This is a cross post from Guy White. He cross-posted one of my pieces (the one on how White America got rich), so I am returning the favour. But unlike him I will quote his post in full and let readers come to their own conclusions about it:
Guywhite,
Do you think that black people would die without us in cold
climate? I’m from Finland and feel that blacks will die of sheer
cold when we whites are gone. I doubt culture enrichers have
the intelligence to uphold heat here.-Tomas
This is a complicated question because there are different types of blacks. I think African-Americans could because an 85 IQ is enough to graduate from high school. If Finns were replaced by American blacks, the country would be much poorer, but probably would survive.
On the other hand, Africans would not. Their IQ is 70, meaning that 4 out of 5 Africans are not even capable of graduating from high school, and only 1 in 50 is capable of doing college level work.
Africans cannot survive in Africa where food just grows, so how would they survive Scandinavian cold?
With American blacks, I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt. With Africans, I see no chance in hell that they would survive alone in Finland without any of the white-invented technology and know-how.
Africans cannot survive in Africa where food just grows, so how would they survive Scandinavian cold?
“Where food just grows”, huh?
How did THIS guy manage to graduate from high school?
Caucasians the world over do their best to deny that they are descendants of the Albino African – which actually makes them mutants.
The question isn’t: Would blacks survive in Finland. The question is: Who the hell wants to go there to start? The earliest lines of my family came to Canada after the war of 1812. They had none of the creature comforts that they have now. They were given land and told to “go to it!”, by the powers that be. Now, if you can survive a Canadian winter with minimal provisions out in the middle of butt blast Ontario, I would hazard a guess and say that, yes you could assuredly survive in Finland. Ask Leigh, I recall that she lives out West. Now that is cold!!!!
I’m not sure what this scenario is trying to get at. Is the core issue whether racial differences in IQ scores result from genetics? There seems to be a great deal of evidence against that hypothesis:
http://www.cscs.umich.edu/~crshalizi/sloth/nisbett-on-rushton-and-jensen.pdf
My reply to Guy White:
If Africans can survive colonization, the raping of their continent, droughts and bear the ignorance of the West, then Africans can survive anything. Put them in a situation, and they will perform. It is also as a result of slavery and colonization that the Africans ability to flourish has been stunted. And if black Americans are so much smarter then Africans, why is that 2000 census reported that African immigrants to the US on average posses a higher level of education – and income – compared to black Americans? Furthermore, amongst all the immigrant communities in the US – Europeans included – Nigerians are the MOST educated, the same census reports. All this in a Western world! Oh, these dumb Africans, how do they do it?!
And even during colonization, many Africans were FORCED to learn the language of their European colonizers, on top of the languages of their tribes and homelands, sometimes knowing up to 5 languages? All this time, many Europeans were unable to understand the “complex” mannerisms and languages of Africans, barely being unable to pick up their languages. So much for them being smart, eh. Destroying what they did not understand and always wanting to divide, conquer and/or “save” their “exotic” counterparts.
Just because modern-day Africans did not migrate north, does not mean that if they were to do so, they would be incapable of adapting and surviving. Things could have easily happened in reverse. I believe that regardless of the minor biological differences found between Europeans and Africans, and the fact that these are a result of environmental factors, the human mind and body has the same capacity to create regardless of race, given that the circumstances are similar. The world we live in today is based on Western concepts and ideals, some of which were borrowed and taken from Eastern civilizations, and in turn, every civilization will eventually crumble so let’s not get carried away thinking that Westerners are some special breed of human.
On another note, this question is heavily biased and designed to do one thing alone and that is to propagate the notion that whites are superior in intellect (and therefore every thing else) to black people, especially Africans, by being able to survive in Finland. How about asking if a Finnish/white person could survive in the Sahara?
Survival has little do race. I’ve travelled extensively and seen various people flourish in their own unique way, to the environment around them. I can give praise and credit where it is due, but let’s not pretend that we both don’t know what your intent was.
It’s a trend i had noticed in many american scifi authors as well. If a people or nation had to be wiped out in a major catastrophe , usually it would be africans.
As if africans were barely surviving, and even their sheer survival was mostly an act of leniency and altruism of the western civilizations.
Most famous example that comes to mind would be the man in the high castle. I have always found it quite interesting that they had some much trouble conceiving the end of their civilization that they had at least to involve as much people as they could in their fall, so they wouldn’t die alone and that none would benefit from their disapearance.
What in the hell is this!!!! What’s the purpose? I’d like to know where he gets his information regarding the IQ of blacks. It seems quite sweeping and all inclusive as it relates to blacks-African’s and African’ Americans. This fool needs to study black history and educate himself regarding all of the inventions by black people. Let’s see-the mail box, the washer, the dryer, the golf Tee, the elevator the gas mask, the stop light and more. I won’t go on because I could. See this is the problem with white supremacy . It has made those who subscribe to it insane! Ridiculous whites like this fool always seek to put themselves above every other race! It seems that he’s the one with the IQ of 70.
Guy White is mentally deranged… Have you read a lot of his stuff? To say he as MAJOR issues when it comes to race and is an understatement.
Would blacks survive in cold climates? I’d yes, even the black Africans. Im from Nigeria and in the North it gets cold enough for snow to drop…The blacks living in Northern Nigeria have been surviving there for centuries. Sure they would have to adapt some of their methods to the Finnish environment, but I have faith in their ability.
The interesting about the IQ debate as it pertains to black Africa is nobody brings up the fact that most Africans are bi/trilingual… In Nigeria most people(70%) can speak their tribal tongue along with standard English, not only that but plenty of people that do not belong to one of the three major tribes(Hausa, Yoruba, and Igbo) can speak and/or understand those languages too. So how is it possible that most Nigerians are multilingual but borderline retarded at the same time?
Culture not IQ.
The best performing immigrant group to America is those of African origin.
First define “IQ”?
what a moron…would this guy survive in finland on his own??? probably not…
This is satirical, isn’t it?
Would Finns survive central Africa on their own?
And where is this IQ nonsense coming from? An IQ of 70 is considered ‘mild mental retardation’ by western standards. Nobody would survive Africa on their own if they were mentally retarded.
Western technology and how to handle modern machinery can be learned. On the other hand, survival with outdated technology and a rudimentary infrastructure in tropical areas which are potentially hostile, prone to conflict and riddled with all sorts of diseases require certain mental capabilities. A sort of instinct that one develops growing up with it. That stuff is not easy to learn as you go along. Once again by western standards.
Where I would agree what could prove lethal for Africans up there is less on a physical but on psychological level. Speaking for myself, I would go bonkers up there and probably kill myself after a couple of years.
This post is not meant as satire or self-parody on the part of Guy White – unless his whole blog is.
Agabond, MLK won the fight and racism is dead… I know thats true because i was taught it in history class. With this knowledge I can only deduce that Guy White is accurate and a good source of information to help me understand the world.
Considering people survived Europe in the ice age by wearing furs and lighting campfires, I don’t think surviving in Finland necessarily requires a PhD.
Guy White and his crowd over there seem to think every possible outcome in history is related to biology and IQ.
The Minnesota Timberwolves beat the Miami Heat? Must be because the T-Wolves have a higher IQ and their colder climate has made them evolve a genetic advantage at hitting jump shots.
Unbeleivable…….Unfortunatly there are so many white people that think like guywhite
Ready to set civilization back , with religious dogma and racist dogma and just plain ignorance
It would be really hard to sit down at a dinner table with mentalities like that
I had thought there were Blacks, or should that be Africans in Finland and in the other Scandanavian countries – unless they have now left??
I wonder if that reference to Finland and the Slave trade had anything to do with the response ha ha??
http://www.antropologinenseura.fi/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/african-diaspora-in-finland-and-europe.pdf
This post is not meant as satire or self-parody on the part of Guy White – unless his whole blog is.
I was about to ask that.
I’d like to ask another question. Would Finns survive in Africa?
(I didn’t put a specific country/region because of two reasons: 1) It doesn’t really matter, as long as it’s not an urban setting, and 2) To these people, “Africa” is uniform).
Ok – after reading the ‘guest post’, I only have enough energy to say, This is really sad. This is crazy thinking and delusional.
Can Finns survive in Finnland? The levels of alcoholism, depression, domestic violence and suicide there are sky high.
Now seriously, I always thought it was harder for whites to survive in tropic climates than blacks in cold climates, mainly because of the skin, really. Especially today. The skin of whites is really sensitive because there is not enough melanin to protect it, which is dangerous (and I’m not just talking about sun burns, but on more serious dangers).
I was hoping this was satire. Unless his entire website is a poorly veiled joke, I’m dissapointed.
To be perfectly honest this is barely an argument, or a coherent point of view. Aside from the fact that IQ (which is based on a skewed set of skills that is definitely made for the makers) has absolutely nothing to do with survival skills, adapting to climate also has nothing to do with skin color. I’d like to see a post that isn’t such a non sequitor.
Is there a point to discuss this? I mean “double u. tee. ef.”
His objective is try to ruin blacks’ day, same about this picture:
http://sousamendes.files.wordpress.com/2010/01/evoluo.jpg
(I think the words on the picture are intelligible therefore it does not require translation)
Now, why the hell would I want to live in Finland? the place is so frigging cold.
Besides, any fool knows that cold climates suit white people better and hot climates suit black people better and that is why we all look the way we do. We are adapted to our environment. This is just common sense knowledge after all.
If I had a pound for the number of times I have been out and about and freezing in the cold, despite wearing three to four layers of clothing, only to see a white person walking along in shorts and a vest as though the sun was out, I would be pretty rich by now.
Anyway, some white people are always touting this lie that black people are dumb or Africans are dumb because some of them have the agenda to keep black people down and out.
I know the game, I have been in it for a while now and you see the little tricks used to try and discredit black people. Of course, some black people fall for this BS most of the time by thinking that education is not important, watching utter crap on TV and getting brainwashed, therefore staying as the underdog while everybody else is flying.
You never see anyone making comments about Chinese or Asian people for example, because A) they make sure their kids get a great education. They read morning, noon and night. B) They don’t wait around for Caucasian people to tell them what to do….they are pretty self-sufficient and have their own businesses, therefore commanding their own destiny C) they are good at what they do, whatever it may be. D) They stick together always.
NO race “realist” has answered this question yet. If black Africans have such low IQs and are retard by Western Standards how did they muster up the ability to learn and speak multiple languages?
I just deleted a string of ad hominems against Guy White.
I just deleted a string of ad hominems against Guy White.
Oh yes, sorry. I guess I got carried away.
NO race “realist” has answered this question yet. If black Africans have such low IQs and are retard by Western Standards how did they muster up the ability to learn and speak multiple languages?
True, true. My wild guess is that their answer would be something along the lines of “I don’t know anybody with that ability”.
There’s also, you know, the subject of Ancient Egypt, if someone is into that discussion.
Guy White’s way of thinking surprises me by its obvious lack of any sense and logic. Now, I am not naive and I know there are hard core racists out there, but for some reason I thought they always try their best to make their arguments sound logical (if false) and that they do their best to fight using language that resembles science, in order to make people believe in their racist narratives.
(Hope this wasn’t ad hominem)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_immigration_to_the_United_States#Educational_attainment
End of argument!
Wow abagond, you really seem to like banging your head against a wall. I suppose it could be justified as a form of exercise?
As for the validity of racially disparate “IQ test” results — PuhLEEZE!!
This post is sheer nonsense. Why post this? I think all idiots should be muzzled, not given a sounding board.
Natasha:
I wanted to compare reactions on the two blogs to the same post.
Well, this is the kind of post where you just shake your head and keep it moving. If a person wants to wallow in ignorance, that’s their prerogative.
Anyway, I don’t know why this post makes it seem as if (a) living in Finland is some extraordinary feat of intelligence and (b) the Finns are living in luxury. Finland has an average IQ below 100 as well. A good percentage of Finns live in uncomplicated log cabins and many were still practicing a hunter-gatherer lifestyle until fairly recently. They are not doing anything Africans could not do.
I’m sure Africans could survive Finland in the present day with modern medicine, but I wonder if they could have 200 years ago. Historian David Hackett Fischer wrote a book titled Albion’s Seed in it he wrote about early New England.
“But after a few years this cold climate proved to be a blessing. It created a exceptionally healthy environment for settlers from northern Europe. At the same time the cold climate had other cultural consequences. It proved to be exceptionally dangerous to immigrants from tropical Africa, who suffered severely from pulmonary infections in New England winters. Black death rates in colonial Massachusetts were twice as high as whites’ – a pattern very different from Virginia where mortality rates for the two races were not so far apart, and still more different from South Carolina where white death rates were higher than those of blacks. So high was mortality among African immigrants in New England that race slavery was not viable on a large scale, despite many attempts to introduce it. Slavery was not impossible in this region, but the human and material costs were higher than many wished to pay. A labor system which was fundamentally hostile to the Puritan ethos of New England was kept at bay partly by the climate.”
Biologically speaking whites would have just as hard of a time surviving in tropical Africa without modern medicine I’m sure, but I don’t think Guy White was referring to this. I think IQ or intelligence has very little to do with surviving hot or cold climates, it is more biology.
As Happiness said
“Besides, any fool knows that cold climates suit white people better and hot climates suit black people better and that is why we all look the way we do.”
@ O’ D
This is a joke, right?
Abagond,
I just deleted a string of ad hominems against Guy White.
*blink* What did you expect?
According to Stephen Fischer black people suffered more pulmonary infections in the cold climate. He very well could be wrong though. I am not really sure either way.
Speaking for myself, I would go bonkers up there and probably kill myself after a couple of years.
You may be on to something as Finland is is in the top ten of the highest suicide rates in the world!:
http://www.aneki.com/countries.php?t=Highest_Suicide_Rates_in_the_World&table=table_suicide&places=*=*&order=desc&orderby=table_suicide.value&decimals=–1&dependency=independent&number=all&cntdn=asc&r=-271-272-273&c=&measures=Country–Annual%20suicide%20rate%20per%20100,000&file=suicide
Finland is #10.
There was a study, cannot remember though that suggested that on the epidermis level White skin ‘adapts’ better to the cold than Black skin, which the author, if I remember correctly attempted to tie into ‘evolution’
O’D – I don’t buy it. The first man to reach the North Pole was a Black Man!!! I don’t equate phenotype nor skin color with this mumbo jumbo.
Ó Dochartaigh,
I don’t get your point in posting that passage? I doubt it is news to anyone that people generally don’t do as well settling in areas that are drastically different from their homelands. European colonists were dropping like flies in Africa. Does this mean they couldn’t eventually adjust to the tropical climate?
Natasha
“Does this mean they couldn’t eventually adjust to the tropical climate?”
Any species or sub species can adjust to it’s climate, given enough time.
@Herneith:
TT you said everything I could have said and more.
Yep, you know it. Minus 40-something degrees celsius excluding the windchill factor is what I call blasted cold.
I have a Canada Goose full length parka for such eventualities! Just get a good parka, boots, mitts, scarf, hat everyone, and you will be good to go, in Finland or the Antarctica! This, despite your phenotype!
Layer! Layer! Layer, I always say!
Color
Here is a link to skin evolution, at the end of the article it says dark skinned people are more susceptible to vitamin d deficiency in colder climates.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/evolution/library/07/3/text_pop/l_073_04.html
Here is a link talking about how African Americans have an added risk of vitamin d deficiency, and that it can effect their cardiovascular heath.
http://news.medill.northwestern.edu/chicago/news.aspx?id=162068
Here is a link called “breathing easier with vitamin d”
http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/6916/title/Food_for_Thought__Breathing_Easier_with_Vitamin_D
So it is not really “mumbo jumbo” as you say. It appears that Steven Fischer may have been on to something, many people with Pulmonary disease are also vitamin d deficient. Here is a medical journal abstract.
http://thorax.bmj.com/content/65/3/215.abstract
Also just to be clear I don’t agree with Guy White’s implications that African people are to stupid or inadequate to live in Finland.
Guy White seems to think white people just fell out of the sky and landed smack dab in the coldest regions of Europe….
There is truth in the idea that biologically, Europeans are better adapted for life in Finland, and Africans are better adapted for Africa. Take one group and put them in the other’s region and they will be at a genetic disadvantage.
The idea that blacks are too stupid to survive in cold climates is ludicrous however. Even if you accept the contention that blacks have an average IQ of 70 (which I don’t, btw), surviving the cold is hardly rocket science. Living in the tropics carries its fair share of hazards as well.
Eurasian
“Even if you accept the contention that blacks have an average IQ of 70 (which I don’t, btw)”
Why don’t you accept it? I agree with you though, a person doesn’t need a high IQ to survive any climate. Just basic survival skills and a will to live. Africa is on of the harshest places in the world, their bushmen are second to none when it comes to survival.
“Why don’t you accept it? I agree with you though, a person doesn’t need a high IQ to survive any climate. ”
Poverty depresses IQ. Look at the IQs of poorer white countries like SE Europe. Poor whites in America score lower than affluent whites. I don’t think the true IQ of Africans is 70.
@ Ó Dochartaigh:
Firstly, I’m sceptical of how well an IQ test can measure intelligence. Intelligence is a hard concept to define in any case.
Secondly, I can accept that there might be a lot of African people with an IQ of 70, but as an AVERAGE score for a whole race it is quite difficult to believe. Now, clearly there are a lot of Africans around who would seem to be just as intelligent as Europeans, or moreso. To balance that out to an average score of 70, you’d expect that there would have to be a whole lot of Africans with sub-50 scores – which classes them as moderately retarded.
I don’t think every race is necessarily going to have the same average IQ, but an average of 70 is incredibly low when you think about it.
@ speakeasy:
True. Malnutrition while the brain is developing has been shown to result in lower IQ. If you buy the idea that Africans have lower IQs, poverty would certainly be a factor there.
Of course some would argue that on the contrary, people are poor BECAUSE they have a low IQ and are not smart enough to be more successful. I’m not saying that view is totally without merit, but to relate almost everything back to IQ, as Guy White’s crowd do, is ridiculous.
True. Malnutrition while the brain is developing has been shown to result in lower IQ. If you buy the idea that Africans have lower IQs, poverty would certainly be a factor there.
Absolutely. I was at a biology conference two weeks ago and I spoke with a grad student that studied the effects malnutrition and maternal education had on a child’s performance on cognitive tests. No surprise the poorest and most malnourished children had the lowest scores while the children who can from affluent backgrounds, had adequate diets and had educated mothers did the best.
Why don’t you accept it?
I don’t accept it because IQ of 70 is borderline mental disability (or whatever is the correct term). That is just a bit higher than an average person with Down syndrome (although I understand there are many persons with Down who are of average, or above average intelligence). Still, to believe that African people are, on average, mentally challenged (to the point of being people with special needs) is absurd.
I am one of those people who do believe IQ tests measure something… But not intelligence. It seems that social factors influence it a lot. I don’t know who it was, but someone proposed that IQ actually measures the level of “modernity”, or, how close you are to (western) modern standards of living. Also, being an oppressed group in a society also seems to influence IQ in a bad way.
For example, people in my part of the world scored much better on tests done in the 70s and 80s, when Yugoslavia was a stable country with relatively “normal” economy and standard. After the mess in the 90s, the IQ level dropped significantly (which makes people mad and some even believe it’s some part of a general conspiracy to make us look stupid).
I couldnt even survive Chicago winters, I had to get the hades out of that city because of that…
lol, i wonder if i could make it there…i live in STL and the weather always seems to be in the extremes. too hot too cold too windy too much humidity too much rain. in fact the rain loves it here and goes days with rain after being mysteriously sunny for one day in between….
personally i have no interest in very cold or very hot places. i need a balance of all seasons or better yet just some nice 50 or 60 degree weather year round would do.
If I had time (and wasn’t at work), I’d google articles about Africans living in Europe — many do and do well there. So, I’m confused as to why anyone thinks that Africans couldn’t live in Finland or other European countries.
Ridiculous!! What is the point of such a blog?
Abagond enough already, why make a post out of this rubbish? I guess we’re all dying over this side of the pond
*rolls eyes*
As an african woman I take offense in this article. There are places in Africa such as SA, area near Mt Kenya and Kilimanjaro, Rain forests of Congo, UIganda, Kakamega and Cameron that are cold as Finland and people have survived there for centuries, hell the temperatures fall upto -10C at times. Blankets were in existence before the white man arrives. We have been surviving for centuries had cures for malaria before the colonialist come up with drugs that become resistant faster than they are being made!
Africans have been surviving without white mans technology, we wtill are.
Again why do white people put so much importance on IQ? African people with said IQ of 60 are outgraduating whites in America and Europe that geos to show that IQ doesnt determine sh*t, its validity has/is actually been debated on its validity most scholars agreeing that its flawed!
Folks, all this talk about transracial comparisons of IQ is bullsh1t for the following reasons:
1) While IQ does indeed seem to have some linkage to one’s success in an industrialized, urban society, not even the most radical padagogues claim that it actually and infallibly measures human intelligence. I.Q. tests, while much improved from 50 years ago, are still too imperfect a tool for that.
2) Most of those so-called “transcontinental racial comparison studies” have been carried out using piss-poor methodology. there’s no consistent definition of what is “balc”, “white”, or “asian” from one study to the next, for starters.
3) What transcontinental studies HAVE been done have not used randomly sampled populations and have certainly not studied statistically significant populations, both of which would need to be the case for the “racial I.Q.” proponents to make the case that they are making.
4) What studies have been done in the U.S. (where we do have something approaching a randomly selected and statistically significant sample) indicate that a series of other factors are far more linked to IQ than race. Just for starters, the study that got this whole ball rolling (and which I.Q. racialists like P. Rushton love to point to) was the U.S. Army study during WWI. That study quite clearly shows NORTHERNERS as having much higher IQs than SOUTHERNERS and northern blacks outstripping southern whites.
Finally, by arguing this bullsh1t as if it had even the slightest relevance to race, you are doing exactly what the racialists want: you are giving a spurious theory airtime and making it “controversial”. And “controversial”, as we know from the creationism debate, is halfway to “plausible”, whatever evidence may or may not exist.
Thank you, Thad.
Hilarious! Would Africans survive in Finland. Frankly I think it would be much more difficult to survive in Africa. The wild animals, the diseases, etc., one would need an incredible storehouse of knowledge to negotiate those myriad challenges. To survive in Finland all you have to do is slaughter a reindeer clothe yourself with its fur, eat the meat then chop down a few trees, build a shelter and start a fire. Ba da boom. WTF is so hard about that? A retard could do that much. Apparently quite a few have. LOL. What a maroon, this guywhite.
Just a small observation, or perhaps its not:
With regard to:
“While IQ does indeed seem to have some linkage to one’s ‘success’ in an industrialized, urban society.
I would say that even this has its own problem. Since what would ‘success’ for example mean in a racist society, for those who are its victims??
Just taking a little trek down the rabitt hole to see how far it takes me??
I have always had a feeling that education played a big part in IQ. Plus saying an entire continent has an average IQ of 70, always seemed a little fishy to me.
I have always had a feeling that education played a big part in IQ.
Then it’s not an intelligence test, but general education test. Also, there are many uneducated people in MENSA, so I doubt it.
“Finally, by arguing this bullsh1t as if it had even the slightest relevance to race, you are doing exactly what the racialists want: you are giving a spurious theory airtime and making it “controversial”. And “controversial”, as we know from the creationism debate, is halfway to “plausible”, whatever evidence may or may not exist.”
That’s why I just ignored the IQ portion of this post and nearly ignored the whole post altogether.
Anyone who thinks it’s “possible” that this IQ business may be truth has never spent time in Africa. It’s all well and good (or not) to speculate behind your work or home computer, but unless you’ve actually spent time there, you have no clue. Seeing as I have, I can’t take these claims at all seriously.
Schoolchildren in West Africa are bilingual or trilingual before adolescence and are doing math in their heads you wish you could do with a standard calculator. All without the resources that we have in American schools. This is why, if they come to the U.S., they are skipped up a grade or are at the top of their class. These are not the “elite” students, just the average. Based on my experiences, I could conclude Africans are more intelligent than Americans, since when given the opportunity they almost always surpass them, but I consider the whole intelligence debate to be mostly useless since so many factors have to be taken into account.
@ MIRA
You said, “Then it’s not an intelligence test, but general education test.”
My sentiments exactly.
Just what exactly is one testing based on what knowldege base? Take any random person off the streets of any major metropolitan area, place them in the middle of the Amazon rainforest and see how “smart” they are. As a matter of fact, let the Indigenous people draft up a test for them to measure their intelligence.
Test Results: severe mental retardation. (this person doesn’t even know the basics.) But then, how are those basics defined and by what criteria designed by who?
“Also, there are many uneducated people in MENSA, so I doubt it.”
I have seen some of the Mensa tests, you have to have at least some education and understanding of numbers to do well on the tests. When they jumble up letters and ask you to decipher them into multiple words, that could be tough if a person doesn’t have a wide vocabulary. So a person might not need a college education to do well, but I think a high school education would help a lot.
I just stumbled across this blog by accident, saw this idiotic post and felt I had to comment.
I am biracial: my mother is from Finland and my father from east Africa (I don’t wish to specify the country here..). I have spent most of my life in Finland and fairly recently gave up and moved out – the best decision I have ever made!!
I agree with Guy White 100%,, blacks do not survive in Finland. However, contrary to what he seems to think, this is not because of the cold climate, but merely because of the lack of opportunities the country has for people of color. The overt racism faced by anyone with a complexion other than white on all levels of the society makes life impossible in Finland.
Guy White appears to be basing his opinions on those expressed by the father of the current prime minister of Finland, Tatu Vanhanen, who is the co-author of “IQ and the Wealth of Nations” and “IQ and Global Inequality”. In these books, Vanhanen attempts to evidence the clearly unfounded, yet unfortunately persistent view that blacks are less intelligent than whites and that this is the main reason behind poverty in Africa.
People have asked me, why I chose to move out instead of staying and trying to change the country, as a “link” between the whites and blacks. The only answer I can give is that frankly I don’t care enough. It is people such as Guy White that make me deeply ashamed of my Finnish roots.
Look folks, you don’t need a genius IQ of 5,000 to know that you will need to bundle up when it is -40! Just get one of these:
http://www.canada-goose.com/157pr_mystique_parka_.htm
A pair of these:
http://www.cabelas.com/cabelas/en/templates/links/link.jsp;jsessionid=B12VXWO2AAMPNLAQBBISCOVMCAEFEIWE?id=0073301831262a&type=product&cmCat=froogle&cm_ven=data_feed&cm_cat=froogle&cm_pla=0600308&cm_ite=0073301831262a&_requestid=94017
And a hat and a scarf. If you are unable to acquire these necessities, there is plenty of road kill around. If you use the road kill, you can use the skin to make a coat, gloves maybe boots, depending on the size of the beast. You can leave the meat in the snow which would act as a freezer during the winter. Waste not, want not! Road kill stew is tasty!
@ Natasha
True. In East Africa most of us speak atleast 3 languages, tribe, Swahili and English! We dont use calculators in school till you are in form 2(ie 16yrs of age)
IQ testing has been proved to be innacurate when it comes to intelligence testing.
I hate it when white americans think they can speak on how africans feel about AA, When I worked in DC they used to try to convince me and pals how we detest AA yet all of us were dating AA hell 2 of us are married to AA so that doesnt make sense, when that fails they talk about how only the top bright students come to europe to study. Really the top 20% students in E. Africa are called to attend E. African University the rest either go to private universities and very few go abroad to study and they are not the top students!
@ Mimi & Natasha
You’re both right. I was trilingual by age ten when I moved back to America and though I was qualified to skip almost two grades, my father didn’t like the notion of a 10-year-old in class with 12- and 13-year-olds.
And just to clarify: calculators are available to most African children; we were simply forbidden to bring them to primary school. Our teachers wanted us to be able to calculate all equations mentally.
African immigrants, by the way, are the most educated group in America.
Think of it as yet another reason – in a long list of reasons – for Guy White to shut up and go to hell.
When the white men from Europe – the pilgrims – came over to America, they could hardly survive. Actually, if it weren’t for the Native Americans they wouldn’t have survived the winter.
And there are some who say today if the Natives had left them, then the world would have been a better place.
Hip Hop liveeeeeeeeeessss ya’llllllllllll
TM said:
“When the white men from Europe – the pilgrims – came over to America, they could hardly survive. Actually, if it weren’t for the Native Americans they wouldn’t have survived the winter.”
I brought up that example on Guy White’s blog, but he dismissed it because there were not enough people (110) to make a functioning economy.
what the hell kind of post is this
I am reading a book on the pilgrims, and I have to say they were morons. They were overly religious, superstitious, and had no knowledge of survival. The Pilgrims were ignorant, and they expected “god” to guide them in the new world. They were basically priests and families, not the hardy survivalist types. Europeans had been settling new England and Canada for many years before the Pilgrims, and had better success dealing with the elements.
“And there are some who say today if the Natives had left them, then the world would have been a better place.”
Sorry J, but even if all the Pilgrims would have died, there were other white men in new England to continue on without them.
I think you are missing the thrust of what these people are saying O’D, but thanks nevertheless
Thanks to the people who say they are from Africa, and , have positive reports of their educational experiances.
Nothing like first hand accounts for welcome insights into the reality.
I can co-sign about African multilingualism, from my own observations. I have worked with a lot of Sudanese refugees here in Australia. Many are still learning English, but already speak their own regional language (Dinka, Nuer, etc), Arabic, and often Swahili.
One of my close friends is Kenyan and speaks English, Swahili and Kikuyu – this seems to be pretty common.
@ TM:
by Guy White’s logic, maybe those early pilgrims all had a low IQ!
About 110 people came over on the Mayflower. A year later less than 50 were still alive. As O.D. points out, they did NOT know what they were doing. They probably would have ALL died but for two things:
1. The people who used to live at Plymouth Rock were wiped out by smallpox a few years before.
2. Squanto showed up and helped them. He ALREADY KNEW ENGLISH. He had even been to England.
Call it sheer luck or God’s Providence, either way it had nothing to do with IQ.
[QUOTE]There was a study, cannot remember though that suggested that on the epidermis level White skin ‘adapts’ better to the cold than Black skin, which the author, if I remember correctly attempted to tie into ‘evolution’[/QUOTE]
That was probably one of those ‘researches’ that, in their incomprehensibly desperate attempt to prove the biological accuracy of ‘race’ in humans, either fail to back their claims up with plausible data and/or ignore existing studies that clearly prove that there’s no such correlation.
It is a known and proven fact for a long time that desert dwelling peoples in Africa like the Bushmen and Australian Aborigines have a high tolerance to cold. The night temperatures in the desert can go down to freezing point.
I’ve read in an unrelated article about European researchers in the Kalahari how they were shivering away in their jumpers and jeans in a sleeping bag while the Bushmen in their ultra light clothing sitting out in the open didn’t seem to mind the cold at all.
With regard to your comments Femi, if I have read and understood what you are saying correctly.
It appears you are separating different types of ‘Black people’. Though I can understand your reasoning
Why do I say this?
When you say:
“It is a known and proven fact for a long time that desert dwelling peoples in Africa like the Bushmen and Australian Aborigines have a high tolerance to cold. The night temperatures in the desert can go down to freezing point”.
I can’t comment on the Austaralian Aborigines. However, it is generally known the Khoi-San people of Southern Africa live in a ‘temperate’ climate and it is one of the reason why their skin and phenotype differs from the stereotypical view of what Black Africans look like.
As I said I cannot remember the study, – I do not think they used teh Khoi-San as their subjects – but I will try to find it..
“…The appearance of the Caucasian presents a compelling model of racial evolution. though a complex of ecological factors figured in the process, the transition from black skin ti white was the most decisive single event…
A small group of this early African type of H. Sapiens would have settled in southwestern Eurasia about 40,000 years ago…In this place and time the climate would have been cold, icy, overcast for long periods, and that would mean drastically reduced sunlight.
What did all this have to do with the emergence of the Caucasian??
…In order to arrive at a plausible explanation, we must look at Vitamin D metabolism. One of the most vital functions of human skin is to produce Vitamin D from a substance called 7-dehydrocholesterol by interacting with the sun’s ultraviolet light…
We see this today in the two-threefold higher susceptibility of Blacks to rickets in northern latitudes compared to Whites. White skin, lacking the melanin barrier, can more efficiently utilize the limited northern sunlight to produce Vitamin D than can black skin.
.What is more, white skin has been shown to be more cold-resistant than black skin. This was observed in the two world wars and the Korean War, wherein Black soldiers were 5 times more likely than White soldiers to develop frost-bite.
Laboratory tests have confirmed that melanized skin is much more susceptible to cold injury than is un-melanized skin.
White skin therefore has two adaptive advantages in an ice-age northern clime: more efficient Vitamin D production and greater cold resistance”
Charles S. Finch M.D
@J
Well, I have a problem with generalisations in this kind of scientific research which is solely based on statistical data and thus is an inexact science. Any claim that cannot be reproduced with 100% identical outcome will always remain what it is; a claim. I don’t know why but I always get this underlying vibe that there’s an agenda that goes beyond science in such research.
“white skin has been shown to be more cold-resistant than black skin”
Aborigines and Bushmen have a lot of melanin in their skin. Go figure.
On a related note, resistance to cold can be trained to a point that the mind fully controls the body and even prevents it from getting frostbite. Amazing stuff.
It’s hard to believe that training such capabilities is limited to light skinned people.
@J
It appears you are separating different types of ‘Black people’. Though I can understand your reasoning
that’s because biologically speaking there ARE different types of black and white people. The genetic makeup of a kalahari bushman is VERY different from that of, say, an Ethiopian.
Race is not biological, J: it’s social and historica. Having a black or white skin does not mean that all of your other biological characteristics are the same as those of everyone else of the same skin color.
“Caucasian” doesn’t even exist as a biological entity.
While lighter-colored skin may indeed reduce your chance for rickets, that doesn’t say a thing about the rest of your biological capacities.
And as for…
This was observed in the two world wars and the Korean War, wherein Black soldiers were 5 times more likely than White soldiers to develop frost-bite.
I’d like to see some regional data on that one before we all jump on the “Hurrah for biological race!” trolley.
In 1952, the vast majority of blacks in the U.S. army were still from the South. Gee, why would southerners be more exposed to frostbite than northerners…?
(Hint: it has nothing to do with biological adaptation to colder climes).
With regard to:
“Any claim that cannot be reproduced with 100% identical outcome will always remain what it is; a claim. I don’t know why but I always get this underlying vibe that there’s an agenda that goes beyond science in such research”.
Just to say there are many issue in science that cannot be replicated 100% of the time.
However, I think you are correct that there is an ‘agenda’ to much of what human pursue in the field of knowledge (epistemology) and all of it not innocent either.
Finally I raised the point in connection to what O’D had to say, and against the backdrop of evolution too.
Hope this clarifies!!
Cheers Thad,
I understand what you are suggesting but this is not quite the stage of discussion, for the point you are making in my opinion..
We are at this point in the discussion because we are looking at ‘adaptability to an environment’, which was something I believe was first raised by O’D.
I then went on to give an example (and then tie it into some of the current ideas with regard to evolution and the origin of races), which directly or even indirectly supported O’D. Or at the very least supported the overall idea of ‘adaptability to an environment’.
Just one other point but this time on a philosophical level
With regard to
“Race is not biological, J: it’s social and historic”
In another post (ie Race is Social) I had posted something where it is argued that even ‘biology’ is a social construct, which is something that is often overlooked
So we have one ‘human construct’ ‘biology’ determining another construct of humans ie ‘race’ or ‘no races’ in this instance.
J, I’m well aware of the “biology is a social construct” viewpoint. What you are apaprently not aware of is that means we need to even take greater care with what we say is and is not biological. It doesn’t mean “Hell, let’s just toss biology into the trashcan and make up any old thing we want because, after all, we’ve now proven that there’s no distinction between subjective and objective realities”.
The “biology is a social construct” argument does not deny physical existence, nor does it imply that physical existence is whatever the hell we want it to be. You can try as hard as you want to socially redefine sex, for example, but if you’re a guy, that still isn’t going make a baby start growing in your abdomen.
The problem at hand is this: you are using race – which is a biological constuct imply stable subspecies – to try to understand human biodiversity. That simply doesn’t work.
White skin does not make you have a biology that’s essentially equal to all other whites. All the happy crappy about “biology as a social construct” doesn’t change that one, simple, provable fact.
So while yes, biology is indeed a social construct, that isn’t a “get out of jail free” card that allows you to reconstruct race any old way you like – in this case as a biological constant.
I am not sure I agree with you here Thad.
Take for instance the biological ‘difference’ between male and female.
There is only a ‘difference’ because we ‘choose’ to see it, and it in this respect biology is a ‘social/human construct’.
Since it is also possible for a given society to view that ‘difference’ as being ‘miniscule’ to overlook it totally.
With regard to the issues of race, I am not sure if youa re jumpingthe gun forward in the debate.
Are you sayingthat Black skin/melanin has no relevance and connected to climate??
Are you suggesting that the tall, slender Somalian type who live in a certain climate is not in anyway influenced thereupon?
I am sure you would not say so. However, I am not quite sure what you are trying to suggest with regard to my contention, that there is some sort of adapatability to climate with regard to the ‘races’??
Yikes, I was beginning to wonder who drugged abagond….
Anyway I hope this is a message to all of those Blacks living in Falala land who believe all Europeans are so progressive and loving towards Blacks.
They have more than their fair share of IDIOTS across the Atlantic.
I don’t think there’s any debate about the correlation of factors like UV radiation intensity and skin tone or resistance to malaria in equatorial zones. It makes perfect sense and is evolution in full effect. Nature will always find its way and pass it on to the next generation.
However the point is that the populistic criteria for coarsely distinguishing groups of humans into a handful of sub-species are arbitrary and intrinsically unscientific.
Playing by the same arbitrary rules, who can prevent me from classifying humans into the following different ‘races’?
– All humans below 1.60m tall
– All humans between 1.61 and 1.70m tall
– All humans between 1.71 and 1.80m tall
– All humans taller than 1.80m
etc…
Another classification
– All humans with slanted eyes
– all others
or
– all humans with a genetic predisposition to cancer and attached earlobes.
– all others
…any combination of the above. The list could be endless.
The ‘regional’ argument won’t hold water either. If you isolate a mixture of people of all different regions of the world on some island in the middle of the pacific ocean for a few hundreds years you will find a genetically fairly homogeneous population of ‘brown’ people. Unless of course you apply brainwashing and discourage (or even prohibit…) people from mixing.
A living example is actually Madagascar. What are the malgaches by the populistic rascist criteria? A race? They certainly are distinct enough from the rest of the world. They are genetically probably more distinct from anyone else than ‘blacks’ are from ‘whites’.
The whole research along those lines is absurd.
Thanks Femi
What you say here in teh opening paragragph directly or indirectly relates to my point of adapability to environment.
With regard to Madagascar as Eurasain Sensation has already pointed out that its population is/has always been mixed.
Just because something is ‘unscientific’, or more specifically cannot be measured ie emirpical does not make a phenomena ‘untrue’. This in fact is one of the myths
of science.
Though it can only become ‘untrue’ according to how humans construct ‘knowledge’.
J sez:
Take for instance the biological ‘difference’ between male and female.
There is only a ‘difference’ because we ‘choose’ to see it, and it in this respect biology is a ‘social/human construct’.
The man who’s probably looked into that the most deeply is Thomas Laquer and even he doesn’t believe that you can make a male pregnant based on willpower and belief, J.
It simply ain’t gonna happen.
So yeah, while race and sex are socially perceived, there is indeed something real object there: the universe doesn’t just change according to your subjective belief.
Are you sayingthat Black skin/melanin has no relevance and connected to climate??
Nope. What I AM saying is that melanin and black skin is not necessarily connected to the thousand and one other biological traits that would make a person “black” or “white”.
The adaptability you see is not across the board. It does not create a solid, homogenous biological package which could be called a “race” or a “subspecies”. Take the melanin trait which gives us “white” skin. It’s a common mutation of a gene all humans carry and also several other animals. It EXPRESSES itself in certain populations under certain environmental conditions. “Whiteness” has most probably appeared at several different points in the same way that the gene for sycle cell anema appeared.
Cheers Thad,
Just to say its not if there is an ‘objective reality’. For instance the Greeks saw the reality of Black skin but did not classify a system based on racism.
What is importance is the perception of the reality??
So with regard to women have babies a given society can ignore this biological reality and construct a society that does not have sex or gender, but ‘human-ness.
So in this respect biology is also a human construct.
Perhaps you should have a look at what I copied into the thread ‘Race is Social’. This may help to explain it a lot better than I can explain it.
With regard to:
“What I AM saying is that melanin and black skin is not necessarily connected to the thousand and one other biological traits that would make a person “black” or “white”.
The adaptability you see is not across the board. It does not create a solid, homogenous biological package which could be called a “race” or a “subspecies”
However, and we will be going over old ground again. It is all based down to how a given society decides to ‘construct’ ‘race’.
A society could say that skin would make someone Black. And we have seen this is what Greek society did when they referred to Eastern Ethiopians in India and Western Ethiopians in Africa, both groups had Black skin, and similar hair, with one more curlier than the other.
Today amongst the status quo we do not have this racial classification ie human construct
this is ignorant
So in this respect biology is also a human construct.
Yes, of course. That STILL doesn’t mean you’re gonna get pregnant, J.
I am very well aware of all this “x is a social construct” stuff, J. I teach it. But none of that theorizing is meant to claim that mind rules over matter. We can recognize drunkeness or not, for example, but that doesn’t change the fact that the human body reacts to alcohol in a certain set of ways.
It is all based down to how a given society decides to ‘construct’ ‘race’.
Yes. But how a given body reacts to cold is largely (though not completely) beyond that construction. Whether or not that reaction is understood as racial in nature – THAT is socially constructed.
And this is my original point (to come back to it): “race” does not necessarily determine the way your body reacts to cold, heat or anything else precisely because blackness and whitenees are not natural, but socially constructed.
Cheers!!
However, the point I am saying is that the construction of ‘biology’ is also a construct no difference to the construction of race in that it is affected and determined by human phenomenology.
When we say ‘race’ no longer exist we are merely using another ‘construct’ ‘biology’ to make this assessment.
I would like to discuss your point about alcohol and being ‘drunk’ by way of illustation. For instance if I am unfamiliar with the effects of alcohol, never seen it, nor even heard of it before etc. I could say that it puts people into a ‘trance-like’ state because my culture, language and understanding cannot relate to the term ‘drunkeness’.
“With American blacks, I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt. With Africans, I see no chance in hell that they would survive alone in Finland without any of the white-invented technology and know-how.”
Given these conditions even modern Finish people would have problems survive in Finland.
IQ results are irrelevant when it comes to survive in harsh environments. A Kalahari Desert Bushman would most likely score low on an IQ test, but I would most likely set my money on him when it comes survive in the Kalahari Desert without any new invented tech. In Finland I may put my money on a Saami.
IQ is in my experience irrelevant in most cases. I would claim that typical “traditional people” are very intelligent because they are able to survive and live well in the nature without a lot of modern technology and money as pillows under their arms. They have qualities that may not get to show in an IQ test because these are qualities less valued by makers of IQ tests. I do not know much about it, but I guess f.eks. An army “IQ” test can have other criterias and golds than a MENSA test.
The thing about better absorbing D vitamins whit less pigment are true, so it can be a benefit to have white skin inn the long dark period if you don’t take D vitamins. Some people even claims blue eyes work better in the dark and brown works better in light for the same reason. I don’t know if these are fact or myth.
When we say ‘race’ no longer exist we are merely using another ‘construct’ ‘biology’ to make this assessment.
Sure, but that in and of itself is not an argument for the existence of race.
I would like to discuss your point about alcohol and being ‘drunk’ by way of illustation. For instance if I am unfamiliar with the effects of alcohol, never seen it, nor even heard of it before etc. I could say that it puts people into a ‘trance-like’ state because my culture, language and understanding cannot relate to the term ‘drunkeness’.
Correct. So we wouldn’t expect you to start talking about how certain types of people are drunkards.
Let’s break it right down to the bottom:
As smart as RR thinks he is, HE wouldn’t stand a rat’s a$$ of a chance of surviving Finland without modern technology.
Guy White should be the poster boy for what can go wrong when incompetent people breed & why there should be mandatory spaying & neutering of parents who produce such ignorant evil minded offspring whose mission seems to be to spew vileness & hatred into the world.
I am black of West Indian descent and live in the US. I visited friends in Finland in June 2010 for one week and it was an AWESOME experience unlike anyplace else. The people were so warm & welcoming and could have cared less that I am black. It’s a beautiful country with a rich, vibrant culture. There’s much be learned from each other, so cut the BS and go see the world.
How the hell did I miss this one? Bezeesus what a moron!
Well, here is an example of finnish racist in “action”. Usually these guys are the ones with very few friends, other than their ilk they meet in the net, and usually they are the ones that have been bullied as kids etc.
I’m sure most of you heard about the school shootings we had here sometime ago. Well, those guys were just like this Guy White. Little boys whose whole “social” life is in the net among other haters. Usually it combines with some mental health problems.
I think the leading finnish racist at the moment is a guy who has some academic studies under his belt and writes his hate blog from a basement. I’m not kidding! He has his work room in a basement of a big building! He is very militant but has never been in the military, which is basically mandatory in Finland, and he targets mainly muslims and other immigrants. His name is Halla-Aho, which translates Frostpasture. No kidding here either!
He has a small following in the net, among these guywhites, who usually come from small country towns with no immigrants at all. Usually these guywhites are not so well educated, coming from farming families in high unemployment areas, and usually commong thing among them is this: they are very akward socially, just like this Halla-aho guy. And usually, just like Frostpasture, they are cowards. Frostpasture has actually admitted publicly in an interview that he is not a “brave man”. Really?
It tells you something about IQ’s that a guywhite actually thinks that he is onto something. I mean, the guy has to be very lonely with very little to do, constructing this kind of a mess in his head. He must be young, otherwise he would know that there have been blacks living in Finland for a century at least. He would know that one black guy even fought in the Winter war! And that is considered a Holy war among these dumbasses.
He would know that one african guy came to Finland, studied to be a vetenarian, moved to a very remote country side with no fluent finnish, took the post of local municipal vetenerian and not only survived, but became most celebrated doc in his field!
And just to show that this african guy not only survived in Finland but also mastered everything we finns consider our own, built his own sauna and became one of the hardest sauna bathers around his neck of the woods. And if you think that is nothing, consider the recent death case in the sauna world championships few days ago! Sauna is very serious thing among finns and this african guy mastered it.
So, Guy White is a sad case of too little friends, too little IQ, too much time and too much junk food. And maybe some medication, I would guess.
Too much melanin for Finland so scurvy.
Of course. That’s why blacks in finland have historically suffered from enormously high levels of scury, right?