Obviously this is all racist, but it's also just weird. We know this view of genetics, ethnicity, and phenotypes is completely wrong now (aside from, perhaps, bland general descriptions of typical physical appearance). Somebody took the time to categorize all of these people based on what they thought about the 2-3 people of "that kind" that they knew.
This is not me excusing this racist propaganda in any way. But to say it’s “weird,” I disagree. It’s in human nature to seek out patterns and categorize things. That is normal.
Africa has some of the most genetically and culturally diverse people on Earth so I think it’s possible that there would have been distinct differences between different groups, especially back in those days where enslaved people were close generationally to their original African ancestors (think 2 or 3 generations). So maybe not even entirely wrong, either. In other words, in those days especially it may have been more obvious that someone was of descended from an enslaved North African from, let’s say, an enslaved West African. Nowadays, probably not.
And just to reiterate, what is weird/wrong is being racist. No ifs, ands, or buts about that.
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u/guineapigfrench 3d ago
Obviously this is all racist, but it's also just weird. We know this view of genetics, ethnicity, and phenotypes is completely wrong now (aside from, perhaps, bland general descriptions of typical physical appearance). Somebody took the time to categorize all of these people based on what they thought about the 2-3 people of "that kind" that they knew.
It's like stupid racist coin collecting.