Lady Susan Hussey

[Spud]

David Lammy and Rishi Sunak are both British, indeed English, by birth and upbringing, but by your definition don't look British. What do Britons look like?

What do Africans look like?

[bluehillside Retd.]

Spud,

What do Africans look like?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Kallis

[Maeght]

What do Africans look like?

People who are born in Africa can look just the same as people born anywhere in the world.

[Dicky Underpants]

And that's all you have to say?


You have just stated that you make a judgement based on the colour of someone's skin. You do know how appa
lling you are sounding right now?

Oh, he probably thinks black-skinned people are living under the curse of Cain, or the curse of Ham, or some such.

[Spud]

Spud,

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Kallis

Does he look African to you?

[Maeght]

Does he look African to you?

What are you on about? What do you think Africans should look like?

[Spud]

What are you on about? What do you think Africans should look like?

Does he look African or not?

[Maeght]

Does he look African or not?

There is no such thing as looking African. Being African is about where you are born not what you look like.

[Spud]

There is no such thing as looking African.  Being African is about where you are born not what you look like.

What about looking as if you were born in Africa?

[Maeght]

What about looking as if you were born in Africa?

Same thing.

[Spud]

Same thing.

"African" can refer to individuals who trace their ancestry to the indigenous inhabitants of Africa. Therefore to look African can be to look as though one's ancestry can be traced to the indigenous inhabitants of Africa.

[Maeght]

"African" can refer to individuals who trace their ancestry to indigenous inhabitants of Africa.

Lady Hussey asked where she was from meaning what's their nationality and wouldn't accept the answer given (allegedly). You talked about people looking African, you didn't say that they look to have indigenous African heritage. You questioned whether Jacques Kallis looked African yet he was born in Africa, so is African. As said earlier, ethnicity and Nationality are different things.

[ProfessorDavey]

What about looking as if you were born in Africa?

What on earth does that mean.

You either were born in Africa - e.g. Jacque Kallis or you weren't - e.g. David Lammy.

[Outrider]

Is there a none of the above option?

Susan Hussey based on the conversation seems racist. Ngozi Fulani seems racist too.

And when you said 'information', you mean incoherent racist rant?

I'm not sure she did seem racist, I just though she came across as completely ignorant. She didn't appear to me to be malicious about it, she just very apparently couldn't understand why what she was saying was being interpreted as it understandably was.

I get that the effect was discriminatory, but I don't think that the intent was, and whilst it's always difficult to absolutely judge intent (and I understand why legally they try to phrase the laws so as to avoid getting into establishing intent because it's an incredibly difficult standard establish) but I think we are at a stage where we need to start differentiating in at least some cases between a racist effect without a racist intent behind it, and the more grotesque and overt racism that is (thankfully) less common than it once was.

O.

[SteveH]

What about looking as if you were born in Africa?

A word of advice, Spud: when you're in a hole, stop digging.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Spud,

What about looking as if you were born in Africa?

What, like Richard Dawkins, Chris Froome, Peter Hain, Richard Leakey, Doris Lessing, Elon Musk, Gary Player, Helen Suzman, Charlize Theron and J.R.R Tolkien – all of whom were born in Africa? Being born in Africa doesn’t “look” like anything. Africanism (and Europeanism) is a status that has nothing to do with place of birth or with skin colour.       

[Outrider]

What do Africans look like?

The modal average is two arms, two legs and two eyes, but the mean is slightly less than that. Otherwise, the data's all over the place.

O.

[Outrider]

Does he look African to you?

Given that he's South African, how can he not? Two legs, two arms, two eyes... fits so far.

O.

[SteveH]

Besides which, no-one thinks of themself as African (or European, Asian etc). They think of themselves as Namibian, South African, Kenyan, Egyptian, etc.

[Maeght]

"African" can refer to individuals who trace their ancestry to the indigenous inhabitants of Africa. Therefore to look African can be to look as though one's ancestry can be traced to the indigenous inhabitants of Africa.

I note the edit.

Now Spud, I accept that she may have been trying to ask what the ethnicity of the person was but did so in a clumsy way, not understanding how here question might come across and not being careful to word it in a way to make that clear, and not realising what offence she was causing. That may be due to her age, her upbringing or something else. You seemed to be going down the same path and you must see that from the various responses you have had surely.

[SteveH]

And another thing: super-Saharan Africans, from Morocco, Egypt, Libya, etc., are largely white.

[Spud]

And that's all you have to say?

You have just stated that you make a judgement based on the colour of someone's skin. You do know how appalling you are sounding right now?

A judgment about where they are from, yes. What's wrong with that?  Other factors influence that judgment once you start talking to them, but your first impression might be based on their skin colour (and their name and attire).

[Spud]

And another thing: super-Saharan Africans, from Morocco, Egypt, Libya, etc., are largely white.

Britons are generally fairer skinned because they live further from the equator.

[ProfessorDavey]

Britons are generally fairer skinned because they live further from the equator.

But generalities aren't worth a bean when you are talking to an individual person in front of you.

Jacques Kallis is (South) African - born and bred in (South) Africa.
David Lammy is British - born and bred in Britain.

Jacques Kallis is white, David Lammy is black - their ethnicity has nothing to do with their nationality.

[ProfessorDavey]

A judgment about where they are from, yes. What's wrong with that?  Other factors influence that judgment once you start talking to them, but your first impression might be based on their skin colour (and their name and attire).

Sure - but when you ask the question and the black person in front of you says 'I'm British, born in London' you'd have to be spectacularly 'tone-deaf' to continue banging on about 'where do you really come from' rather than feel mortified about your prejudiced presumption.