Official Impeachment Thread

[Amsel_]

@Dolan I'm not very familiar with Eastern Euro genetics. The most I've noticed is that they tend to be more White the further north you go. Did you guys actually survive the Mongols, Turks, Slavs, etc and retain your ethnic character?

[occamslightsaber]

Nobody writes about the silent majority of Eastern Europeans simply doing their jobs or minding their own business.

BUT DEY TOOK ER JERBS!!!

[Dolan]

@Dolan I'm not very familiar with Eastern Euro genetics. The most I've noticed is that they tend to be more White the further north you go. Did you guys actually survive the Mongols, Turks, Slavs, etc and retain your ethnic character?

This is a vast subject to write about here, because it involves a lot of history, culture, genetics.

First of all, a few myths need to be dispelled. "Slavs" is not a genetic or anthropological category, it's cultural. Czechs for example are genetically closer to Germans, but their language is Slavic. And lots of Russian-speaking people have Asian genetics. So, are they actually "Slavs"?

Secondly, almost no nation is a monolithic genetic cluster. They're all mixtures of neighbouring ethnic groups that cluster together. For example, despite the historical animosity that exists between Romanians and Hungarians, they're a lot more similar genetically than they would probably like to admit. Hungarians have all but lost any trace of their Asian roots, genetically speaking, although they have kept their non-Indo-European language and built a cultural-ethnic identity around it. The few exceptions of isolated genetic clusters are people like the Basques or some insular nations.

Thirdly, skin pigmentation is not a reliable criterion to characterise ethnic genetic clusters or so-called "races". Sardinians are one of the oldest populations in Europe and they look slightly olive-skinned. I leave aside the fact that these labels "white"/"black" lack precision and can't be used to distinguish between different ethnic groups (what is more, nobody is really white-skinned, more like light pinkish/light yellowish). There's a wide variety of skin pigmentation types even among Caucasians. Sardinians are Caucasian, but they're olive-skinned. And ancient Greeks were probably slightly tanned too. And yet, this myth that Nordics are some kind of hard-working, pure and exceptional race and Mediterraneans are lazy hedonists persists, despite ancient Greeks having founded a few major civilisations. During the Middle Ages, the most developed part of Europe was the Eastern Roman empire (wrongly called Byzantine empire). And Nordics were just a bunch of poor tribes, while the populations that were part of the Eastern Roman empire (Greeks, Latinised Thracians, proto-Bulgarians) belonged to the most advanced civilisation at the time. Later on, China and India became the most advanced civilisations in their time. And after the 9th-10th century, Northern Italian city-states developed the incipient forms of modern capitalism and democracy, which marked the beginning of "Western" domination (if you can even consider Northern Italy to be part of Western Europe).

It seems to me that these categories and ideas are very popular in Anglophone cultures (the USA is notorious for using a completely unscientific system of racial categorisation in its census and legal statistics). For example, as occamslightsaber pointed out (before he deleted that part of his post), Americans don't perceive Eastern Europeans to be "white", they think only Western Europeans are. But then what are Germans? People wrongly assume that Germany is part of "the West", even though Germany is a Central European country. And Eastern Germany at some point was considered part of Eastern Europe, when they were under the grip of communism, during the Cold War. Were some Germans "white" because they lived in Western Germany, while others who lived in Eastern Germany weren't? You see, these categories are based on very simplistic perceptions that fail to capture realities on the ground. And it's not our fault that you have such perceptions.

OK, this reply is already very long so I'll get to the point that you raised in the question. Eastern Euro genetics.. wew that's, again, a huge topic. It would take me days to write about. Let's simplify things a bit, to get a basic, but correct point across. Europe's populations are largely the product of three genetic pools:

- West European Hunter-Gatherers (WHGs) that were descendants of the first humans in Europe, so-called European early modern humans (EEMH) or Cro-Magnon
- Anatolian Neolithic populations that migrated to Europe (back when Anatolia was not occupied by Turks) in multiple waves
- Yamnaya people who migrated from Western Asia in successive waves

The original European population (WHGs) was not white, it was actually of swarthy complexion. It's actually those Anatolian farmers and Yamnaya people that most likely brought lighter skin pigmentation. One of the main regulators of skin pigmentation, an allele of the gene SLC24A5 (Ala111Thr), that is responsible for about 40% of Europeans' colour was found over a large geographical area, from Ukraine to Georgia, Iran, Anatolia, and as far back in history as early Neolithic (about 8000 years ago).

Romanians are a people that was formed from Latinised Dacians, a Thracian tribe that lived north of the Danube river, in the Carpathian basin, during the late Bronze Age. We can't really talk about a "Romanian people" until late Medieval age, when the Romanian language reached a mature stage and people identified as speakers of "the language of the Romans" (Romanian is basically an evolved form of vulgar Latin, with subsequent minor additions from neighbouring cultures). Romanians' ethnic awareness was basically built around using the same language and identifying as descendants of the Latinised population that was left behind after the Romans pulled out their army from north of Danube. During their early history, they haven't been part of a single political entity, they were split in several principalities, but somehow they maintained this common awareness that they all spoke a common language and were descendants of the previous Southeastern European populations that lived in this area when Romans conquered their territory. The question is: who were those populations? They were Thracians, that were most likely formed from previous mixtures of European populations: from the descendants of all major European ethnic groups (WHGs, Anatolian farmers, Yamnaya etc). That doesn't mean that modern Romanians share 100% the genetics of Thracians and Dacians. Populations evolved by mixing with other neighbouring groups.

Just to give you an idea of how little genetics we share with those populations that lived in Europe thousands of years ago, modern Serbians have inherited 10% of genes from that ancient European mix that was formed between the old WHGs and Anatolian Neolithic farmers, at the end of the Mesolithic and start of the Neolithic period. Everything else is made of subsequent layers that were added on top of the original, ancient European population. And those subsequent layers of ancestry were also mosaics/mixtures that came from elsewhere.

Further migratory waves at the end of the 1st millennium complicated the ethno-genetic picture even more. Since invading tribes pushed the local population elsewhere, made them take shelter in the mountains and higher elevation locations, sometimes got partially integrated and sometimes only settled here for a while, then left later, when they also got pushed away by other incoming migratory tribes (Avars, Huns, Goths, even Celts lived in one of our regions at some point during the Hallstatt culture which is why many Romanians have a small degree of genetic kinship of Celtic origins).

Modern Romanians reflect this complicated genetic mosaic that includes old ancestral European populations (WHG, Anatolian farmers and to a smaller degree Yamnaya people) and later additions from migratory peoples (some degree of admixture with populations that later became "Slavic", "Germanic", "Bulgarian" or "Serb"). As a result of this complicated history, the most common human phenotypes in Romania are: Pontid, Carpathid, Gorid, Mediterranid, Dinarid, NeoDanubian, Tavastid. You can find pictures that were made by physical anthropologists from composite average images of real people, if you search for these terms.

The genetic picture is much more complicated than that but I'll spare you the details that include more than 3 main genetic pools and a crazy thicket of ramifications, branches and overlapping cultures.

Now you probably understand why talking about "whiteness" or "surviving the Mongols, Turks, Slavs" and "retain your ethnic character" doesn't make much sense in the broader picture. There are almost no populations that "retained their ethnic character" from a few thousands of years ago, with a few exceptions of very isolated tribes. I haven't seen any study that asserted any significant "Mongol" or "Turk" mixture in the genetic mix of Romanians. In anthropology, typically, if you want to see ancestral traces of other populations, you look at neighbouring ones, not somewhere on another continent. Romanians' genetics cluster closest with those of Bulgarians (another group that descended from ancient Thracians) and more distantly with those of Sardinians/Italians, Albanians and Greeks (who are also genetically related to Thracians). However they also share all of the major European haplotypes with the rest of Europe. Romanians are actually a mixture of all the common genetics from Europe, including major Western haplotypes, Northern and Southeastern haplotypes. It's the proportion of mixtures that varies compared to other countries, and from individual to individual.

[Goodspeed]

I don't understand why people give a fuck who they descended from

[fightinfrenchman]

New poll on impeachment, the topic of the thread

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/10/07/polls-b ... trump.html

[Dolan]

I don't understand why people give a fuck who they descended from

You mean you're not curious how humans came to be the way they are today?
Sheesh, why do we even have anthropology.

[Goodspeed]

Rather I'm not interested in who I descended from, and don't understand why people use that to define themselves and each other. It's often destructive, too.

[Dolan]

Humans evolved from regional branches everywhere. So they developed interesting regional adaptations. For example, I'm curious why are the Japanese so obsessed with cleanliness. Current explanations put it down to the influence of Buddhism, but that's clearly not enough. There are other Buddhist countries/cultures that don't have a similar thing.

The further back you go in history, the more you realise every cultural form we see today has solid grounding in more ancient forms. You basically understand why people today are the way they are and why they behave the way they do. You also understand yourself better.

Or you could choose to stay a nub.

[Goodspeed]

That's culture though, not genetics. Knowing I'm 1/8th Spanish does exactly nothing to help me understand myself better.

[fightinfrenchman]

It's so transparently a cover up, I wonder what Sondland has to say that is so bad Trump thinks Congressional Republicans would flip on him

[Goodspeed]

What makes you say Trump thinks that

[fightinfrenchman]

Well it's clearly a bad look to block him from testifying especially when you claim you've done nothing wrong, so why do it

[Dolan]

That's culture though, not genetics. Knowing I'm 1/8th Spanish or whatever does exactly nothing to help me understand myself better.

Culture and genetics go hand in hand. When anthropologists talk about "Yamnaya people" they actually refer to people who shared that culture. A culture was basically a breeding ground for a particular genetic pool, back then.

[Goodspeed]

Well it's clearly a bad look to block him from testifying especially when you claim you've done nothing wrong, so why do it

Because you can

[Dolan]

It also helps you understand why some regions are more developed than others. If you don't understand the causes well, you're clueless about what needs to be changed/reformed.
To choose not to know would be ignorant and probably destructive too.

[fightinfrenchman]

It also helps you understand why some regions are more developed than others. If you don't understand the causes well, you're clueless about what needs to be changed/reformed.
To choose not to know would be ignorant and probably destructive too.

Feel free to make a thread about it

[Riotcoke]

It also helps you understand why some regions are more developed than others. If you don't understand the causes well, you're clueless about what needs to be changed/reformed.
To choose not to know would be ignorant and probably destructive too.

Feel free to make a thread about it

Imagine getting annoyed when people deviate off the original topic when that's all you do 90 percent of the time

[fightinfrenchman]

It also helps you understand why some regions are more developed than others. If you don't understand the causes well, you're clueless about what needs to be changed/reformed.
To choose not to know would be ignorant and probably destructive too.

Feel free to make a thread about it

Imagine getting annoyed when people deviate off the original topic when that's all you do 90 percent of the time

Imagine doing that but you're also in Toon World

[wardyb1]

Well it's clearly a bad look to block him from testifying especially when you claim you've done nothing wrong, so why do it

I'd say it's simply part of a larger game plan for them. So far the House has been scared to use it's powers to actually start arresting people who continually break the law and refuse to testify.
Trump knows that he can convince people not to testify as they have nothing to lose as everyone already knows these people are slimy fucks. And from there it is rather easy for them to control the narrative, they either never let him testify = win, they dither and delay and make people forget about what's going on = win, he can then testify and say some shady shit but nothing monumental and then they can spin it as if it was nothing much and that it has been a witch hunt all along.
It is all about controlling the situation and the message. Until the house starts holding people in contempt they will always be a step behind.

[n0el]

It is all about controlling the situation and the message. Until the house starts holding people in contempt they will always be a step behind.

this

[Amsel_]

@Dolan Do you consider yourself or Romanians in general to be White? Do you identify more with Western, Central, or Eastern Europeans?

[Dolan]

@Amsel_
Nobody here in Eastern Europe thinks much or at all about "being white" or about "race", probably because there's almost no experience or exposure to non-European ethnic groups. That's also why we don't have this taboo on the subject. We can talk about it like we can talk about zebrafish.

As I explained in my answer, Romanians are a mosaic of genetics that are typical of Eastern/Southeastern Europe. From an anthropological point of view they fall under the definition of Caucasian, so I guess, in American terms they're "white". But then, again, so are Greeks and Sardinians, despite many of them having a more swarthy complexion.

Romania's position in Europe is hard to classify, but I think it would be more correct to generically consider it part of Eastern Europe. But if you get down to nuances and regional influences, our three main historical regions show different cultural influences: Transylvania has been heavily influenced by Central European culture (Germanic/Saxon architecture, folk attire that is typical of Central Europe, work ethic that is also closer to that region, etc), Moldovia shows clear Slavic influences (people's accents sound very Slavic and they also borrowed words from neighbouring countries like Ukraine), and Muntenia (or Wallachia as foreigners call it, shows some Southeastern/Balkan influences).

Not sure what people here identify with more, I'd have to see a survey. I think they associate the West with material wealth and financial success, but also with moral decay. Eastern and Central Europeans are perceived to be closer to us, in terms of temperament and customs. Romanians would probably like to enjoy Western living standards while keeping their local customs and mores.

Well yeah, I'm quite "white" since half of my family was from Austria. When I was a lil kid, I had gold-white hair, they used to call me "the German". Part of my family settled here when the Austro-Hungarian empire conquered Bucovina (northern region of Romania). They were part of the administration and were left behind after the empire collapsed.

[fightinfrenchman]

I hate women and minorities

I don't see how this fits in with the thread

[Amsel_]

@Dolan Romania is a member of both the European Union and NATO. What do you make of their decision to embrace these Western power structures?

[Dolan]

Well, I know this point of view is not popular right now, it's fashionable to bash the EU and consider NATO some kind of neocon invention.

But you have to understand that this part of Europe has felt isolated and kept behind a barbed wire fence for half a century, during Communism. So we were eager to join NATO and the EU, so that Europe would become undivided again.

Now, after being in both structures for a number of years, I have mixed feelings about it. It's definitely in everyone's interest here to be part of a bigger security structure that pools everyone's resources, because most European countries are too small to match neighbouring armies like Russia's.

As far as the EU is concerned, it's mostly Western companies that benefited the most from our accession to the club. After 12 years of EU membership, 50% of Romania's GDP is produced and owned by foreign firms, most of them EU-based. On the bright side, more than 2 million Romanians have found jobs in the Common Market that pay wages they couldn't have gotten in their home country. So there are pros and cons to EU membership. It rewards more those countries with the higher levels of productivity and capital. And if you're a country that was depleted of capital during Communism, when you join a very competitive market, you get crushed by big-capital companies with lots of experience and a huge technological lead. You can't compete with that, so you end up using your cheaper labour cost as leverage. Overall, it's still a positive thing that Romania is in NATO and the EU, but if we don't learn how to promote our local capital, we're gonna end up being a colony of Franco-German-Austrian-etc capital and just work for their firms.