 black - the illegitimate child of a Medici pope and mulatto servant
But other than that, there is not alot of recent admixture of Africans in Italy since Arab conquest. The trade routes did not flow that way - there were more blacks in Spain & portugal, as they were involved in the African trade networks, even thought Italy is much closer.
North African differs genetically from sub-Saharan Africa. Alleles have crossed the Sahara in both directions, but some groups of North Africans, for example the Kabyle Berbers, have relatively little sub-Saharan admixture given that they are actually in North Africa rather than "close" like Italy. The problem with these discussions is that people with agendas distort the amounts of sub-Saharan admixture. In Italians, the studies show clearly that it's minute. Not everyone with an olive complexion or curly hair has a black great-grandfather.
"But I'm afraid one can't be (too) nonchalant about the issue of african admixture. The reason is that it's used as a weapon against. You're told that you're "already mixed" or that you "already have some african in you," with the obvious implication that you shouldn't resist accepting more. The question then ought to become how much more?"
No, my question becomes, accepting your admixture, why should a Nord (generally accepted superior strain of white) want their kid's DNA mixing with yours, you are polluted in some way, if not by N-, then by Camel Jockey, right?
Even North Europeans aren't totally pure, Truth, although their sub-Saharan admixture is extremely minute. The Fst value (one way to estimate population genetic distance) for Europeans compared to sub-Saharans is higher than the Fst value for East Asians compared to sub-Saharans.
Correction, the Fst for Europeans compared to sub-Saharans is lower than for East Asians compared to sub-Saharans. Lower Fst correlates with greater population genetic similarity. Darned typos.
I´ve been thinking lately about the new term "people of color". Isn´t that the exact same thing as colored people, or colored for short? Liberals are now using colored to describe blacks, just like the signs in the segregationist south.
People of color means non-white, not black. It was pushed by Chicano/Immigrant/Asian/what have you civil rights activists and academics who objected to the black-white focus of American racial politics. Not much has changed since.
I watched the The Avengers and it was FREAKING AWESOME! I like them all but the Hulk/Bruce Banner STANDOUT among the rest. Mark Ruffalo did an AMAZING job and he gave JUSTICE to Hulk/Bruce Banner compared to the other 2 Hulk movies. Marvel and Disney made an EXCELLENT decision for giving the role to Mark Ruffalo. We NEED a new Hulk movie of Mark Ruffalo! WE NEED MORE!
It's a sign of how privileged blacks are in our society nowadays that a white man like the appropriately named Ben Jealous would want to throw in his lot with them.
ReplyDeleteDude totally looks teh ghey.
ReplyDeleteHey - wait a minute...
Netanyahu pledges 'action' on Africa migrants
ReplyDeleteSun, 20 May, 2012
ca.news.yahoo.com
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday highlighted the dangers of an uncontrollable influx of African migrants to the Jewish state while vowing he would act to resolve the issue.
The phenomenon of "illegal work infiltrators" is "very grave and threatens the social fabric of society, our national security and our national identity," he told ministers at the weekly cabinet meeting.
If Israel did not prevent illegal African migrants from entering, the current "60,000 illegal infiltrators could easily grow to 600,000 illegal infiltrators.
"This would inundate the state and, to a considerable degree, cancel out its image as a Jewish and democratic state," Netanyahu said in remarks relayed by his office...
Nothing new. Walter White been there done that 60+ years ago.
ReplyDeleteNational Association for the Advancement of Certain People
ReplyDeleteNobody stays that pink without sunblock.
ReplyDeleteI wonder what SPF he uses?
45?
Do a side-by-aside of Jealous and Zimmerman.
Which one passes the paper bag test?
Every time I see the name "Mark Ruffalo", all I can think of is that soft-core pr0n flick which Meg Ryan made right before she disappeared into menopausal obscurity.
ReplyDeleteIf Rev. Jeremiah Wright had a son....he'd look like that.
ReplyDeletevalerie jarrett
ReplyDeletewhittaker
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-05-17/competition-is-killing-higher-education-part-1-.html
ReplyDeletehttp://www.historytoday.com/blog/2012/05/algeria-frances-undeclared-war
ReplyDeletehttp://bloggingheads.tv/morevideos?v=9755
ReplyDeletei have a ream.
Very snarky post on your part Mr. Sailer! You're sounding less and less reasonable.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/05/21/russia_s_surprisingly_liberal_new_cabinet
ReplyDeleteBen Jealous' elite leftist white background is a lot like Obama's and he probably similarly struggles with issues of "authenticity".
ReplyDeleteBen Jealous'? wikipedia article says he grew up in Monterrey, CA which is 0.5% black.
He went to an elite Episcopalian day school in Monterrey (York) for high school where 43% of seniors were National Merit Finalists, Winners or Commended students.
He then went onto Columbia (poly sci) and later as a Rhodes Scholar to Oxford where he studied comparative social research.
They must follow the one drop rule.
ReplyDeleteHere's a picture of Benjamin Todd Jealous and his wife and Colin Powell and his wife at an NAACP image awards meeting. Is there enough African-American heritage between the four of them to make one actual African-American? Hard to say.
ReplyDeleteElizabeth Warren and Ward Churchill are in contention for Person With Least Claim On Being Native American To Do So Nonetheless, but I'd be curious who holds that distinction for claiming to be black. Benjamin Todd Jealous would have a shot, and I've seen pictures of female heads of Black Studies departments who would also be strong candidates.
ReplyDeleteMan, Liev Schreiber's looking pasty...
ReplyDeleteA blacktivist talk radio personality in Memphis has been openly mocking the NAACP's irrelevance for years. This highlights his point that it is not only out touch with blacks, doesn't really practically do anything for them anyway, and the singing of "We Shall Overcome" at NAACP events is done to allude to the perils blacks experienced prior to and during the civil rights era. He states that blacks have overcome, so what's their next move as a people? The NAACP has no real answer, so they just keep rahashing old grievances.
ReplyDeleteI continue to be amazed by how obviously wimpy guys get to wear facial hair designed to convey toughness. Shouldn't these people be ridiculed into shaving? On the other hand, I could see how, having to deal with blacks every day, he'd feel like he needs something to hide the babyface.
ReplyDeleteYou think that's bad, here's a photo of the current "Principal Chief" of the Cherokee Nation, Bill John Baker:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.cherokee.org/OurGovernment/Executive/PrincipalChiefsOffice/24811/Information.aspx
Maybe he's related to Elizabeth Warren?
Could someone explain this post? I don't get it.
ReplyDeleteIsn't this what W.E.B. Du Bois meant by "The Talented Tenth"?
ReplyDeleteI agree with TontoBubbaGoldstein, Reverend (I-look-white) Wright takes the cake for self-hating white guy. If most American blacks are 20% white, he is only 20% black.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2012/05/george_zimmerman_s_defense_is_being_assisted_by_conservative_groups_.html
ReplyDeleteEven Wiegel is giving up on this one. Granted, he throws out every face-saving accusation of evil intentions he can, but clearly even he doesn't think zimmerman is guilty of anything anymore.
With regard to entertain news, though, Steve here makes the great point that Ruffalo's turn as Bruce Banner/Hulk in The Avengers was really a break-out role.
ReplyDeleteBa-dum-tsh.
Sailer, you're on fire. You've even been posting clever one-liners on other blogs.
ReplyDeleteThe best performances from "In The Cut" came from Patrice O'Neal and the random ex-cop amateur who was cast as the villain. Ryan and Ruffalo were a chore to watch. The latter also seemed a bit generic and anachronistic in "Zodiac" but I never finished it, too boring and I knew the ending.
ReplyDeleteForget "high yellow", he's high creme.
ReplyDelete"Netanyahu pledges 'action' on Africa migrants"
ReplyDeleteIt wouldn't be an isteve thread without the Jews.
"If Rev. Jeremiah Wright had a son [with a white woman]....he'd look like that."
Corrected.
By the way, has anyone noticed that some light-skinned mulattos look Italian? Fits in with the Italians having some African admixture.
"Steve Sailer said...
ReplyDeleteNational Association for the Advancement of Certain People"
I´ve been thinking lately about the new term "people of color". Isn´t that the exact same thing as colored people, or colored for short? Liberals are now using colored to describe blacks, just like the signs in the segregationist south. How ironic...
Perfect for the role of Roger White II in a film version of "Man In Full."
ReplyDeleteBy the way, has anyone noticed that some light-skinned mulattos look Italian?
Always Italians, isn't it? Never Greeks, never Spaniards, never Portuguese, never Jews, they always go for the Italians.
Well, except the other day when someone for Dilma Rousseff, who is of Bulgarian provenance.
It wouldn't be an isteve thread without the Jews.
ReplyDeleteWhat if Mario Monti pledged action on Africans? Then it would be an NYT thread, and WashPost thread, and a Forward thread, and a Slate thread, and a Commentary thread, and a WSJ thread, and an LATimes thread, and a Newsweek thread, and a Time thread, and a... well you get it.
"Always Italians, isn't it?"
ReplyDeleteThat's because of the scientific contribution of noted population geneticist Quentin Tarantino.
That's because of the scientific contribution of noted population geneticist Quentin Tarantino.
ReplyDeleteTo their credit, from what I can tell on the race boards, Italians can take it when people suggest some of their kind are admixed. They never try to duck it by claiming "that's a gypsy" or "he's an immigrant" or "he's only half Italian." You see this sort of thing from other euro ethnic groups all the time.
African admixture in Southern European groups, including Italians, is very minor. It is unlikely in the extreme that someone with typical Italian ancestry would look like a full-blown mulatto. If someone Italian inherits a stray physical characteristic unusual among Europeans, it does not necessarily signify either much or recent non-European ancestry. For the record, I am not of Italian ancestry.
ReplyDelete"To their credit, from what I can tell on the race boards, Italians can take it when people suggest some of their kind are admixed. They never try to duck it by claiming "that's a gypsy" or "he's an immigrant" or "he's only half Italian." You see this sort of thing from other euro ethnic groups all the time."
ReplyDeleteTheir glory days were the Roman Empire, which had North African provinces. So Italian pride doesn't really revolve around racial purity to the same degree. Mussolini never gave race much credibility until he had to cozy up to Hitler.
He reminds me of the actor Michael Lonsdale playing Hugo Drax in the 1979 Roger Moore James Bond film Moonraker. Don't let him board the International Space Station.
ReplyDeleteI just watched the first minute of an interview with Benjamin Todd Jealous.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7tBc0G5gMSA
Asked about what the Brown decision means to him, he explains that his first experience with it was on the desegregation bus.
"The irony is that I was the only black kid on the white bus."
He goes on to explain that he wanted to learn about computers and the black school was supposedly the only one that had one. That is his explanation of how he, a black kid, ended up on the white bus.
He relates how surprised the bus driver allegedly was on the first day about him as an obviously black kid wanting to board the white bus.
Hilarious.
@Steve:
This guy is a gold mine for you.
Always Italians, isn't it? Never Greeks, never Spaniards, never Portuguese, never Jews, they always go for the Italians.
ReplyDeleteBut it's true! Steve himself just compared this Jealous person to an actor of Italian ancestry. But, Greeks are a possibility. Here is a picture of two Black politicians. The one on the left looks Greek; the one on the right...Italian.
To their credit, from what I can tell on the race boards, Italians can take it when people suggest some of their kind are admixed.
ReplyDeleteItalians are some of the most mixed folks in Europe, thanks to the Romans. The Romans did a pretty thorough job of replacing the native populations of Italy with the immigrants from all over the Empire, mostly from the East and South.
It's like Benjamin Todd Jealous
ReplyDeleteon the white kids desegregation bus
And isn't it ironic?
Don't you think?
Based on his physical appearance I would estimate that Benjamin Jealous is about 1/16th black. Possibly 1/8th, but not likely.
ReplyDeleteMark Ruffalo? This guy looks like a fat version of Vince Vaughn.
ReplyDeleteBy the way, has anyone noticed that some light-skinned Indians look English? Fit´s in with the English having some Indian admixture...
ReplyDeleteOT/ This Kleiner discrimination suit is good stuff
ReplyDeletehttp://techcrunch.com/2012/05/22/key-details-of-the-kleiner-perkins-gender-discrimination-lawsuit/
OT/ The bio of the husband of Ellen Pao, the woman filing the discrimination lawsuit against Kleiner, is also interesting:
ReplyDeletehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddy_Fletcher
Anonymous 5/22/12 3:33 PM
ReplyDeleteThe ancient authors' accounts cannot be taken to be completely accurate. Principal component plots based on autosomal DNA studies do not show Italians to be far outside the range expected based on their geographic location. Moreover, some of what you attribute to admixture may reflect the Neolithic demic diffusion 6-8,000 YBP that had a greater impact on the population genetics of the Italian peninsula than it did in Northern Europe. But that is all pre-Roman. Now that there is autosomal DNA data, we know that the level of sub-Saharan admixture in Italians is in the low single-digit percent range.
Always Italians, isn't it?
ReplyDeleteI think Italians (at least some Italians) have both generally curlier hair and wider, more rounded faces than occur together in the Spanish, Greeks or Levantine types. Which makes them more suitable. (Or maybe I'm just conditioned. Perhaps Super Mario could just as easily be Super Stavros or Super Miguel).
Some Italians, particularly from Sicily, do look quite dark. This may be rooted in history and geography. Everything from the Roman empire to being in the center of the Mediterranean sea. When i first saw the movie REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE, I thought the guy who played "Plato" (Sal Mineo) was supposed to be a Mexican character in the story.
ReplyDeleteI have been around many Italians, mostly southern, and don't think I've ever seen any that look like "full-blown mulattos." I do remember one girl who used to make fun of her sister's puffy lips. Then there was Big Pussy in the Sopranos, but he looked Arabish, not mulatto. And his looks were unusually extreme in the direction, I think.
ReplyDeleteA common Italian countenance, even in the south, is a narrow featured, aquiline face, a look that is almost diametrically opposed to a negroid phenotype. Think of those Roman coins with the profiles. The people really look like that.
Apparently Steve isn't the only one to note how much Benjamin Jealous is not black.
ReplyDeleteTyping "Benjamin Jealous" into Google brings up "Benjamin Jealous White" as the 3rd most popular auto-complete option.
The second top hit from that search phrase, after his Wiki entry, is a link to an article titled 20 White People Who Are Darker Than NAACP President Ben Jealous with quips like:
Ben Jealous, President of the NAACP, is as white as – you’ll pardon the expression – a sheet. He looks like he should be President of the National Association for the Advancement of Sort of Vaguely Colored People. Get thee to a tanning salon and don’t worry about Obama’s new 10% tanning tax, Ben, because your pasty pallor and lack of melanin must be wreaking havoc with your street cred.
"Italians are some of the most mixed folks in Europe, thanks to the Romans. The Romans did a pretty thorough job of replacing the native populations of Italy with the immigrants from all over the Empire, mostly from the East and South.
ReplyDeletePeople love to exaggerate the presence of blacks just about everywhere except Africa.
Very few sub-Saharan Africans left Africa before the Arab slave trade became extensive around 1000 AD. The admixture from the "south" one finds in Italy is mostly middle eastern. There is no evidence (and no reason) that they imported large numbers of blacks. Indeed, most of non-Italians who ended up living in the Italian peninsula during the days of the Roman empire were from other parts of Europe (most), northern Africa (like St. Augustine), Anatolians (current day Turks) and Syrians of various ethnicities, mostly Jews. You will find more Jewish dna in the the med make up than black.
A few years ago a spanish geneticists made a splash claiming black dna in Greeks. I am not sure why they grasped onto this like burrs. What on earth about ancient Greek culture or representation in art, makes one think of Negroes? I wonder if it was part of some sort social engineering project--forcing us find blacks everywhere in our own lineage, whether it makes any sense or not. Anyway, in recent years this Spanish geneticist (about whom we know little) has been proven fraudulent. There is next to zilch sub-Saharan dna in Greeks, and there was even less 2500 years ago.
My memory of Italians is mainly of those in Florence and I saw some of the most breath takingly gorgeous people I've ever seen--definitely not "mulatto." Brunettes and blonds. Children who looked like Botticelli angels and a policeman with green eyes who should have been in pictures. Another think common among Italians in Italy is the great quality of their hair. Think, glossy, no spilts ends, very smooth. Shortly after I came back the U.S. I saw a blond with perfect, silken hair, walking up the street and I thought she looked Italian from the back--sure enough, I got close and she was speaking Italian. I don't know whether that hair is genese or olive oil. Maybe both.
I´ve been thinking lately about the new term "people of color". Isn´t that the exact same thing as colored people, or colored for short? Liberals are now using colored to describe blacks, just like the signs in the segregationist south.
ReplyDelete"People of color" means "non-white." It can refer to anyone who is not a non-Hispanic white.
Genetics says that Italians have exactly the same heritage than all the other europeans (in diverse proportions)and that the average Italian don´t have more "Black" than the average English.
ReplyDeleteGenetics also says that the blondest etnic group in Europe( Finns)is also the one with more non "white"(east asian).
Genetic is not funny...
Besides, stop imigration and start marry Blacks; in the end of the century they all will look like this guy; in the next, millions of Blonde "Blacks" will march in Martin Luther Day...
"SFG said...
ReplyDeleteTheir glory days were the Roman Empire, which had North African provinces."
Yeah, but a lot of the people in those provinces we would nowadays class as white.
My policy toward the NAACP remains the same. I refuse to acknowledge an organization whose name I am not permitted to speak.
ReplyDelete"Anonymous said...
ReplyDeleteMark Ruffalo? This guy looks like a fat version of Vince Vaughn."
I thought Vince Vaughn was a fat version of Vince Vaughn.
NAACP...National Association Against Caucasian People
ReplyDeleteI want to second a previous commenter's point. Jealous looks more like an octoroonish Vince Vaughgn than Mark Ruffalo. Vaughn btw is one of the few big name conservative actors in Hollywood.
ReplyDelete"By the way, has anyone noticed that some light-skinned Indians look English? Fit´s in with the English having some Indian admixture..."
ReplyDeleteThis comment makes no sense. Italy is geographically close to North Africa, so it stands to reason that there would be some admixture, and it is apparent in the features of some Italians, as it is in the features of some other southern Europeans.
I don't regard this as a bad thing, by the way, as I like the dark Mediterranean look. And, unlike some people here, I don't regard having some African blood as some kind of shameful sin.
Steve's post supports my supposition, by the way, since he compares a guy with a small amount of African blood to an Italian-American.
vince vaughn
ReplyDelete"Italians are some of the most mixed folks in Europe, thanks to the Romans. The Romans did a pretty thorough job of replacing the native populations of Italy with the immigrants from all over the Empire, mostly from the East and South."
ReplyDeleteThat's false. Foreigners were mostly European and small in numbers. There was no population replacement.
* Few Foreigners in Ancient Rome
* Minimal Demographic Impact of Roman Slavery
"Some Italians, particularly from Sicily, do look quite dark."
Sicilians look the same as other Italians.
* Northern and Southern Facial Composites
* Regional Soccer Player Composites
Speaking of movies, that flick which Vince Vaughn made with Jennifer Anniston was bleak to the point of being nihilistic.
ReplyDeleteAck! It's down there with "Terms of Endearment" in the category of movies that normal, healthy, well-balanced folk should avoid at all costs.
I don't regard this as a bad thing, by the way, as I like the dark Mediterranean look. And, unlike some people here, I don't regard having some African blood as some kind of shameful sin.
ReplyDeleteHey, you won't find a bigger aficionado of the dark med look than me. (Which is just as well for me, since that's the look I sport.) But I'm afraid one can't be (too) nonchalant about the issue of african admixture. The reason is that it's used as a weapon against. You're told that you're "already mixed" or that you "already have some african in you," with the obvious implication that you shouldn't resist accepting more. The question then ought to become how much more? But that question never gets asked, or if asked, is never answered. You're told to shut up and accept mixing. Whether your kind (however you define it) can "survive" mixing more or less intact depends wholly on the numbers involved. There's a world of difference between a little and a lot. But the conversation never gets that far.
Even more curiously, the race that can least afford mixing -- northern/northwestern europeans -- tends to be the most fiercely determined to people's mouths. That attitude is mostly an outgrowth of the most urgent social engineering project of the latter half of the 20th century, the "Taming of the Teuton," but we can see that over time the emphasis has shifted inexorably from racial non-aggression to racial non-existence. Why should I want to follow in their footsteps?
For an odd example of Africans in Italy, one of the Medici dukes of Florence was 1/4 black - the illegitimate child of a Medici pope and mulatto servant
ReplyDeletehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alessandro_de%27_Medici,_Duke_of_Florence
But other than that, there is not alot of recent admixture of Africans in Italy since Arab conquest. The trade routes did not flow that way - there were more blacks in Spain & portugal, as they were involved in the African trade networks, even thought Italy is much closer.
anonymous 5/22/12 11:45,
ReplyDeleteNorth African differs genetically from sub-Saharan Africa. Alleles have crossed the Sahara in both directions, but some groups of North Africans, for example the Kabyle Berbers, have relatively little sub-Saharan admixture given that they are actually in North Africa rather than "close" like Italy. The problem with these discussions is that people with agendas distort the amounts of sub-Saharan admixture. In Italians, the studies show clearly that it's minute. Not everyone with an olive complexion or curly hair has a black great-grandfather.
"If Rev. Jeremiah Wright had a son [with an albino Irishwoman] he'd look like that."
ReplyDeleteFTFY.
Dennis Hopper and Christopher Walken in "True Romance". Written by Tarantino. You a funny motha fucka Steve.
ReplyDelete"But I'm afraid one can't be (too) nonchalant about the issue of african admixture. The reason is that it's used as a weapon against. You're told that you're "already mixed" or that you "already have some african in you," with the obvious implication that you shouldn't resist accepting more. The question then ought to become how much more?"
ReplyDeleteNo, my question becomes, accepting your admixture, why should a Nord (generally accepted superior strain of white) want their kid's DNA mixing with yours, you are polluted in some way, if not by N-, then by Camel Jockey, right?
Even North Europeans aren't totally pure, Truth, although their sub-Saharan admixture is extremely minute. The Fst value (one way to estimate population genetic distance) for Europeans compared to sub-Saharans is higher than the Fst value for East Asians compared to sub-Saharans.
ReplyDeleteCorrection, the Fst for Europeans compared to sub-Saharans is lower than for East Asians compared to sub-Saharans. Lower Fst correlates with greater population genetic similarity. Darned typos.
ReplyDeleteI´ve been thinking lately about the new term "people of color". Isn´t that the exact same thing as colored people, or colored for short? Liberals are now using colored to describe blacks, just like the signs in the segregationist south.
ReplyDeletePeople of color means non-white, not black. It was pushed by Chicano/Immigrant/Asian/what have you civil rights activists and academics who objected to the black-white focus of American racial politics. Not much has changed since.
All I know is that gentleman looks very non-black to me.
ReplyDeleteI watched the The Avengers and it was FREAKING AWESOME! I like them all but the Hulk/Bruce Banner STANDOUT among the rest. Mark Ruffalo did an AMAZING job and he gave JUSTICE to Hulk/Bruce Banner compared to the other 2 Hulk movies. Marvel and Disney made an EXCELLENT decision for giving the role to Mark Ruffalo. We NEED a new Hulk movie of Mark Ruffalo! WE NEED MORE!
ReplyDeleteSincerely,
TheUniverse