# Why isn't Europe enough for the white race? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 28, 2012, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-isnt-europe-enough-for-the-white-race/645438 "2012-12-28T23:01:52Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2013, 2:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-isnt-europe-enough-for-the-white-race/645438/101 "2013-01-01T14:14:51Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Now, why **is** that? Why does “Western” civilization include Spain and Portugal, but not Latin America? Well, racism, obviously. I think the justification is that the English-speaking world and the cultures they most respect had the Renaissance and the Enlightenment to pick and choose the best aspects of Roman civilization, while actual the Romance culture practiced by the actual cultural descendants of the Romans includes a lot of degenerate practices the English were able to side-step. In other words, Born-Again Romans are better than actual Romans because they chose it rather than being born to it. Or something. ---
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2013, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-isnt-europe-enough-for-the-white-race/645438/102 "2013-01-01T19:45:12Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Oh please; the Europeans slaughtered and enslaved their way across the world, and their “morality” was no better and often worse than that of the local people. Some bunch of _conquistadores_ didn’t care about human rights; they cared about looting, destroying, raping, enslaving and killing. Yep it was a real pisser them stopping the ritual slaughter of thousands by having their hearts getting cut out with an obsidian knife. Bastard colonialsts. And in Africa everyone lived in harmony until the wicked whities came along. Well except for the Zulus wiping out the Bushmen, and the east and west Africans routinely enslaving their neighbours, BEFORE Whitie turned up on the scene. And who are still doing it now. And genocide being practiced still, by Africans on Africans Check with the United Nations. The Europeans weren’t anymore inheritently evil then anyone else. Its just that they developed science, education and technology to the extent that they COULD rove worldwide and beat up the locals. The locals in all cases did it to their neighbours, and if they’d developed navigation, shipbuilding and weapon technology themselves would have done exactly the same thing on a global basis. Except they didn’t develop the technology and the know how. As to White supremicists, they are loathsome scum, they make me feel ashamed that they claim to be of the same genes as me. But that said, Black racists are just as much lowlives as them. They play off of each other, using each other as an excuse for their sickness. Racists are racists, whether their White ,Black, Brown or Sky Blue Pink. Total filth,all of them. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2013, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-isnt-europe-enough-for-the-white-race/645438/103 "2013-01-01T20:03:39Z")
> [@Lust4Life](#): > > The locals in all cases did it to their neighbours, and if they’d developed navigation, shipbuilding and weapon technology themselves would have done exactly the same thing on a global basis. Some would, some wouldn’t; expansionism isn’t a human universal. Some simply wouldn’t have been interested. ---
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2013, 8:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-isnt-europe-enough-for-the-white-race/645438/104 "2013-01-01T20:39:51Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Some would, some wouldn’t; expansionism isn’t a human universal. Some simply wouldn’t have been interested. I’m quite well travelled, and my impression of cultures worldwide, is that they all would. Apathetic cultures tend to die off, not live in peaceful coexistance with Gaia . ---
**Author:** ![Chief\_Pedant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@Chief\_Pedant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chief_Pedant)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2013, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-isnt-europe-enough-for-the-white-race/645438/105 "2013-01-01T21:11:07Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > I should hope by now we all know [the answer to **that!**](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guns,_Germs,_and_Steel) If I ever need a good excuse for incompetence, I’m goin’ right to Jared to ask him to write it up. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2013, 9:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-isnt-europe-enough-for-the-white-race/645438/106 "2013-01-01T21:15:06Z")
> [@Lust4Life](#): > > I’m quite well travelled, and my impression of cultures worldwide, is that they all would. The Chinese [tried it and decided they didn’t like it.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zheng_he) ---
**Author:** ![Chief\_Pedant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@Chief\_Pedant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chief_Pedant)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2013, 9:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-isnt-europe-enough-for-the-white-race/645438/107 "2013-01-01T21:15:24Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Some would, some wouldn’t; expansionism isn’t a human universal. Some simply wouldn’t have been interested. Some, maybe. Pansies. But mostly, the competent done in the incompetent. You gotta feel the worst for the Incas, who finally clawed their way to the top of the locals only hours before the Spanish punked 'em. Similar sad tale for the Zulus getting plastered by the British… ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2013, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-isnt-europe-enough-for-the-white-race/645438/108 "2013-01-01T21:16:10Z")
> [@Chief\_Pedant](#): > > If I ever need a good excuse for incompetence, I’m goin’ right to Jared to ask him to write it up. What specifically is the flaw in his thesis? ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2013, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-isnt-europe-enough-for-the-white-race/645438/109 "2013-01-01T21:27:35Z")
> [@Lust4Life](#): > > I’m quite well travelled, and my impression of cultures worldwide, is that they all would. > > Apathetic cultures tend to die off, not live in peaceful coexistance with Gaia . Who said anything about apathetic? The lust for conquest isn’t the only desire people have. An the vast majority of cultures that have existed have been destroyed, one way or another; traveling won’t give you a very good idea of human variability. At best you’ll get an idea of what’s left. > [@Chief\_Pedant](#): > > Some, maybe. Pansies. Ah, yes. Anyone who isn’t a genocidal slaver is a “pansy”. Well, I guess we know now what your end goal is with your constant insistence that “non-white races” are inferior. :rolleyes: > [@Chief\_Pedant](#): > > But mostly, the competent done in the incompetent. Superior technology beats competence any day. It was about better armed monsters killing and enslaving anyone they could, not “competence”. > [@BrainGlutton](#): > > What specifically is the flaw in his thesis? It doesn’t involve white people being superior. ---
**Author:** ![Chief\_Pedant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@Chief\_Pedant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chief_Pedant)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2013, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-isnt-europe-enough-for-the-white-race/645438/110 "2013-01-01T21:32:51Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > What specifically is the flaw in his thesis? That populations have equal fundamental potential for outcomes, and if it weren’t for guns, germs and steel, there’d have been an equitable distribution of success for various populations around the world. So far (and I sorta think you’ve seen the threads 😉 ) no evidence at all that equalizing opportunity equalizes outcomes. No question better opportunity and a helping hand up helps, but unfortunately some populations are likely to stay light on cargo for the forseeable future, and some populations aren’t ever going to catch up in the average knowledge transfer required to get and maintain their share of cargo. Other populations have actually had to lighten up their cargo when opportunity has been normalized, where “cargo” is Olympic sprinting medals. 😉 Damn mother nature… But hey, check back in 20 years. Always 20 years out… (Hold off on the f-word replying, if you can. It doesn’t add much weight to a debate.) ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2013, 9:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-isnt-europe-enough-for-the-white-race/645438/111 "2013-01-01T21:59:08Z")
> [@Lust4Life](#): > > Well except for the Zulus wiping out the Bushmen They did no such thing. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2013, 10:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-isnt-europe-enough-for-the-white-race/645438/112 "2013-01-01T22:09:54Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > They did no such thing. The Zulus **did** do a lot of wiping-out – see [Mfecane](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mfecane) – but it did not involve the [Bushmen](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bushmen). ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2013, 10:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-isnt-europe-enough-for-the-white-race/645438/113 "2013-01-01T22:12:53Z")
> [@Chief\_Pedant](#): > > That populations have equal fundamental potential for outcomes . . . Well? We’re all cut from the same cloth genetically. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2013, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-isnt-europe-enough-for-the-white-race/645438/114 "2013-01-01T22:30:03Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > The Zulus **did** do a lot of wiping-out – see [Mfecane](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mfecane) – but it did not involve the [Bushmen](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bushmen). Yep. ---
**Author:** ![Capt\_Kirk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/779978/32.png) [@Capt\_Kirk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Capt_Kirk)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2013, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-isnt-europe-enough-for-the-white-race/645438/115 "2013-01-01T22:59:05Z")
> [@Chief\_Pedant](#): > > That populations have equal fundamental potential for outcomes, and if it weren’t for guns, germs and steel, there’d have been an equitable distribution of success for various populations around the world. > > So far (and I sorta think you’ve seen the threads 😉 ) no evidence at all that equalizing opportunity equalizes outcomes. No question better opportunity and a helping hand up helps, but unfortunately some populations are likely to stay light on cargo for the forseeable future, and some populations aren’t ever going to catch up in the average knowledge transfer required to get and maintain their share of cargo. Other populations have actually had to lighten up their cargo when opportunity has been normalized, where “cargo” is Olympic sprinting medals. 😉 Damn mother nature… > > But hey, check back in 20 years. Always 20 years out… > > (Hold off on the f-word replying, if you can. It doesn’t add much weight to a debate.) It has been a while since I read Guns, Germs ans Steel but I thought the basic point was that Europeans dominated the World because they got very good at killing each other first. Guns, the Chinese invented it and built simple cannons. Take it to Europe, where there is a perpetual arms race and you get firearms in 100 or so years. The Europeans weren’t smarter, they spent several hundred years practicing killing each other and refining the tools of death, they seem to have gotten over that fairly recently. Europeans were more resistant to and carried more disease because they lived in filthy, germ laden and crowded cities. Exposed to all that they developed resistance if they survived. Send out into the rest of the World and almost noone can compete with the heavily armed and disease laden. Hardly superior but effective. **Capt** ---
**Author:** ![Nunzio\_Tavulari](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/b9bd4f/32.png) [@Nunzio\_Tavulari](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nunzio_Tavulari)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2013, 11:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-isnt-europe-enough-for-the-white-race/645438/116 "2013-01-01T23:08:40Z")
The current human race started in Africa and spread to Asia & Europe. This would indicate that we are merely carrying on the traits of our dark-skinned ancestors. **Clearly, black people have only themselves to blame for all of their problems.** ---
**Author:** ![Chief\_Pedant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@Chief\_Pedant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chief_Pedant)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2013, 3:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-isnt-europe-enough-for-the-white-race/645438/117 "2013-01-02T03:11:49Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Superior technology beats competence any day. It was about better armed monsters killing and enslaving anyone they could, not “competence”. > > It doesn’t involve white people being superior. DT, in addition to traveling more, you gotta read more buddy, so you can expand your hate circle beyond whites. First, technology isn’t found under a rock, so by “competence” I am including the competence to develop war techonology. On the “monsters killing and enslaving” front, from what I’ve read that’s a fundamental potential that seems to be parked in the genes of all populations (animals and plants, too, from what I’ve read). It’s dog eat dog; human eat human out there, man. By pure coincidence I happen to be reading “The Zulu War Through Contemporary Eyes,” an account written by James Grant first published in 1894 (originally published as part of Cassell’s series, “British Battles on Land and Sea.” ) I think you might broaden your perspective–literally–on how widespread human naughtiness is among all populations; in this case blacks and whites. The Zulus conquered with force and then fought the Boers and the British when those groups showed up to take over the land. But the Zulus were themselves pretty severe in their takeover of the locals. For example, when King Chaka (“…there are only two chiefs in the world; my brother George, he is King of the Whites; and I, Chaka, am King of the Blacks”) came to be Chief of the Zulus in 1810, he had a habit of reviewing his troops after a battle and culling out the cowards. These were executed on the spot. Chaka is said to have exterminated half the people of a Zulu king who showed him hospitality, and is reported to have killed 10,000 people as sort of a sacrifice to the souls of his mother. One of his palaces was called the “Place of Slaughter” because he executed not only a defeated regimen of married soldiers, but also their wives and children. About 20 years later, Chaka’s brother bumped him off when he grew weak with age, so I guess what goes around comes around. In any case, the point is that monstrosity–as we would define it in our refined societal construct today–seems to live within all of us. I keep thinking you want us to take the inference from your posts that mostly white Christians do the ass-kickings and enslavings, and I encourage to stretch your library a bit if you can’t get out to the world in person. ---
**Author:** ![Human\_Action](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@Human\_Action](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Human_Action)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2013, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-isnt-europe-enough-for-the-white-race/645438/118 "2013-01-02T04:45:04Z")
> [@Capt Kirk](#): > > It has been a while since I read Guns, Germs ans Steel but I thought the basic point was that Europeans dominated the World because they got very good at killing each other first. This is part of it, but there’s also an analysis of the factors that give rise to agriculture, such as the domesticability of local plants and animals, and an east-west versus north-south layout of landmasses making it easier to spread cultivated plants and domesticated animals, as climate doesn’t change east-west. ---
**Author:** ![Belowjob2.0](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Belowjob2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Belowjob2.0)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2013, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-isnt-europe-enough-for-the-white-race/645438/119 "2013-01-02T16:27:17Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > The way L. Sprague de Camp explained it in _Great Cities of the Ancient World,_ the Romans never actually set out to conquer the known world. As with the British Empire, they conquered it “in a fit of absence of mind.” They just happened to have a better army than any of their neighbors (being intensively trained, and always willing to learn and adopt new weapons and tactics). Wars with neighbors happened all the time as a matter of course, and the Romans kept winning the wars, and gaining territory. But now they had new border with barbarians on the other side of it raiding Roman territory . . . so to defend their established territory they had to go conquer **those** barbarians . . . and so on. Which raises an interesting question: if you don’t go forth and conquer, are you then more vulnerable to being conquered? If you don’t take action to eliminate potential rivals/enemies, will they take action against you? Why not just knock them out first? I believe this was part of the Japanese argument for their colonial adventures. ---
**Author:** ![Chief\_Pedant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@Chief\_Pedant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chief_Pedant)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2013, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-isnt-europe-enough-for-the-white-race/645438/120 "2013-01-02T17:05:06Z")
> [@Human\_Action](#): > > This is part of it, but there’s also an analysis of the factors that give rise to agriculture, such as the domesticability of local plants and animals, and an east-west versus north-south layout of landmasses making it easier to spread cultivated plants and domesticated animals, as climate doesn’t change east-west. This (climate and geography in certain latitudes) is part of his argument as well; his most basic point is that it’s NOT inherent superiority (for example, of culture or intelligence) that drives differences in societies and the populations that contain those societies. Pretty much any excuse for disparate outcomes is viable for Dr Diamond, except genetic culpability. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-isnt-europe-enough-for-the-white-race/645438.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-isnt-europe-enough-for-the-white-race/645438.md?page=7)