First off, let me make it clear that blacks are just as smart as white’s, asians, native Americans, etc.
But mt B.S. degree was in molecular bio, so I am always wondering about humans. Genetically, race is almost meaningless. Almost, but not quite. There ARE differences, and I want to examine them a bit - specifically in regards to athletics. The easy thing would be to chalk some differences up to “culture”*, but that’s too lazy for my scientific self. Hence swimming.
If you look at American sports, there are more pro athletes that are African American than there are European American. I believe this is mostly due to the fact that people from West Africa (and really most of Africa) statistically have larger bones and more “fast twitch” muscle fibers. Both of those are heavy. This makes me think that the bones and the muscles are a liability in swimming - which is why you see black guys breaking records in the 100 meter dash and white guys breaking records in swimming.
Black people tend to be poorer and are less likely to have access to a pool to practice in? You’ll never become a great swimmer if you never have the opportunity to swim.
Many pounds ago, I was the fastest kid in my junior high. I also suck at swimming. If you’re trying to give me a reason to blame my ancestry…well, I’m listening.
Throughout West Africa and areas influenced by west African culture, you can find variations of Mami Wata. In Cameroon, it was widely believed that Mami Wata inhabited most bodies of water and posed a great hazard for swimmers (and indeed, any drownings would be automatically attributed to Mami Wata.) I remember going to a professional conference in a beach town and all the Americans were swimming happily in the waves while the Cameroonians waded tentatively in the shallows. Generally Cameroonians didn’t swim a lot unless they were from a beach town or an exceptionally hot area.
I wouldn’t be surprised if habits stemming from these beliefs have been persisted for generations.
On edit: This post is directed for all before even sven
Can’t we have a discussion about the variations in humans without the peanut gallery? The first sentence in my OP should tell you what I am talking about. i.e. human variation. Your average Samoan is taller than your average Vietnamese. I am talking about body type in relation to ancestry. Please try to be scientific.
The end cause seems to be that many populations of black Americans didn’t have exposure to swimming, and then that lack of exposure led to fear which led them to keep their children from swimming even when the kids would have had a greater access to facilities.
So, what you’re saying is that you will only accept an answer that says it’s racial and physical even when the evidence points to it being cultural and a matter of exposure and money?
That’s pretty interesting in regards to center of gravity. Couple that with this University graph of bone density with my OP and we may be on to something about African descent and swimming. The farther away from neutral buoyancy someone is - the more effort they have to spend. That means slower.
That’s all statistical, though. It doesn’t mean that African descended people can’t swim, I just think that some groups are more capable at some things than others. Again, that’s pretty much statistically. There’s no fast rules here.
Again, I am talking about athletics - not intelligence or wisdom. I haven’t seen any difference between the “races” regarding those two.
Let me make this clear. I want us, as humans, to be able discuss our biological differences in a rational and scientific way. “Race” is an imperfect concept, but it does give us a baseline about how the bodies of different humans work. A Kenyan has far more tolerance to UV rays than some pale Norwegian, but he can’t get the Vitamin D he need without sunlight. Everything is an evolutionary trade off. Humans are too damn similar for me to pick one more than the other as superior or inferior, but damnit there ARE statistical biological differences.
I know full well there have been societal differences, but I want to examine the biological.
