Why do people from other races refer to black people's skin as black?

Question

Anybody with one eye and has 50 vision in that eye can see blacks come in many shades of Brown. I ve read many times where anthropogist say "they come in shades of black" how the hell does someone come in shades of black? Ive been to Africa and those realy dark people you see on t.v. are like minorities when it comes to their skin. Ive seen reddish browns, siennas, yellowish shades, golden browns, dark chocolates, milk chocolates, and more. And they were not mixed ,If anything we are anyhitng but black "color wise".

Answer 1

next time I see a "black" person I will call him according to the shade of his skin like:"that brown guy, that really black guy, that light skinned brown guy, that dark chocolate guy, that milk chocolate guy, that reddish brown guy, etc" LOL

Answer 2

In general we are Black in comparison to the average White person depending on the extremes of melanin or lack of.
At first White people considered themselves Caucasian. If you look in the dictionary (Webster-by White Man) it says a word used in default of a better on. The people found in/from the area of the Caucasus mountains are the original Caucasians.
We are refer ed to (now) as the Black race due to most of the original ancestors were Black or very dark. The so called White people were classified as that based on lack of color. So I guess you could describe them as "Clear"people!
Truth is there are very few (if any) of us that are pure Black or them as pure White. I know a lady who describes herself as White (but has brown eyes) She is from Cape Verde, Africa. She should me a family photo and there were all mixtures of color tone, hair color and texture.
I would say Black is more referred to a culture than skin tone. My father was very high yellow, but you better not call him anything but Black. As for me, I like, prefer and proud of my Black ancestry, culture and skin tone.

Answer 3

Stems from history. The word "*****", which means "black" in Spanish kinda stuck. I guess Europeans typified Africans as "black" because they'd never seen anything like it before, and the closest color it resembled was black. Due to the admixture/miscegenation, black people come in different shades.

Answer 4

The terms have been used for years, and majority of people have become comfortable with it, because they don't look at it as being nagative. The reality is, black people aren't actually black, white people aren't white, I'll even say that asians aren
t yellow, and indiands aren't red. I've heard it at times, and because people haven't developed to calling asians yellow and indians red, it does become offensive to them, because it hasn't been adapted like white and black has.

I just don't like racism period. But I'm not bothered with being called black as in refering to me as an African American.


Krazy Libra

Answer 5

yea i wonder the same thing i have more of a yellow tone to my brown skin i get burned from the sun and it peels off to the same color people think just black people only have black skin when i've only met one person with black skin he was from africa but his skin is a beautiful color

Answer 6

Your statement is incorrect... they are often referred to as "mixed race." Please avoid "always" and "never" and "everyone" statements... try to qualify your observations with "often" or "frequently" or "some." The reason that many people of mixed heritage as referred to as their minority race is because in many societies, the minority status takes precedence. Children were often considered to "follow the status of the mother" (since the identity of the father is often debatable) - ie, if the mother was a slave, her children would be as well, and the slaveholder could breed his own workforce. Also, regrettably, people are treated by their looks - ie, if you look at all black, you are black, even if only one of your ancestors was black. But there is also a positive side to this: in American society, where white people remain the majority of the population, people are often eager to establish a more interesting and unique heritage for themselves, and are happy to emphasize their black heritage.

Answer 7

Well, why do you call a "white person" "white"???? We're not white...we're pink, brown, tan, ect....I'm certainly not litterally the color of white....
For easy and convenience of speech, I feel this is why we refer to people as, "white", "black'...whatever....
Peel away the skin, and we're all the same underneath....no one got to choose what color they came in to this world as...so no one should judge someone on the color of their skin...IMHO

Answer 8

Please!! I 'm not white either.I'm caucasion but i'm darker than Halle Berry.Get real .I have a friend from highschool.He was born in Africa,came here as a little kid,but now that we are in our 50s he's getting darker.He almost looks navy blue!

Answer 9

I really don't waste my time thinking about it. People will say what they want. I know who and what I am and who and what I am not. Also they call us black because they used to call us "negroes" which in spanish means black.

Answer 10

Ive just come to collect my 2 points. I have n time to split hairs.