This topic is somewhat contentious with several respected sources giving different figures. In alphabetic order these are:
CIA Fact Book: black 91.2%, mixed 6.2%, other or unknown 2.6% (2001 census).[2]
University of the West Indies: 76.3% African descent, 15.1% Afro-European, 3.4% East Indian and Afro-East Indian, 3.2% Caucasian, 1.2% Chinese and Afro-Chinese and 0.8% Other
Jamaica had a much, much higher ratio of slaves to white settlers than any of the other islands or colonies in the area.
I just can’t imagine how you can call that without DNA testing a sample size. Take the obv. example of Michael Johnson - slave descendent, he assumed as much but had no idea 10% of his ancestry was Anglo-Saxon until being DNA tested for this programme.
Not to add another political dimension to this, but athletes in Cuba aren’t free (to choose what sports they participate in, at the very least). Kind of taints them as a population sample.
I have to admit that I laughed when the guy who got angry at me for asking him how he defined black and rather huffily said his standard was if “they look black to me” is now claiming that 65% of all Cubans are “white”.
Wikipedia articles are reliable if you’re all out of toilet paper and you need to wipe your ass, but as a rule they’re not reliable and your cite is a good example. Talk to anyone who’s visited there, watch a documentary on it, or stop by your library and pick up a good book on it and you’ll find that while the people in charge of Cuba may be “white” the majority of the population would certainly pass your “they look black to me” test.
I know you like to dump on wikipedia, but it’s usually quite good for this type of information. It’s as good as any other encyclopedia, if not better. The problem with the Cuban statistics isn’t wikipedia-- it’s Cuba. So, yeah, if all those people lived in the US, many of the “whites” would be black. But that’s not wikipedia’s fault. You’d have a similar problem with Brazil, but not because it’s a closed society-- because the definitions of race they use is different than in the US.
I think that also illustrates the problem with this US centric race thing. People from or familiar with other countries, read and look at what we consider ‘black’ or ‘white’ and wonder what the hell we’re talking about and why all fuss?
But, yeah. People in the US tend to take a very parochial view, assuming everyone else in the world thinks about race the way we do. That simply is not the case, and there is a whole world south of the border where the rules are entirely different.
Mariano Rivera, David Ortiz, and Manny Ramirez all “look black” to Americans but they certainly don’t consider themselves black.
That’s why I asked Treis for his definition of black, to which he explained his test was someone who “looked black to me” though he apparantly exempts Cuba from the test.
Jamaica was unique in its tiny ratio of whites to slaves:
In 1800 20,000 whites vs 300,000 slaves.
If you actually read the cite I gave for Cuban’s demographics, you can see that it gives numbers of Spanish immigrants vs. slaves, and the results of genetic testing.
This is so ridiculous. We have a ton of Cubans in American, and they are considered white or Hispanic, not black.
You’re calling me anti-science when you flat just make up shit?
Ok, for starters Cuban-Americans aren’t remotely representative of Cuba. They mostly came from the upper class and middle-class who fled the revolution.
Similarly, IIRC around 40-50% of all Vietnamese-Americans are Catholic even though Catholics make up a tiny percentage of Vietnam and IIRC around 30-40% of all Iranian-Americans are Jewish even though only about 1% of all Iranians are Jewish.
Also, I’d recommend using better sources than Wikipedia articles if you’re going to accuse someone of lying.
And yet you claimed that Cuba was 15% black. Why aren’t at least 15% of the Cuban-Americans black?
I didn’t call you anti-sceince.
It is a fact that the definition of “black” is significantly different in Latin America than it is the US, and that many people who are not black there would be black here.
Who says they aren’t? Here’s one off the top of my head: Orlando Hernández - Wikipedia
I didn’t call you anti-sceince.
Um, and why are we taking a throw away quote from an article without any methodology over a cite with 240 years of ethnic history based on the census, a listing origin of immigration for Cuba, and genetic ancestry based on genetics. Oooohhh right, because all of that says you’re wrong and this random cite you found says you’re right. Gee, if only someone had warned us against that:
I’m not playing this game where I post a cite proving my point by many different methods simply to have it ignored. It’s clear what result you are looking for here and how little interest you have in any facts that contradict your preconceived ideas.
Early on in this thread someone noted that there’s an irrational level of hostility to what should be accepted as straightforward evolutionary and genetic arguments. In that vein, I can’t help but notice that no one who’s been arguing against any significant genetic contribution has made any comment on links to solid science I’ve posted on this subject.
Most of the studies cited are published / peer reviewed. Note also how the authors treat this mostly as a “no-big-deal,” interesting aspect of human experience sort of story.
