Aren't I White?

By: Sofie Balan

71% of America’s white– wow, that's a terribly degrading statistic for black people, because “white people are not particularly degraded—at least, not as a race—and the themes of "slavery, resistance, and abolition" apply more intuitively to Black people rather than White descent.” - says an article published at Yale University in 2003.

Black people however, aren’t my subject today, “White” people are.

First, let's talk about what “white” really means. Ironically, “white” encompasses many more colors than you think. This term refers to people anywhere in Europe, Western Asia, Central Asia, South Asia, North Africa, and the Horn of Africa. A lot of people right? Especially when other racial groups often stick to one continent. Have you ever thought of why you mark off “Caucasian” on a form? Probably not.

Johann Friedrich Blumenbach was an 1800s German physiologist, who founded racial classifications, aka, the first actual racist. Funny how language spins what we think is “progressive” to something that pervades our abhorrent society. Well, what did Blumenbach do? He is the one who made skin color a social group, the one who made “white” and “caucasian” synonyms. Now I'll delve into the story of how he came to this conclusion, and why it is terribly offensive.

Obviously the name "Caucasian" connects to the Caucasus mountains, these mountains run through two areas. One that creates a natural border with Russia, and the other area that creates a border with Turkey and Iran. There are over 50 ethnic groups that make up the Caucasus, but the main three are; Circassian, Indo-European, and Atalic (images respectively).

Blumenbach called the Atalic the embodiment of ugliness, which may foreshadow his perception of humanity in general. But Circassian people! specifically Georgians, well, Blumenbach loved us!

Blumenbach developed a theory of racial classification based on a Georgian woman’s skull. Blumenbach was enamored with it, and Georgian women in general, so he called this skull, the “most handsome and becoming”- which is talked about in an article from the National Institute of health. Aside from Georgians, Blumenbach looked at 4 other skulls.

Keep what I say after this with a grain of salt and remember this is the words of Blumenbach, not me. The Mongolian skull represented the yellow race, the Malayan skull represented the brown race, the Ethiopian skull represented the black race, and the American skull represented the red race.

Now, we don't use the terms yellow, or red anymore, because they are clearly too ambiguous and classified as rude. But somehow we find it okay to use black, brown, and white, often.

The most important thing to take out of this speech isn't the racial theory, its its application of it. The reason white people are called Caucasian is because Blumenbach wanted to be the same race as this Georgian female, he figured that since Caucasian encompassed some of Europe and Asia, its geographical ambiguity would counter any questionings. So he called white people just that, Caucasian. So the mountain men of Georgia, the other 50 ethnic groups that are the direct descent of the first humans, are now the same race as a random selfish German man from the 1800s. The same man who inspired Hitler, and the concept of racism as we know it.

In my opinion, terms like “White, Brown, and Black” imply a disconnect with one's heritage and ethnicity. The reason we now call people these terms is because they don't know, and don't care about where they originate from.

Subconsciously, we as a society reduce peoples cultural worth to what they look like. Which is wrong, because culture should be important, even though many think it isn't– but that isn't the fault of the real Caucasians. To put it in perspective, Georgians–people of a country so small, people so in touch with their roots, people who work to preserve their heritage–should never be reduced to their skin color. Everyday Georgians hope to become more known and cherished because they are proud of their home and history. Why are we stripped of our culture because others dont care about theirs?

Modern day society doesn't think people can be racist towards white people, they think that's offensive to even bring up because racism is more prevalent in Black–or people of color. But what they dont realize is the slavery, torture, stripping of culture, pain and overall muffling of the real Caucasian voices since Blumenbachs theory is just that, racism. We deserve a voice, one that separates us from the majority, and so do the other “white” people. Why is it fair that Europeans, West Asians, Central Asians, South Asians, North Africans, Southern Africans and Middle Easterners don't get the same legal classification as others? Even the Census Bureau follows Blumenbach's theory despite its history. It's not fair to the Georgian woman's skull that her own culture is removed, because of a completely obsessive, rich, and out of touch German man. Give us back our history and allow each country that is suppressed from their heritage to be independent from the term “white”, because we have our own history, our own stories, and are far more than a color.

02/01/2025

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