# Why "Black" but "white"? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [July 8, 2016, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-black-but-white/759427 "2016-07-08T20:59:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Infovore](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/infovore/32/420_2.png) [@Infovore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Infovore)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2016, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-black-but-white/759427/1 "2016-07-08T20:59:37Z")
This isn’t an invitation for any sort of value judgment or political opinion–I just want to understand. In reading articles about the recent killings, I’ve noticed several sites, both news and editorial, referring to “Black people” and “white people.” I did a little Googling and discovered that many people consider that it’s proper to capitalize “Black” because it represents a group of people, rather than a color–I get that. But then, why not capitalize “White” too, when referring to people? It seems to me that it should be parallel–either “black people and white people” or “Black people and White people.” I think it’s stretching the definition of “racism” pretty hard to say capitalizing them both is wrong, and that it would definitely be racist to capitalize “White” but not “Black.” I can easily see why this might occur in articles aimed primarily at a [B|b]lack audience, but I’ve seen it in more mainstream material aimed at more general audiences. Fight my ignorance, please? Thanks! ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2016, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-black-but-white/759427/2 "2016-07-08T21:01:26Z")
Stupid point, but in how many examples does “Black” lead off the sentence? Search for an adequate number of samples of “black” and “white” within sentences, and then note capitalization. ---
**Author:** ![Infovore](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/infovore/32/420_2.png) [@Infovore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Infovore)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2016, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-black-but-white/759427/3 "2016-07-08T21:11:20Z")
No, I’m definitely not referring to times when “Black” begins a sentence. This is within a sentence. It’s not like I see it all the time, but just today I’ve run across enough instances of it that I consciously noticed it. ---
**Author:** ![Hershele\_Ostropoler](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e47c2d/32.png) [@Hershele\_Ostropoler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hershele_Ostropoler)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2016, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-black-but-white/759427/4 "2016-07-08T21:26:50Z")
I think it’s mostly because B/black writers do it about their own race, while W/white writers do not. One might also speculate that being white is unmarked in a way being Black is not. I think it looks very '80s and capitalize neither ---
**Author:** ![Beware\_of\_Doug](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/278dde/32.png) [@Beware\_of\_Doug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beware_of_Doug)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2016, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-black-but-white/759427/5 "2016-07-09T00:02:55Z")
I used to cap Black _and_ White. I now cap neither. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2016, 1:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-black-but-white/759427/6 "2016-07-09T01:12:07Z")
This goes back to the period after the Civil War, when writers deliberately sought to bring attention to the former slave population as an oppressed but dignified group. What to call this group? Colored People was one solution, as exemplified in the National Association for Advancement of Colored People, founded in 1909. That was superseded by Negro about 20 years later. In the 1960s, Afro-American and African-American began being used. Black is harder to trace because of all the non-germane uses, but it also became a norm around the 1960s, when the older terms began to sound demeaning through association. All of these terms were capitalized to emphasize the similarity to the capitalization of terms for analogous groups. Why not White, therefore? White was the default term for a large majority that did not see itself as a single grouping. Ethnic, national, and religious heritages were deemed the important identifying factors. The obvious counterpoint is that Blacks, Hispanics, Asians, Muslims, and the other capitalized identifiers are equally diverse. This is obviously true, but when they were a tiny percentage of the population their unique difference counted for more than the nuanced differences among them. As they did with many negative terms, the oppressed minority tried to turn around the word and embrace it as a positive. You can see this now in the extreme irony of white supremacists capitalizing White. I’ve seen a debate on the use or non-use of capitals on White and Black for at least 40 years. Language tends to resist change from above, although it’s extremely quick to adopt change from below. Seems that white and Black will stay as standard for a long time. ---
**Author:** ![Toastmaker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/74df32/32.png) [@Toastmaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Toastmaker)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2016, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-black-but-white/759427/7 "2016-07-10T22:13:59Z")
To be technically correct, both should be capitalized when used in the context of describing or denoting a particular race. It is a contextual rule. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2016, 11:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-black-but-white/759427/8 "2016-07-10T23:54:45Z")
> [@Toastmaker](#): > > To be technically correct, both should be capitalized when used in the context of describing or denoting a particular race. It is a contextual rule. There is no such thing as a “contextual rule.” There is just usage and style guides for particular applications. ---
**Author:** ![Hail\_Ants](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/dc4da7/32.png) [@Hail\_Ants](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hail_Ants)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2016, 2:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-black-but-white/759427/9 "2016-07-12T02:23:43Z")
I would not capitalize either. FWIW, in a personal act of non-violent protest, ever since 9/11 I refuse to capitalize the word muslim… ---
**Author:** ![spamforbrains](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e274bd/32.png) [@spamforbrains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/spamforbrains)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2016, 2:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-black-but-white/759427/10 "2016-07-12T02:30:32Z")
I prefer to be called a Caucasian. I don’t capitalize either black or white.