Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with racial

photographic white lies

Jody Tresidder — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 10:53:04 -0800

This might be a wild goose chase. But can anyone help me track down any sort of a technical clue for why a white tint very specifically applied to one part of a photo taken in the 1920s – for the purpose of deliberate deception – would have turned a dark, purplish navy color over time? I’m assuming the color corruption is due to some type of direct chemical reaction with the photographic paper. It's obvious the white color was painted/applied directly onto the surface of the original black and white print.

But I don’t know where to even start looking for a chemical answer.

I‘ve had access to this doctored and unpublished photo and I’ve looked at it very closely (it’s in a museum archive).

The intention of the hand tinting – and I know it was also done in the 1920s by the same guy who took the original photo -was to cover up the brown skin of a Central American “native” and make it look as if he really had pure white skin.

On the one hand, it's a clumsy deception –because when you tilt the surface of the photo under normal light you can see immediately where some liquid (paint or ink or possibly a light gel) – has been applied only to the area of bare skin of one prominent figure in the foreground. Also, I don't think the photo would have been terribly scientifically convincing even if the white tint had stayed white. On the other hand, it’s very neatly done.

There’s no question the doctored “native warrior” was meant to look as if he was of pale, Scandinavian origin (there’s a saga of fraudulent anthropology which explains the photo).

My feeling is that the photographer didn’t have a clue about any “special” paints or colors you were meant to use. He was just trying to create photographic evidence for his own mad racial theories. (It’s obviously ironic that the “native” he was attempting to transform into a white man in the photo ended up a blue aubergine hue – with a kind of dull bluebottle sheen.)

I was wondering if anyone knows whether any innocently hand tinted photos from the same 1920s era developed the same color corruption problem?

Racial segregation in Mid-west?

Deflagro — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 15:02:06 -0800

How prominent was racial segregation in the western parts of the Mid-west (Kansas/Nebraska area) in the early-to-mid-50s? I heard someone the other day mention that when they were growing up in that area in the 50s that there was absolutely no segregation and just wanted to see how accurate that was. I know the Civil Rights Movement didn't start until late 50s/late 60s, but she made it sound like there was no segregation (such as all races going to same schools and such)

(Note: I know racial segregation is wrong and unethical, I just want to know the accuracy of a statement made the other day.)

Attraction across races

Big Fat Tycoon — Fri, 03 Jun 2005 08:13:35 -0800

Are you attracted to people of races different from your own? I pose this question not to be inflammatory, but because it's one of those semi-taboo questions that I think might not always be answered honestly or seriously, and I think AskMeFi is one of the better places to pose it.

I'm ethnically Asian, and I'm attracted to white women, for the most part. Now, there could be endless debates as to why that is, but suffice to say I grew up in North America in a mostly white enclave. The problem for me is that I find it very difficult, compared to my white friends, to attract women that I'm actually attracted to -- this issue was brought home when I lived in Asia for a while and discovered that local women found me quite attractive but I didn't usually feel likewise. The same goes for my most recent foray into online personals, where my white friends have garnered a great deal more interest than me. Now, perhaps it's some aspect of my attitude that is causing this, but it seems like it is a factor. An average-looking white man I feel will garner more interest than an equivalently average-looking Asian male in this society. My cousin, also raised in North America, has bumped into similar problems, where women have actually said, "I don't Asians" to his face.

So, in this seemingly increasingly multi-cultural world, is this a natural "prejudice" that still remains in you? If you have particular tastes in this area, are they related to physical factors (look of eyes, skin color) or is it a cultural issue? Do you feel you have a fetishistic interest in other races, if you do find other races attractive? If you aren't attracted to other races, why not? Is this something I just have to accept, since attraction is tied to so many subconscious and irrational factors?

Is the Southern United States a 'bad area' for a mixed-race couple to travel?

bunglin jones — Wed, 16 Feb 2005 01:18:09 -0800

My girlfriend (white, both parents English) and I (dark-skinned, both parents from Sri Lanka) met an American couple in a bar (here in Australia). They seemed very adventurous, educated and intelligent but became very VERY serious when we said we planned to travel in the Southern States of the U.S., suggesting that - after dark at least - the whole area is still (and I quote) "maybe a bad idea for a mixed-race couple." Are they right?

What was so offensive about "the blacks"?

yalestar — Sun, 03 Oct 2004 11:07:35 -0800

Oddball semantics question: Yesterday my wife and her mother were talking about chutney for some reason. Her mother remarked that she always thought that chutney was something that "the blacks" ate. Setting aside the fact that chutney is an Indian thing, what is so distasteful about mom-in-law's choice of words? [MI] Now I've never known mom-in-law to espouse any particularly racist points of view before, and I don't think any were intended here. But the wife and I were both caught off guard by it, and are also finding ourselves pretty fascinated at the semantics at play here. For example, I don't think I would have given it a second thought if mom-in-law had said "the Greeks" or "the Swedes." But for some reason, hearing her say "the blacks" was very cringe-inducing.

So, what's the deal here? Why does saying "the blacks" sound so blunt and wrong? Or are we just reading too much into some colloquialism from yesteryear (mom-in-law grew up in rural Nebraska)?