# Individual's role and its relation to race



## undead (Nov 28, 2010)

Do you think there's a natural correlation between race and individual's role?

Considering the world population, or the role of Asians in non-Asian countries.

Example:
- Asian people tend to have an administrative, technical or "at most" scientific role.
- Caucasians tend to have a managerial role.

Asians are practical. Caucasians are theoretical, and philosophical.

This looks like stereotyping, but that's what I observed. I'm thinking that it could be a natural factor, even though we try to promote equal opportunity. The fact is, there are more Asians who aspire to be techies or scientists. This is also influenced by the reality that it's hard for Asians to compete in the "creative" sector.

There are exceptions, but they are "exceptions".


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## strawberryLola (Sep 19, 2010)

I don't think it's a natural correlation, I think it's a tendency..

That tendency relates to conformation..

For instance, a lot of East Asian roots stem from Confucianism, which highly respects structure/order.. Many of the decisions made by the individual is to maintain that structural role within the system.. that is, the collective role that each member contributes within the family, and therefore, the society/culture- which emphasizes family, respect for elders, maintaining that silver rule- _"Do unto others what you would not like to have done unto you."
_
It's a totally different lifestyle that promotes collectivist thinking.. which tends to revolve around pragmatism in order to maintain a sort of status quo. Of course- this was the older model, which is continually changing as globalization/market monopoly seems to dominant the trend.. We'll see what the future holds, because as technology changes, so do our values/the way we live life. What we previously thought of as "Asian" or "Caucasian" values seems to move towards a blurring/mixing of the two, moving towards an unknown territory. Technology and culture are continually changing and adapting in ways unimaginable. From a sociological stand point, I'd be interested to see how this will all play out in 20 or 50 years in time.. Seems like it's not really about the race that matters, but the position of power, which depends on how many 'social networks' a person has?


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## undead (Nov 28, 2010)

strawberryLola said:


> I don't think it's a natural correlation, I think it's a tendency..
> 
> That tendency relates to conformation..
> 
> ...


I think that should be: _"Do unto others as you would have others do unto you."_

Yes, you're right about the tradition and collectivist thinking. 
But, there should be reasons on why the most popular celebrities, notable public figures and corporate leaders are Caucasians.

Exceptions are Asians who were born in western countries and were born out of interracial marriage. Maggie Q is one of them.

Even Jackie Chan, Jet Li, or Bruce Lee are only well-known for their Asian characteristics. Movie producers won't put them as a leading role in a movie that should not have any cultural or racial bias such as "The Matrix", "Armageddon", "2012", or I don't know what else. I think lots of them.

A movie/anime such as "Blood: The Last Vampire" also showed this "racial" role. "Saya" (asian) the human-vampire hybrid is the one conducting the dirty work of the US government. David (caucasian) is the one who "guides" her, just like a manager's role.


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## Mutatio NOmenis (Jun 22, 2009)

I think it's cultural stuff. MOST people aren't philosophical at all.


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## Plaxico (Dec 11, 2010)

I'm Asian and I'm more practical than theoretical. But i thought maybe asians would be typed as philosophical because of confucius, lao tzu, buddha, dalai lama, gandhi, sun tzu.............like the stereotypical dojo you find in hot pockets commercials.


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## Blanco (Dec 23, 2010)

It's interesting to note that western cultures tend to value individuality while western religions are much more collectivist.

Compared to Eastern cultures which value collectivism in society, yet many eastern regions seem to be centered on individual enlightenment.


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## undead (Nov 28, 2010)

Blanco said:


> It's interesting to note that western cultures tend to value individuality while western religions are much more collectivist.
> 
> Compared to Eastern cultures which value collectivism in society, yet many eastern regions seem to be centered on individual enlightenment.


Yes that's correct, theoretically. 

But, in practice, spiritual enlightment regardless of its true purpose tend to be done collectively as well among Asians. While this is not the case ifor people in western countries who practice eastern religions.


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## pwiloson (Jan 15, 2011)

Many studies have shown there to be massive differences between Races.

Frankly, this whole, 'everybody is equal' stuff is a load of cock and bull. Thank Heavens, no 2 people are quite the same - if everyone was truly equal then there would be no society - rather - there would be only a workforce.

Sport is a great example of the difference in races. Whilst of course there are many white sprinters and many black swimmers - look at the Olympics; The ratio of black sprinters to white sprinters would be more than 10:1 I'm sure - and I do not recall seeing a single black swimmer. Or skier.

And, as horrible as it is and may never a thing like it ever occur again - but it takes a greater capacity of brainpower from one species/organism over another to enable the first organism to 'utilise' the second - like the way humans ride horses and not visa versa... and, well, I refer to the slave trade.

Take offence if you will, but it happened and that's that.


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## skycloud86 (Jul 15, 2009)

pwiloson said:


> Many studies have shown there to be massive differences between Races.


And these studies are?

Genetically, all humans - that's all humans, all seven billion of us - are over 99% genetically similar, and most scientists do not believe that the human species can be split into races.



> Frankly, this whole, 'everybody is equal' stuff is a load of cock and bull. Thank Heavens, no 2 people are quite the same - if everyone was truly equal then there would be no society - rather - there would be only a workforce.


I agree and disagree - I think people can be both equal yet different.



> Sport is a great example of the difference in races. Whilst of course there are many white sprinters and many black swimmers - look at the Olympics; The ratio of black sprinters to white sprinters would be more than 10:1 I'm sure - and I do not recall seeing a single black swimmer. Or skier.


This has nothing to do with their supposed race, but more to do with cultural norms and the popularity of certain sports in certain societies, as well as the fact that many ethnic minorities in the West tend to be more poorer than white Westerners. To assume that because you haven't personally seen a black swimmer or skiier before (the latter being rare almost completely due to the fact that few places in Africa get snow, and many people in Africa are to poor to afford to ski) that they don't exist is illogical. You might as well claim that white people can't play basketball.



> And, as horrible as it is and may never a thing like it ever occur again - but it takes a greater capacity of brainpower from one species/organism over another to enable the first organism to 'utilise' the second - like the way humans ride horses and not visa versa... and, well, I refer to the slave trade.


Except that black people aren't a separate species, except that many Africans were sold into slavery by other Africans or even used as slaves by other Africans, except that people from every nationality have been used as slaves, even in their own countries. Are you going to claim that European peasants were a different species or less intelligent than European nobility in the Middle Ages?



> Take offence if you will, but it happened and that's that.


The only way I can take offence at your post is that it is so bad, so stupid that you can only be trolling, and so are wasting my time reading and replying to it.


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## pwiloson (Jan 15, 2011)

I have addressed your points, in bold, below.

Thanks



skycloud86 said:


> And these studies are?
> 
> *Racial Anthropology - and if it wasn't for the looney left, then, we'd still be allowed to scientifically prove the differences.*
> 
> ...


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## skycloud86 (Jul 15, 2009)

> Racial Anthropology - and if it wasn't for the looney left, then, we'd still be allowed to scientifically prove the differences.


Racial Anthropology, which was discredited by scientists decades ago? You're referring to the quackery that suggests that people can be put into groups with laughable names like Bruenn and Pontid and Borreby in the same way phrenologists used to think bumps on someone's head said something about their personality. Also, I assume mainstream Anthropology must not be enough for you, even though anthropology itself can be used to identify people of a certain group (loosely, of course, as all humans groups are varied, not to mention the fact that most people not of recent African ancestry are genetically much more similar to each other than they are to Africans who are the most genetically diverse people in the world, regardless of any attempt to put them all into one group.

If you want to be taken seriously, I would stop using terms like the "looney left", it doesn't suit a discussion and it certainly makes your viewpoint a lot less credible than you would want it to. It wasn't the political Left (and you're going to need to define what you mean by the Left - do you mean the wide spectrum of ideologies between anarchism and liberalism, or do you mean Communism, or do you mean the American definition of the left?) that discredited Racial Anthropology, it was the rise of genetics and modern Anthropology that ended such quackery.

You say that people would still be allowed to scientifically prove the differences - what do you mean by this? Surely if Racial Anthropology was scientifically provable, it would still be seen as a valid scientific field. Instead, it has vanished, just like the idea that everything revolved around the Earth, and the idea that the Earth was flat.



> At which point did I say that they didn't exist? You will clearly have read (or ignored) the part where I stated that I simply have not seen them and thus leads one to use an approximation to form a basis - IE, you haven't seen any of x doing z's activity but you have seen many of y doing z's activity, therefore, it is not as likely to see x doing a z activity but more likely to see y doing a z activity.


Fair enough, but I do not think that it is supposed racial differences which cause swimming and skiing to be seemingly white-only sports, but rather economical, cultural and geographic factors.



> Yes, that is exactly what I am going to claim and already have done so - if they were more intelligent, or even equally intelligent, then they would have realised that there was many more slaves than there were slave traders and one boatload of slaves would have surely been enough to overthrow the traders. A few slaves might have been shot in the process, but the majority would have been better off. They did not adapt or even try to change the situation, rather, they simply did what they were told and were not even freed properly until influential white people began putting a stop to it.
> 
> QED?


Are you serious? These people were barely fed, chained up in inhuman conditions and most likely had never even seen the ocean until they were sold in the African ports used in the slave trade. Not only that, but the white slavers would have been armed, and the slaves would most likely have no idea what to do with a European ship, even if they did manage to overthrow the slavers. There are few stories of successful slave mutinies on slaver boats because there was no chance of them even being able to attempt to escape.

As for intelligence, why didn't white slaves try and escape from North Africa or the Middle East after they had been captured? Surely they as white people should have been intelligent enough, right? Why didn't indentured servants from Ireland and Scotland try and mutiny on the ships taking them to the New World, especially as they would have been treated much better than the African slaves and would have had some idea of how a European ship worked. 

I think you're really ignoring the reality of slavery. You seem to think that the slaves could just walk away from the plantations, even though they were ill-treated, with poor diets and no real ability to read or write. Eventually, most slaves were born to slaves, and never knew anything other than slavery. You're also ignoring the fact that there were many white indentured servants in the New World. Why didn't they try and escape from their situation as well?



> And firstly, I was not familiar with the term trolling until your use just now - as you will see by my postcount I am not familiar with these boards, or any for that matter, as these are the first time in my adult life that I have bothered with them and that no, I am not trolling, and your failure to reply to this will simply go down as defeat.


Well, your post sounds like it was made simply to cause offence rather than to actually create discussion. You paint a very biased, uneducated picture of many issues.


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