Muhammad Chen (1983-2050) is the completely average person.
First, he is a he because there are more hes than shes worldwide. He has the most common given name, Muhammad, and the most common family name, Chen. He is 28 because that is the average age worldwide. Etc.
So:
- name: Muhammad Chen (陈 穆罕默德)
- address: Shenzhen, China
- age: 28 (life expectancy: 67)
- sex: male
- ethnicity: Han Chinese
- language: Mandarin Chinese, some English
- religion: Roman Catholic (the largest sect of the largest religion)
- income: $11,200 a year (= 47.3 g of silver a day or 47 crowns a month) (24% of American income by purchasing power)
- education: 11 years
- number of children: two or three
- kind of work: service sector as opposed to farm or factory
- television: has access to one
- mobile phone: yes
- landline telephone: no
- computer: no
- Internet: no
- car: no
- bank account: no
- electricity: 7.27 kWh a day (21% of American use)
- smokes: no
- food: 2833 calories a day (75% of the American diet)
- chief grain: rice
- chief meat: pig
- milk: 195 mL a day
- Coca-Cola: 2.5 litres a year
- main sport: football (soccer)
- film: Bollywood
- weights and measures: metric
Yes, most people in the world now have a mobile phone and close to a high school education or better. Average diet and length of life are at American levels of the 1960s.
The picture at the top of the post is the most common-looking face in the world if you go by sex, age and ethnicity. It was made by National Geographic from the average of thousands of pictures of 28-year-old Han Chinese men.
Hong Kong
Muhammad Chen was born in the country but now lives in the city. I put him in Shenzhen, the city just north of Hong Kong, instead of Shanghai, China’s largest city, because:
- The Pearl River Delta, which has the cities of Hong Kong, Shenzhen, Dongguan and Guangzhou, has about 50 million people – more than twice Shanghai’s 18 million.
- Shenzhen is not only the largest city in the Delta, it is also at 22.5 degrees north, the average latitude of the world’s 59 largest cities (all those with an urban area of 5 million or more). Which means that probably about as many people live north of him as south, making him yet more average.
If we put him at not just the average latitude (22.5103 N) but also at the average longitude (39.4393 E), he would wind up in the desert about 150 km north of, guess where – Mecca!
Mandarin Chinese is the world’s largest language if you go by the number of native speakers. But if you add those who speak a second language, more people know English. So I said he knows some English since more know English than Chinese.
Unlike most people in China, Chen is Christian, has two or more children and has a Muslim name. That is because he is a world average, not a Chinese one. He is only as Chinese as he is because China is so huge.
But not for long: By 2030 the average person will be a 45-year-old woman from India.
See also:
- Jennifer Smith – the completely average American
- world population
- If Black America were a country
- white gaze
- Life in Ethiopia
- crowns
Interesting. China and India both have similar populations, yet China dominates so much here because its people are far more homogeneous that Indians. Indians speak a variety of languages and are more diverse ethnically (China’s ethnic minorities are fewer in numbers).
Is China also the crucial factor in our average person being male? I know there are 20-30 million more males than females in China.
Fascinating work!!! How long did this take you?
Nineteen percent of humanity is Chinese and 9million ppl are ethnically Han! I think that’s amazing. I want to know when and how China’s population grew so large. I’m guessing it has a little to do with the Yangtze & Yellow Rivers and their bountiful harvests.
@ Cynic:
Yes, there are a some other reasons for it:
* Farming has been going on in China longer than any other region aside from the Middle East. However, China did not suffer the land degradation that crippled the so-called “Fertile Crescent”.
* Over time China expanded and subsequently absorbed a great many other ethnicities into one ethnicity. It’s like if the Roman Empire never declined, but kept expanding to take in most of Europe, who would then consider themselves Romans.
haha amazing!!
Ankhesen:
It took several hours. Most of it is from the CIA Factbook. The most time-consuming part was trying to find facts for what I had to leave out. For example, while the Internet is apparently awash with numbers about penis size (Google “world average” and see what comes up), I could not find out how tall the average man is. So I did not give him a height. Nor could I find out how many people have television. So I wound up writing “has access to one” based on the fact that most people saw at least part of the 2008 Summer Olympics.
Wait, wait, waaait….
I was positive there were more women in the world. Are you 100% sure there are more men?
@ Mira:
From the CIA Factbook:
Source:
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/xx.html
Interesting. I thought there were more women in the world.
And I can’t believe it was impossible to find average height for a man. I’d say about 170 cm (5’7″)?
I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that there *is* actually a Roman Catholic convert who was born into Islam in the Western part of China, where there are some Muslims, I believe, named Muhammad Chen.
True, but like with other averages, there doesn’t need to be anyone who fits it. Oh, the beauty of statistics.
@ Scipio:
I’m sure there is a Muhammad Chen out there somewhere, but there’s a good chance he’s not actually living in China. Here’s why:
The main Muslim groups in China are the Hui (Chinese Muslims), and the Turkic people (including Uighurs and Kazakhs) from Western China.
The Uighurs and the like tend to have Muslim/Turkic names (including Muhammad, I assume), but because they are not Han Chinese, they wouldn’t have a surname like Chen. An example is the Uighur activist Rebiya Kadeer.
The Hui have some ancestors who were usually Middle Eastern traders, but basically look like Han Chinese and speak Chinese, and have Chinese names. The Arabic names of their ancestors have become Chinese over time – so Muhammad might become Ma, or Mu. So perhaps the closest you’ll get to Muhammad Chen is “Chen Ma” or something like that.
Out of curiosity I ran a Facebook search on Muhammad Chen, and all the results I could find where from Indonesians. This makes sense. They would be ethnic Chinese in Indonesia who converted to Islam, adopting a Muslim name yet keeping their surname.
Crazy. I once read that the average man and woman of the future would resemble Dwayne “the Rock” Johnson and Jessica Alba.
@ Mel:
That sounds like an awesome future.
So time travel might just be my best chance of having a shot at Jessica Alba (or someone who looks like her anyway). Although I would have to fight off a bunch of Dwayne Johnson clones to even have a chance.
ES,
With all due respect, that sounds like a horrifically dystopian future. You’d want all the diverse peoples of world to cease to exist and turn into nearly identical clones of one another?
Do you also look forward to a future where all food is the same around the world, music is completely homogeneous, and all dogs look alike?
Randy, I think he was joking… Y’now? Jessica Alba…
Besides, race and culture are a fluid thing. The people of the world did not always appear as they do today. Race and culture are constantly moving in a slow but fluid process of change. In the farther future, there likely will be no “White people” as we know them, or “Black people” as we know them. Those phenotypical divisions came as a result of vastly separated human populations. Technology, information access, and wealth, are making that much less likely in the future. There will, of course be differences in the way that people look, but they may not be as pronounced, and the looks will be shaped by the issues of the future, not by the old and extinct “races” of the past.
We have a tendency to become tied to the current gamut of phenotypical categorizations, as if they really mean anything in the long run. They do not.
With all due respect, that sounds like a horrifically dystopian future. You’d want all the diverse peoples of world to cease to exist and turn into nearly identical clones of one another?
If the men looked like Dwayne Johnson, I wouldn’t mind at all! In fact, that sounds like one of my fantasies(besides winning a no-stop shopping spree)! You are right though, a world of beefcake!
Do you also look forward to a future where all food is the same around the world, music is completely homogeneous, and all dogs look alike?
If the foods tasty, who cares? What if it looks like this?:
http://www.hothousecafe.com/brunch.html
The cakes alone are worth the price of admission. If the food in this homogeneous future is like that, than I am all for it. Between Dwayne Johnson clones and feast like this I would be in paradise!
You will most likely get more genetic diversity between all individuals than ever in human history. Or… are looks so important then after all?
Dogs are just man-made interpretations of wolfs. They’re not naturally occurring. Wolfs around the world look very similar.
What makes you think that the way people look has a direct causation on the food or the music they make?
Why not let nature, evolution, genetics etc take their natural course? What’s so horrifically dystopian about that?
@ Olufemi
“Why not let nature, evolution, genetics etc take their natural course? What’s so horrifically dystopian about that?”
It destroys the notion of an enduring White race of superior people, based on superior and separate genetics.
@ King:
what made you think that I was joking? Was it the bit where I mentioned mastering time travel in order to get with a Jessica Alba lookalike?
Besides, as Mel mentioned, the “average man and woman” would look like Johnson and Alba, just like the average person today is Muhammad Chen. In other words, they wouldn’t all look alike anymore than people today all look alike. And just so there is no misunderstandings, let me just state that I’m not travelling to the present to try to hook up with Muhammad Chen.
ES,
Contrary to what you just posted, your first comment clearly indicated the desire for a future filled with actual Jessica Alba and Dwayne Johnson “clones”, not some type of statistical average.
Olefemi said: “Why not let nature, evolution, genetics etc take their natural course? What’s so horrifically dystopian about that?”
People here often discuss the merits of “diversity”, when what they’re really desiring is homogeneity, which is actually the exact opposite of diversity. Homogeneity is how cultures die.
“People here often discuss the merits of “diversity”, when what they’re really desiring is homogeneity, which is actually the exact opposite of diversity. Homogeneity is how cultures die.”
It’s not that we don’t value diversity, we just understand that diversity is going to look differently than it does today, as nature continues to shape the human phenotypes. The diversity of the future will be shaped by the opportunities and pressures of the future world. There will be differences, but they won’t be simple “Black” and “White,” so to speak.
There is no reason to fear the demise of diversity, it’s not like we’re mixing paint.
@ Randy:
When someone makes a comment about utilising time travel in order to have sexytime with Jessica Alba, it’s probably not worth your while trying to construct logical arguments about why that’s not a good idea.
King said: “There is no reason to fear the demise of diversity, it’s not like we’re mixing paint.”
In a way, that’s exactly what’s happening. One could easily identify dozens (if not hundreds) of regional cultures in the US alone which are now being subsumed by the mass-produced commercial overculture. How sad.
Expand your scope to the whole world, and the number of threatened cultures may be in the thousands.
And yet on this board you have people who think that black churches and Bengali supper clubs are necessarily evidence of the existence of “racism”.
“And yet on this board you have people who think that black churches and Bengali supper clubs are necessarily evidence of the existence of “racism”.”
Wrong topic and a purposeful mis-characterization.
“of regional cultures in the US alone which are now being subsumed by the mass-produced commercial overculture. How sad.
Expand your scope to the whole world, and the number of threatened cultures may be in the thousands.”
This is the way it has always been. You can’t fight it. You can’t preserve cultures in little glass jars, the best you can do is record them in detail before they are washed away.
@ Randy
I was afraid that’s how you were looking at it. But I’m afraid that’s all wrong, old chap.
We are not pouring the all pigment of human diversity into an empty paint drum, and stirring it up with a big stick until it’s evenly mixed!
Once paint gets mixed, it stays mixed. Gray paint may settle a bit, but it’s always going to be gray. Humanity is different, it can change, mix or segregate along new lines or in different concentrations. Human sociology, philosophy, religion, economics, and politics, work to change the colors and cultures of humanity. It’s not like mixing paint at all. It’s like paint that mixes itself and is ever changing in response to external and internal variables.
Don’t get caught up in “today’s diversity” as if it’s the only kind of diversity possible. There will come new types of diversity and new colors and textures.
Stop pretending that you know what the choices of the future are. None of us do. you’re not protecting diversity, you’re just afraid of change.
What makes you think that nature taking its course will result in homogeneity?
Cultures come and go. With or without diversity.
Jas0n, King, and Olufemi,
What’s happening in terms of cultural destruction is not a natural process which I’m attempting to stand athwart.
Rather, the current politically correct indoctrination practiced in schools and promulgated through the media actively encourages and cheerleads this. Monocultural fellowship is demonized and deemed pathological instead of being valued.
King said: “Don’t get caught up in “today’s diversity” as if it’s the only kind of diversity possible. There will come new types of diversity and new colors and textures. “
Today’s diversity, if you wish to call it that, is mostly the result of thousands of years of traditions from around the world. It’s pretty sad to think that people are so willing to flush such a rich tapestry away in exchange for the sanitized and politically correct trend-du-jour.
@ Randy
Monocultural fellowship is demonized and deemed pathological instead of being valued.
oh so in other words:
“why can’t we have a white history month? how come THEY get to be all pro black or gay or whatever but us WHITE people can’t even say we’re proud to be white! you call that fair!”
I mean your not fooling anybody with you big words dude.
Randy,
Monocultural fellowship is demonized and deemed pathological instead of being valued.
I’d love to hear you define this sentence for me ; )
You DO realize however that nobody is demonizing people for adhering to their own culture, but rather many people object to a de facto/de jure culture that surpasses everything else. For instance, the supposed “War on Christmas” which isn’t really happening. Or the removal of Judeo-Christian traditions from our court-rooms and classrooms. To the average White American who hasn’t ever had to deal with other types of people, this feels like demonization, but in reality it’s called accommodation to the people who believe in other things.
Answer me truly, is there anything WRONG with celebrating multiple holidays in the same school play? Is there anything WRONG with multiculturalism in a country founded upon the principles of being a “melting pot” (but is really more like a salad bowl)? Is there anything WRONG with White heterosexual Christian upper-class values being just ONE way to live among many?
What some people call homogenization, sanitization and political correctness, I call the realization that other people with unique cultures and traditions and feelings are demanding their place at the table without being made to feel subsumed into the homogenization of a single culture that ultimately makes them feel like a second-class citizen.
It’s about appreciating diversity. And if diversity to you is the equivalent of flushing away a “rich tapestry” then you really don’t know anything about diversity at all.
Seriously, because it’s not about deciding which White American tradition to follow. It’s about ethnic studies programs, bi-lingual education, respecting our largely immigrant population, and promoting the idea that everyone’s way of life is important in this country. This doesn’t always happen, but according to our declaration, our constitution, our national myth, and many of our founding fathers this is something which should happen.
It’s about stopping the white-wash of history, like Texas has been doing. It’s about including the people in this country that have been historically ignored — like Howard Zinn did — despite their contributions. It’s about combating prejudice via a celebration of many kinds of people coming together to find a way to live.
Call me idealistic or cheesy, but there it is.
zek,
I think you’ve raised an interesting topic, although slightly different from what the last few comments were about.
When someone looks around a restaurant and sees white folks and black folks eating amongst themselves and thinks “racism”, or looks at a black church with no white people and thinks “racism”, or looks at Korean supper club with no black people and thinks “racism”, then that is a charge against real diversity, not for it.
More fundamentally, it indicates a mindset where cultural mixing is not simply tolerated (as I believe it should be in a free country), but rather mandated.
This is a critical difference.
“What’s happening in terms of cultural destruction is not a natural process which I’m attempting to stand athwart.”
So… The choices that mankind made to get this far were all “normal” and “natural,” but the choices that are being made today are somehow outside of nature? How do you decide which human actions are “natural” and which are “artificial?”
“Political correctness” is as much a cog in the mechanism of human development as anything else. How could it not be?
“Today’s diversity, if you wish to call it that, is mostly the result of thousands of years of traditions from around the world.”
Indeed, it has always been the result of thousands of years of traditions, then we throw them all out and start with something new. That is human history.
Most HBD types have this harebrained notion that evolution has somehow brought us to the blessed zenith of racial development. The Races, as they stand today, are a masterpiece of human division. And therefore, this gift of racial perfection must be kept pure! We must not ruin it by filthy miscegenation!
“It’s pretty sad to think that people are so willing to flush such a rich tapestry away in exchange for the sanitized and politically correct trend-du-jour.”
We’re not talking about the trend-du-jour, we’re talking about the trends-de-millénium. It is not until you are able to let go of what was that you are ready to accept what can be.
People LOOKING identical does not equal everyone having one language, diet, religion, government, education, technology, economy, infrastructure, or whatever the hell else you want to throw in into the definition of a “culture.” There’s nothing to fear Randy… we more than likely won’t see the day all of this phenotypic diversity goes away.
The Races, as they stand today, are a masterpiece of human division.
The aliens would beg to differ!
“There’s nothing to fear Randy… we more than likely won’t see the day all of this phenotypic diversity goes away.”
No. And people probably wouldn’t all look the same in the first place. Look at Brazil (which we always do when this topic is discussed) there’s more ethnic mixing going on there than in most other places in the world, but it doesn’t mean that everybody looks like the same race. There is a tendency to always take things to their extreme case, and then argue it as if were probable. But we will never know what pressures or opportunities will shape the new group phenotypes. There are a lot of possible combinations out there to be had.
Who knows? Darker skinned people with almond shaped eyes and straight black hair. Or perhaps, tan skinned people with kinky hair, high cheek bones, and hazel eyes. Maybe even pale skinned people with fuller lips, curly hair, and a tendency toward muscular body types. Nobody knows. But it’s nothing to be afraid of, and in any case, it would happen long after we have all checked out.
@ Herneith
The aliens are preparing their cookbook!
Cynic,
I’m not arguing about phenotopic diversity per se (I’d be one to talk), but rather the ability for Jas0n and others to look at the ethnic composition of a room and diagnose that a “problem” exists.
The mindset which allows one to form such opinions, given only the most superficial evidence, suggests that it’s not enough for cross-ethnic and cross-cultural interaction to simply be allowed, rather, it must be forced. That is the belief which I find to be objectionable.
“When someone looks around a restaurant and sees white folks and black folks eating amongst themselves and thinks “racism”,
Racism plays a big role in that example.
“or looks at a black church with no white people and thinks “racism”,”
Racism created the need for black churches. That doesn’t make for a charge of racism hurled at black churches.
“or looks at Korean supper club with no black people and thinks “racism”
Huh? that has nothing to do with racism at all. Did you all notice how randy had to add that last example in to make his point seem more valid? That’s because his premise is very weak. Next he’ll tell us that we said chinese food is racist because it doesn’t include tacos and hamburgers. That way he can make our premise seem absurd while not addressing anything we actually said. The purpose for such behavior is beyond me.
“Racism created the need for black churches. That doesn’t make for a charge of racism hurled at black churches.”
I think that’s just the point Randy.
If we still had Negro baseball leagues, Blacks only schools, and Colored water fountains, you’d think that it was all perfectly natural because hey, people who look the same are drawn together.
Many of the specific ethnic conventions that exist in America today are the result of being told by the White majority, “We don’t accept you as part of our American culture.” So, in response, we had to develop our own parallel American cultures. However, in many cases, it was not our first choice to do so.
Jason,
The purpose for such behavior is beyond me.
I think the purpose is exactly what Abagond said it was when Randy first started on this shtick weeks ago. He has a deep-seated need to maintain his illusion of equality in America that justifies his looking down at People of Color, especially Black and Hispanic people. More importantly, this allows him to justify and reinforce his own racism until it seems as natural and logical as mathematics.
Randy,
King makes a good point too in that if your argument were to be taken seriously, it would entail that SEGREGATION IS A GOOD IDEA! I mean, c’mon man! Seriously Randy???
Are you going to tell me that you object to FORCED INTEGRATION? What the eff dude? Are you trying to be some Strom Thurmond meets George Wallace kinda crazy racist? Next thing you’ll be telling me you think it’s time to stand on the steps of some New England golf club and bar entry to Jews — like they did to my parents and grandparents in upstate New York — all in the name of preventing the homogenization of America! (Because, as we all know, if everybody were allowed to mix it be bad for diversity… Haha, such logic!)
Let me tell YOU something Randy. People in America who are/were considered The Other didn’t at first choose to form their own Chinatowns and Mission districts and Chicago ghettos. Whites refused to include them, so they had to create their own. That you would make the argument that segregation is a GOOD thing because it preserves your idea of a “rich tapestry” is effing disgusting.
You’re not merely a racist; you’re a virulent, dyed-in-the-wool, wannabe cross-burning, fetishizing racist!
Integration should, by all means be FORCED, BY LAW if necessary, for reasons that were made so eloquently during the CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT!
Mother of Moses, sons of Solomon, and all that jazz! You make me wanna laugh and cry all at the same time Randy. You’re so wrong and yet so completely ignorant of it that it’s a wonder you’re able to function in society at all.
Oy vey.
@ Herneith
The Races, as they stand today, are a masterpiece of human division.
The aliens would beg to differ!
@King
@ Herneith
The aliens are preparing their cookbook!
@jas0nburns
Next he’ll tell us that we said chinese food is racist because it doesn’t include tacos and hamburgers.
You guys are hilarious! Thanks for giving me a few laughs at the end of a very trying day…
Hey Abagond,
I really liked this post.
Mira, I think there are more boys than girls because two of the most populous countries, China and India favor boys over girls.
I find it shocking too btw.
zek said: “Are you going to tell me that you object to FORCED INTEGRATION? What the eff dude?Are you trying to be some Strom Thurmond meets George Wallace kinda crazy racist? (…) Integration should, by all means be FORCED, BY LAW if necessary, for reasons that were made so eloquently during the CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT!”
Easy tiger.
In Jas0n’s example, the restaurant in question had black as well as white diners. His issue was that he saw that the blacks and whites were sitting amongst themselves, and intuitively determined this to be a “problem”. It has nothing to do with matters of civil rights and “equal access”.
King, are you suggesting that Swedes, Vietnamese, and Ghanians have exactly the same amount of natural affinity between their respective groups as they do within them? I would challenge this assumption, and suggest that it’s normal to have occasion where these groups would get together amongst themselves.
I certainly encourage my wife to set aside time to spend in the exclusive company of her co-ethnics. That’s real diversity, although you and Jas0n might be dismayed to see their group sitting amongst themselves at a restaurant.
Sweden is a country
Vietnam is a country
Ghana is a country
All three countries speak different languages and have different cultures. Their mutual affinity is based on those cultures, and color, ONLY to the degree that it clues them to the idea that they may share the same culture.
If they all were in the same country, and sharing the same culture, then there would be no more reason for them to be drawn to skin color than for all the right-handed people to cluster together on one side of the room.
BTW, I have said it several times now that there is no problem for people of the same ethnicity to congregate together.
@Randy
Do you think America would be better or worse if Blacks & Whites shared an identical culture?
I love how Randy didn’t elaborate on his earlier statement of…
Monocultural fellowship is demonized and deemed pathological instead of being valued.
…and chose to go off in another direction, via twistable semantics.
King said: “All three countries speak different languages and have different cultures. Their mutual affinity is based on those cultures, and color, ONLY to the degree that it clues them to the idea that they may share the same culture.”
Considering that people don’t tend to leave their culture and families “at the door” when emigrating, I wouldn’t expect this affinity to simply disappear.
Cynic asked: “Do you think America would be better or worse if Blacks & Whites shared an identical culture?”
Interesting question. First I’d say that there are dozens if not hundreds of individual cultures in America, some predominantly monoethnic (e.g. the Gullah, coastal New Englanders) and some multiethnic.
Do I think America would be better if these all completely mixed together? I think it would be worse. That would be the end of diversity. All “places” disappear if every place is the same. Who would want that?
King said: “BTW, I have said it several times now that there is no problem for people of the same ethnicity to congregate together.”
Sorry, that was poor phrasing on my part. I was referring to Jas0n and zek, not you.
Franklin said: “I love how Randy didn’t elaborate on his earlier statement of…
Monocultural fellowship is demonized and deemed pathological instead of being valued.
…and chose to go off in another direction, via twistable semantics.”
Franklin, I’m saying that if people want to mix their paints, then that’s fine, but automatically seeing unmixed paint as a “problem” is unfortunate.
@ Randy
Except damn near no one cares when things are unmixed. They only care when it’s physically enforced and breaks the law. So you with your obvious disingenuous projections, and like-minded White Nationalists with their typical Martyr Complex, need to stop acting as if it’s open season on everything white. It’s getting tired.
“In Jas0n’s example, the restaurant in question had black as well as white diners. His issue was that he saw that the blacks and whites were sitting amongst themselves, and intuitively determined this to be a “problem””
Qnce again you attempt to misrepresent my statements. If you disagree with me why don’t you attack my premise directly instead of creating a straw man and attacking that.
I have said numerous times that black and white patrons sitting together is indicative of a problem. it is a symptom of a problem. Can you read?
do you know what a symptom is?
from wikipedia:
“A symptom may not be a malady, for example symptoms of pregnancy. One could debate, however, that this is an example of common misuse of a word, as the majority of symptoms and the history of the word are related to malady. The proper word for such situations would be “indication” or “suggestion” or simply “sign”"
So that’s your straw man. conflating the malady with the SYMPTOMS of the malady. They are two different things.
If you ever decide to debate with integrity by all means.
@Randy
I think I incorrectly worded my question. I didn’t mean to insinuate a hypothetical mono-cultural United States. Allow me to re-word this…
Do you think America would be better or worse if its cultural diversity did not fall along the lines of race(non-blks/whites not included)?
“Considering that people don’t tend to leave their culture and families “at the door” when emigrating, I wouldn’t expect this affinity to simply disappear.”
Yes, and that may explain the racial divisions in restaurants full of immigrants from England and Cameroon, but little else.
Randy said:
Most blacks came to America before 1800 and most whites before 1920. The cultural differences that remain between them are largely due to segregation. So blaming cultural differences begs the question.
If that is true, it would be a strong indicator for an underlying problem that needs to be addressed at the roots. Just as much as mutual and self-segregation indicate a fundamental problem.
One thing is certain, none of the above are a result of natural human behaviour. There’s enough living evidence for that in the world. Without any imposition, that is.
Jas0n said: “I have said numerous times that black and white patrons sitting together is indicative of a problem. it is a symptom of a problem. Can you read?”
I disagree with your conclusion, whether your observations indicate a problem or the symptom of a problem.
Franklin said: “Except damn near no one cares when things are unmixed. They only care when it’s physically enforced and breaks the law.”
Jas0n (and others) apparently do care.
The Cynic asked: “Do you think America would be better or worse if its cultural diversity did not fall along the lines of race(non-blks/whites not included)?”
Asking whether or not the country would benefit from the removal of race-based divisions seems a bit like asking if you’d rather have had a girl following the birth of your son. Those divisions are here now, and they’re real, so it seems unnecessarily destructive to decide now to wholesale eliminate them.
For example, how many people who attend a “black church” look around on Sunday and wish that 3/4 of the black folks would be replaced by whites, hispanics, and asians? My guess is that plenty of black church parishioners are perfectly happy even if no white folks show up for a given service.
King said: “Yes, and that may explain the racial divisions in restaurants full of immigrants from England and Cameroon, but little else.”
King and Abagond, I know people from Italian families whose close friends are nearly exclusively Italian, even after several generations. Cultures can and do persist. You might simply not be noticing how much voluntary intra-European “self-segregation” is going on in this country.
Olufemi said: “If that is true, it would be a strong indicator for an underlying problem that needs to be addressed at the roots. Just as much as mutual and self-segregation indicate a fundamental problem.
One thing is certain, none of the above are a result of natural human behaviour. There’s enough living evidence for that in the world. Without any imposition, that is.”
I have no animus towards white people, but I do (in effect) limit my family’s exposure to them by encouraging monocultural events amongst my wife’s people. I believe this is a necessary step to cultivate genuine diversity.
Randy, I think that you’re misunderstanding what Jason was saying from the beginning. I think that the restaurant incident was just one moment that brought some clarity to a lifetime of observation. He’s in this restaurant and he notices… Wow, we’re all still segregating ourselves by color here—not that much has changed.
I don’t think that Jason stepped into one restaurant on one afternoon and freaked out because White’s and Blacks weren’t sitting at the same tables. But you’ve been arguing as if that had been the case.
It’s really not about one restaurant, it’s about simply noticing the separations when they seem to be unnatural. I think that all of us have been in public situations where the self-inflicted color coded sorting come off as odd, and we ask ourselves, “Shouldn’t things be different than this by now?”
“King and Abagond, I know people from Italian families whose close friends are nearly exclusively Italian, even after several generations.”
Well yes, this can happen particularly when you have a large group of immigrants who all speak the same language, and are sharing the same burden of ostracization. But, you will generally find that the older generations are more ethnically isolated than the younger people, and in time, the young venture out from their enclave and mix with the rest of society.
In the past, it was much easier to be isolated. Nowadays, you will probably attend at least 4 integrated schools while growing up, and your workplace is likely to integrated as well. Like it or not, you’re going to get to know many people from different ethnic backgrounds. There are far fewer people who live their lives in ethnic ghettos today.
“I disagree with your conclusion, whether your observations indicate a problem or the symptom of a problem”
my conclusion being that it is a problem.
so you agree that racism created a lingering cultural divide between blacks and whites, you just don’t see anything wrong with that.
King said: “Wow, we’re all still segregating ourselves by color here—not that much has changed. “
I believe that I understand the subtlety of the point. However, I still think that this perspective inaccurately discounts many types of natural INTER-group affinity that would still exist even in the most egalitarian situations.
“It’s really not about one restaurant, it’s about simply noticing the separations when they seem to be unnatural.”
This begs the question of which types of human groupings are “natural” and which types are “unnatural”. I lack the hubris to make the bold pronouncement that this or that organizational model is unnatural, but folks like Jas0n who have been steeped in politically-correct groupthink for years apparently have no problems making such denouncements.
“Shouldn’t things be different than this by now?”
In other words, the situation doesn’t conform to some arbitrary amount of necessary “diversity”, so some pathology MUST be at the root.
“Well yes, this can happen particularly when you have a large group of immigrants who all speak the same language, and are sharing the same burden of ostracization.”
I don’t mean to beat up on you King, but this is a perfect example of what I am objecting to. Your statement assumes that the only reason Italians might prefer the company of other Italians from time to time is as a response to “ostracization”.
This concept sits at the heart of the arbitrary politically-correct belief system which actually poisons the well of true diversity.
That’s not to say that these folks ONLY associate with Italians, but I claim that it’s perfectly normal and natural for monoethnic groups like Italians, Bangladeshis, and Javanese to set aside time in their lives to spend in the exclusive company of their fellows.
“In the past, it was much easier to be isolated. Nowadays, you will probably attend at least 4 integrated schools while growing up, and your workplace is likely to integrated as well. Like it or not, you’re going to get to know many people from different ethnic backgrounds.”
My family has friends from a wide array of different backgrounds, and yet we also prioritize time dedicated exclusively to our ethnic roots. This need not be based in any sense upon discrimination or oppression.
“but folks like Jas0n who have been steeped in politically-correct groupthink for years apparently have no problems making such”
That’s just the thing though Randy. I don’t know if you recall why I brought up that scenario to begin with. It did happen a couple years ago and you might be suprised to know that at the time my views might have been more in line with yours. That is to say, I was a completely ignorant white male living in my little privilege bubble. Unaware of my own racism. Just like you except not so thick in the head. So thankfully some sense was able to penetrate eventually. Hell Randy, I didn’t even attend a liberal university. I just thought it might be a good idea to listen to POC when they talk about racism instead of acting like I know better than they do. I guess that’s so PC it probably makes you sick don’t it.
Jas0n,
When you see black parishioners in a black church, do you think that’s the symptom of a problem? Are you suggesting they’d be better off by removing most of the black folks and replacing them with whites and hispanics?
When you see a group of asians setting together at a restaurant, do you also see that as the symptom of a problem?
I live in Shenzhen, and people from all over China come here to find work. There is a large Muslim Chinese community in the city, as well as Christian missionary organizations. Making him a non-smoking fan of Bollywood narrows it down a lot, but by no means makes him impossible.
I wonder if the average person has access to a bicycle? It certainly seems to be the case in Shenzhen, and I imagine people share family or even village bicycles in rural areas.