Tocky on 7/6/2025 at 02:47
Quote Posted by SD
I remember how surprised I was when I first went to the USA and found out Latino were considered separate from white. In Europe, our Spanish are and have always only ever been considered slightly swarthy white people, like Greeks or Italians.
In Europe your Spanish have further blended with lighter toned upper Europeans over the centuries. In America our Spanish speakers or Latino are descended of the Spanish conquerors and the indigenous darker skinned folks, though if you are observant, you can tell those with more indigenous makeup.
I have often quoted here that "we are all the bastard sons of war" (which I thought was Shakespeare but can't find it) because various wars have blended our static genetic pools (suit you better than race?) over the centuries. It makes me laugh when anyone talks of pure blood or a particular race though we still insist on it in census forms. No area is pure either in America or Europe. The most ethnically diverse genes are found in the various regions of Africa who only fought neighboring tribes. The rest of us blended through rape and pillage far afield. Wasn't it the Moors who darkened Spain?
In any event, none of us, no matter the region, are pure or innocent. Anthropology would widen many a racists eyes. Also history many a "noble savage" notion. We are all the same. We are all assholes. Some are travelling assholes is all.
But yeah, weird that RippedPhreak brought up race as an interchangeable with homophobia. I suppose white supremacists hate both and what they hate gets confused. Hate does that overlapping thing often. But he should have caught that so people won't think he too is a white supremacist or nationalist or whatever they call themselves these days to mitigate they are just hate filled bastards.
SD on 8/6/2025 at 18:47
There is definitely significant North African and Middle Eastern DNA within the population of Iberia, the result of the forced assimilation of Muslims and Jews. Having said that, North Africans and West Asians aren't that much darker than Southern Europeans anyway.
I've always found it interesting that people talk about Western imperialism as a reason for negative Islamic attitudes to America and Europe, but people forget that the Muslim conquest of Iberia was more than three centuries before even the First Crusade. To this day in parts of Spain there is an annual festival to celebrate kicking the Moors out of their country. I once stood for three and a half hours in the baking August heat watching a seemingly endless procession of costumed performers during one such event.
History is interesting and complex and it is very often at odds with many of the narratives that are popular today.
Tocky on 9/6/2025 at 05:45
It is indeed. I often wish I could go back through all the migrations and wars all the way back to the first dropping out of trees man did just to understand it all. All the fears and manipulation, all the struggles, to get to this point which really isn't so far removed. We still do violent crap at the goading of assholes all to benefit the ruling class. Jack London nailed it in his story, "The Wisdom of the Wise". But to see the full evolution and dispersal and remixing... I mean, how the hell could anyone hate after seeing all that? For that matter how can anyone hate over who someone loves? I would like to see the full evolution of religion to find that out.
