Sometimes I think about the time Blaire White gave a hypothetical about going on a date with her. If she got to the restaurant first and then you show up, the waiter would ask, "who are you sitting with?" You wouldn't say "him, over there." because she doesn't look like a man. This isn't a comprehensive look, and I think, notoriously, you wouldn't find a comprehensive look from her, but it's a base way of looking at gender as a social construct (as opposed to how absurd it would be to make the definition of gender somehow genetic - the waiter wouldn't understand you). In the same way, if you're a white supremacist and you fucking hate the Russians - Russians aren't exactly white and Italians are definitely your allies. If Russia is incapacitated, Britain fucks off, and France is subjugated, conveniently, Italians stop being white. If there's one strain of Germanic white on Earth because you're a white supremacist who exterminated everyone else, and you learn through gene testing that a person had an Italian ancestor 500 years ago, that person isn't really white because of that drop of Italian blood. In that sense, whiteness is a product of the social and cultural context around it. Likewise, there can be a lot of diversity in people who are black, but they might all just be called black.
Sometimes I think about the time Blaire White gave a hypothetical about going on a date with her. If she got to the restaurant first and then you show up, the waiter would ask, "who are you sitting with?" You wouldn't say "him, over there." because she doesn't look like a man. This isn't a comprehensive look, and I think, notoriously, you wouldn't find a comprehensive look from her, but it's a base way of looking at gender as a social construct (as opposed to how absurd it would be to make the definition of gender somehow genetic - the waiter wouldn't understand you). In the same way, if you're a white supremacist and you fucking hate the Russians - Russians aren't exactly white and Italians are definitely your allies. If Russia is incapacitated, Britain fucks off, and France is subjugated, conveniently, Italians stop being white. If there's one strain of Germanic white on Earth because you're a white supremacist who exterminated everyone else, and you learn through gene testing that a person had an Italian ancestor 500 years ago, that person isn't really white because of that drop of Italian blood. In that sense, whiteness is a product of the social and cultural context around it. Likewise, there can be a lot of diversity in people who are black, but they might all just be called black.