User talk:Iseebias

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Contents 1 Thanks 2 Rules 3 Image:Two Curve Bell.jpg 4 Response to comment on my talk page 5 Rules 6 Unilateral reverts without giving other editors a chance to comment 7 Hi 8 Black people edit 9 recent addition 10 Rome people

[edit] Thanks

Thank you for you great additions to Black people that show the nebulous nature of the color line across international boarders. futurebird 00:47, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

Hello. I noticed that you reverted a lot of changes to Black people. Please do not do this, you reverted very many changes, make a new edit if you have a problem with just some edits. I have removed some cited material because it was not relevant to the article. This is quite reasonable, just because something is cited, it does not make it sacrosanct, especially if they are not relevant or not from reliable sources. For example definitions of "Negro/Negroid" do not constitute the same thing as definitions of "Black people". I would have thought that this was quite obvious. There is also a massive pov-fork on this article, this is not the place to discuss the various controversies regarding the existence/non-existence of "race" from the perspective of genetics. It is impossible to biologically or genetically define Black people, not least because this does not represent a group with a recent shared common ancestry and because it is impossible to define any "race" from a biological point of view, because from a biological point of view no such thing as "race" exists for humans, we are all Homo sapiens sapiens, the second sapiens designates us as all the same race. So if you want to be strictly accurate, from a biological point of view we are all the same race. Furthermore the section on "Racial reification" is confusing and misleading. Indeed it is not about "race" at all. It seems to be little more than the half cocked musings of a few very confused people, these represent mainly social constructs for defining Black people anyway, they certainly do not represent anything other than social constructs. Therefore they belong in the Sociopolitical definitions" section. Indeed given that biology does not recognise the existence of different "races" within the human species, it is actually more correct to point out that all definitions of "race" are in fact sociopolitical. By the way, I suspect you are a sockpuppet of Timelist/Editingoprah. Alun 10:31, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

I'm not a sockpuppet. I just want to document all perspectives. If you want to leave definitions explicitly for negro and negroid to other articles I guess you can make that argument, but please don't reove any cited perspectives on what it means to be "black". Iseebias

Ok, thanks for your message. Sorry if I wrongly accused you of being a sockpuppet. I think your analysis is spot on. I have had some conflict in the past regarding this and other related articles by people who want to push a "biological/genetic" pov, and as a biologist I get annoyed when people who are apparently racists abuse my profession in order to promote their bigotry. Because of this maybe I overreacted, so I apologise unreservedly. I suppose it's an emotive issue and we can all get a little defensive every now and then. I think you are probably right to say that we need to show that there have been many and contradictory types of meanings for the term Black people, and that highlighting exposes the fact that it is, and always will be a social construct. There were two things I did object to. I don't understand why it claimed that people like Rushton or Satel were using "objective" criteria, their criteria are no more or less objective than anyone else's. For example the definition that states that Black people are of recent African origin, I wonder what is objective about stating that migration out of Africa 100,000 years ago is different to say migration out of Africa 75,000 years ago, or 50,000 years ago, or even 1000 or 500 years ago. This is not objective, it is arbitrary and subjective. Likewise I do not agree that any of these beliefs are anything other than socio-political. Humans form a continuous geographical distribution that varies gradually or clinally if you like. Therefore any division of this population into sub-populations is always going to be arbitrary and subjective, this is exactly why there are anywhere from 2 to 100 so called "races". I've been looking into this quite a bit, and if we want to define a "race" as a genetically "distinct" population, then there are many different "races" in sub-Saharan Africa (where the vast majority of human genetic diversity exists), and all of the populations outside of Africa display much reduced diversity, because they represent a sub-set of African genes. In effect the migration out of Africa was a bottleneck, the people who left Africa represented only a small proportion of the diversity seen within Africa. There's an excellent paper on this by Long and Kittles (Human genetic variation and the nonexistence of human races: Human Biology, 75, no. 4, pp. 449-471. [PDF) where they convincingly show that no concepts of "race" in biology fit the observed human population distribution. Anyway, thanks for the note, and again sorry if I was a bit confrontational. Alun 06:08, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Rules

Please read WP:3RR and dont break it by reverting again. If 3 separate editors oppose you perhaps the material should stay? SqueakBox 22:02, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

I suggest rather than reverting that you try to edit the new material and add to it. And leave in Ed Poor's edit as well unless there is a strong reason not to, SqueakBox 22:15, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Image:Two Curve Bell.jpg

Please weigh in on this IfD [5] futurebird 06:16, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Response to comment on my talk page

If revealing J. Philippe Rushton's actual acadamic credentials and racial/political biases (information that is backed up by reliable sources) is considered "offensive" and "discrediting" him, then perhaps his quotes should not be included in the black people article. In fact, a few editors have requested that his content be deleted from the article. I tend to agree, but am willing to comprimise by allowing his views to be in the article only if the necessary biographical information is included. Spylab 14:42, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Fair enough. My intention in putting him in was simply to document the fact that proponents of racial theories reserve the term black only for those of PREDOMINANTLY sub-Saharan descent (as opposed to the 1 drop rule), and do not consider North Africans to be black. I feel this is an important contrast to make with Afrocentric scholars who take a much broader view on who is black, and the relevance of the whole sub-Saharan distinction becomes clear in the criticism section. Again, my only goal is to document the full spectrum of notable ways the term black is applied and academic racialism is certainly notable. If you feel that in the interest of full disclosure, it is also important to document some of the racialist theories that accompany Rushton's definition, then I respect your decision. Iseebias

[edit] Rules

Please read WP:3RR and dont break it by reverting again. U cannot claim Deecee voice is willing to comprimises as he is one editor i am another, i have not seen him agree to the changes, my concerns are his concerns yet you go against my decision and have now violated the 3rr.--HalaTruth(ሐላቃህ) 11:53, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

Exactly why you dont 3rr against editors, the deeper you go the more problems you get. The somali and the Ethiopian are the same. The minute you allow a gallery he will put in Ethiopians, see the loop. Just leave it alone, leave it alone. Is it worth it. 3RR is the worst thing, it is uncivilized on wiki. If you take out the Ethiopian he will put it in. Then we r back to the problem, stop the loop. every human has a complex lineage especially Arabs and African Americans.--HalaTruth(ሐላቃህ) 12:00, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

I dont want to report your 3RR if you stop doing what you are doing, or else it will go on and on.--HalaTruth(ሐላቃህ) 12:01, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Unilateral reverts without giving other editors a chance to comment

Please do not unilaterally remove information from the Black peoples page without giving other editors a chance to comment. The information is extremely relevant, address several relevant core issues, and brings much need scholarly reference to an article that mentions a host of OTHER things besides scholarship, like whether Condi Rice qualfies as "black." A number of your statements such as Ethiopians being 40% Arab are erroneous, showing that if anything there is a pressing need for valid scholarly references on the subject, whatever the individual schools of thought may be.

I notice also that a number of other editors have asked you to stop unilateral reverts. I recommend you give everyone a chance to weight in on this relevant info which is only fair, customary WIkipedia policy. Actually the some sources I mention support the statement on your front page as to all races being one when the basic genetic core is analyzed. So this new info is not fundamentally at odds with your own core position. Give it a chance and let robust debate occur rather than the edit warring so common on other "race" pages. Adrunkman 00:46, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Anyway, rather than try to make sense of complex genetic studies we're not qualified to interpret, I quote directly from the man universally regarded as the most important population geneticist in the world today, Cavalli-Sforza, who says this about Ethiopians on pg 199 of The Great Human Diasporas:

The Ethiopians compromise a number of different ethnic groups and have many more languages. They are one of the forty-two genetic groups emerging from the fifteen hundred populations studied, and are classified as African, genetically speaking, even if a closer look reveals that they are special Africans with a high level of genes of caucasoid (white) origin. In fact we can call them an admixture of African and west Asian (Arab) genes. The two groups contribute respectively about 60 percent and 40 percent of their genes. But linguistically speaking, they are closer to the Arabs, because they generally speak languages from a family (Afro-Asiatic) covering northern Africa, Arabia, and the Middle East.

The mixed genetic makeup and use of Afro-Asiatic languages reflect the history of the Ethiopians, who for a long time had close contacts with the Arabs. In and around the earliest Christian times, there was an empire that took in both regions. Its capital was first at Saba (Sheba) in Arabia and later at Axum, in Africa. According to Ethiopian tradition, Makeda, the Queen of Sheba, visited King Solomon and had by him a son, Menelek, founder of the Ethiopian dynasty, which has only recently been overthrown. The Bible tells of these events. Iseebias

OK. That is a fair comment and I withdraw claims of erroneous information or edit warring. Fair enough. As said before, I have shortened the info I have obtained per your earlier suggestions and added clarifiers. Acutally some of the scholars I have found argue for a "non racial" approach challenging alll categorizing, including the notion of a broad, world wide black grouping stretching from Australia, to New Guinea, to India to Africa. I have included that critique, as well as the "true negro" definition controversy. This should make for a more balanced article anyway. I am more than happy to strike a compromise and heed some of your suggestions. Peace.Adrunkman 02:51, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Hi

Basically I agree with your point of view regarding the "White people" and "Black people" articles. They seem only to exist so various racists with an axe to grind can try to disguise their moronic ideology as science or as a fact. What can we do? Wikipedia as an organisation seems to think that this is fine, and seems to regard racism as acceptable, even though it's policies specifically prohibit it. I am of the opinion that certain articles should be under the control of a moderator and permanently locked, and that the moderator of these articles should have the final say about what is included and what is not. I have been thinking about applying to join the Citizens Compendium, which is new, but is going to have only one editor per article, who wil be the final authority, everyone will be able to contribute, but all contributors must be registered, and to register a person needs to email the organisation and use their real name. I susspect that this will rapidly overtake Wikipedia as a source for reliable information, because all articles will be moderated by an expert, who will not allow POV pushing racists to include half truths, lies and distortions into articles. Alun 13:58, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

Hi Alun, as you know I empathize greatly with your concerns. One thing I feel helps is to keep the articles as tightly focused as possible. In my opinion, if these articles must exist they should simply be a documentation of all the ways that terms like black and white have been used; they should not be dissertations defending the scientific validity of any particular definition. Now if someone does use terms like black or white to describe a certain genetic or biogegraphic profile it’s reasonable to mention that because that’s perhaps the latest way these labels are being reconstructed. But the problem is people use original research to imply that because a researcher did a study on European DNA, said research is relevant to the white people article, even though that researcher may never have even used the term “white” and may not even equate whiteness with exclusively European ancestry. I know Lukas19 tried to add a lot of information about a sub-Saharan African genetic cluster to the black people article which I repeatedly removed for the simple reason that unless and until the scientist he quotes actually uses the term “black” when describing his research, it’s off topic. In fact even if a geneticist does believe in a white race or a black race, he or she is unlikely to use such terminology in a genetic context because it’s politically incorrect, and by not using the terms, he is not defining these categories, and thus is not relevant to articles that document the history of these labels. This, in theory, should put race advocates at a huge disadvantage on wikipedia because they can’t get any direct quotes from any academic sources advocating the existence of a white or black genetics. Wikipedia already has articles debating the validity of race; the black and white articles should be exclusively for describing the history of labeling in a neutral way (without pushing the POV that there’s a scientifically correct way to label human beings). I know it’s an uphill battle trying to get wikipedia to appreciate our concerns, but if we can at least keep articles tightly focused and thus free of original research (i.e. general research synthesized to make specific arguments that the researchers themselves never made) we move in the right direction. Good luck! Iseebias 21:49, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Black people edit

Hey there, I was just adding the reference, after thought, and you had already done it. Thank you for not adding that part that was quoted in the article. But, I still believe it's better to try to defuse this controversy as much as possible, by not inflaming others. We both think the page should not exist, as it is. It is such a broad term and everything and anything can and will be added, unfortunately. There will continue to be edit wars to these types of subjects which I do not like, of course. I just didn't feel that bit should be in the article as it seemed to push a political issue on Arabs, even though the person referenced was part African, and the section was Arab. Tricky. Just trying to keep it less controversial as possible, and NPOV (as if). Thanks for your work. It is appreciated. :) Jeeny 20:20, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] recent addition

Hey again. I just read your recent addition. Good call. Thank you. Jeeny 20:25, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the positive feedback. Have a great day Iseebias 21:51, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Rome people

I reverted your edit, i believe the editor is making the same point as you, that they're not Egyptian which is something of an myth for the origin of the name Gypsy- I myself was taught it meant Egyptian as a child. One can only presume the editor's point was to dispel this. Cheers, Jonomacdrones _(talk) 14:42, 24 March 2007 (UTC)