I had to roll a d20 before deciding whether or not to make this thread and you can guess how that turned out.
Anyway, lets say, that in the future it became very possible to basically change your entire appearance to make yourself into a typical member of any other race. It was also relatively cheap. Lets say people were already doing it. Often it enough that it mattered. White guys can become black guys, black guys can become white guys. People can be asians, indian, whatever.. Could even choose your kids to be a different race before they are born.
Would you
do it? To what race(s)? And even if you don't, and other people still do, what would it mean for society? I'm trying to picture a world where this happens all the fucking time, and I don't know if it would increase racism or decrease it.
Because now, I'm starting to believe that the only reason civil people generally tend to not be racist is because they know a person can't really help that they are of a certain race. Can't really hate a man for something he can't control without being a douche. This is off topic but it's also like hating someone for being gay when you know they have no choice.
But if they
did have a choice now with this new technology, and likewise, people had the choice of choosing their own race... would it eventually mean a return of the Holocausts? Genocides? Hate crimes? Even more stereotyping? People who choose 'X', are likely to also choose to be killers, bastards, rapists, and thieves?
Or would the evil men from all races flock toward becoming members of the stereotypical "good" races and thus bring them down too over time, eventually balancing out all the races again and making them all equally shitty?
No god damnit! The sheriff is a nig*Church Bells*r!!
Pensies are "just kinda ugly" any way you slice it.
Or don't slice it.
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change myself into the race "purple"
most of all, most of all
someone said true love was dead
but i'm bound to fall
bound to fall for you
oh what can i do
Or a keebler elf. Because they make fantastic cookies.
But man. I would never want to be mono-racial.
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Alternatively: Thri-kreen
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then, for school, i'd be asian so i could be super smart
and after i graduate and get laid with the black/asian combo, i'd turn back into a white guy because we get all the breaks all the time always
and then when i retire, i'd be mexican, because man do those dudes know how to relax and not do work
He looked like Fred Savage.
Or a midget, if midget counts as a race.
Or a combination. That would probably be best.
I'm the most efficient job stealing mexican out there - you'll never see it coming.
I'm so white.
naw, it is, but that's cool
Yellow on the outside, white on the inside.
I'm a Malaysian-born Chinese living in Australia.
Being Native American (same damned thing) I am either Mexican or Germanic depending on my sunlight exposure.
It's fricking awesome.
Also, everyone tries to claim you as one of their own race, which is quite a compliment.
However, I don't think we'd see anything along the lines of the holocaust or wide-scale violence. You're basically decoupling race from identity here; people commit serious acts of racial violence because they perceive people of other races to be significantly different from them. If race no longer telegraphs any meaningful difference in identity, why would people commit violence on a large scale over it? It would be as absurd as committing genocide against people with blue eyes. And if they did, why would anybody choose to remain a victim for something that cosmetic if they could easily change their skin color and blend in?
What we might see, though, is more minor racial discrimination. For example, maybe somebody opens a sushi restaurant and decides that all his sushi chefs should look Japanese, therefore if you want to get a job with him you need to go back to the clinic and get your racial reassignment procedure done.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Noone tries to claim me.
Oh god.
It would be the new Boob Job or Starvation.
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I'm part of pretty much all the Germanic type peoples - English, Welsh, French, German, Swedish, etc.
The French part is probably why everyone wants me.
Or maybe it's because Cherokee is the Choctaw (one of my tribes) term for "Cave Dweller"
You're a Ani-yun'wiya' or a Tsalag if you want to use your own people's language.
That sounds offensive, but there you have it.
(as long as i don't have to be something lame like the peon)
(I'm English, Irish, Scottish, and Cherokee. My younger brother got the tan skin and dark hair, and I look like Conan O'Brien >_<)
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Me? I'd probably not want to change anything much. I like not burning in the sun, and I can't imagine myself pinkish or brownish. If it got wildly artistic (blue people) maybe I'd experiment with that, but I can't see myself wanting to change myself permanently.
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That's disturbingly similar to me, except I'm Cree.
jk :P
plus the rampant racism associated with being black
you know
i'm sure that wouldn't work with you either.
most of all, most of all
someone said true love was dead
but i'm bound to fall
bound to fall for you
oh what can i do
I guess I wouldn't mind making myself 100% Sicilian but that doesn't really fit in this thread and ultimately isn't something I really care about.
Although, in reality, I'm 1/2 Welsh, 1/4 Irish and 1/4 English and depending how far back I go I think I'm actually less English than anything else.
as much as I hate having to be the angry welsh guy all the time
the welsh are almost definitively non-germanic
the wel- or wal- prefix that many countries and regions hold was generally attributed to places inhabited by non-germanic peoples or tribes when they were encountered by germanic peoples
just a heads up
Edit: I too can see my veins, at least on my inner arms and palms. I'd rather not have semi-transparent skin thanks.
Ideally, I'd just be hooked up with a Culture neural net and accessories so I can change it whenever I want. :P
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If I were to change my race, would that as well alter my memories/self-view, or would I still consider myself a white person just with different appearance?
I have no interest in changing my race, and I suspect I wouldn't if I had been born a different race (though I can't be sure, because that would have surely changed my viewpoint). That said, I would love a little extra melanin...us pale pink Northern European types tend to burn easily.
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As am I, though the German is tiny and I also have a nice shot of Irish.
Everyone fears an albino.
Edit: If we're trading breeds, I'm half German, maybe a third English and the rest Irish. I think there's one assorted native american back there somewhere.
In fact I'm pretty sure a lot of things mentioned here aren't races at all.
This is basically me just without the native American.
It's not, it's a mutation in which you produce no skin pigment I'm almost certain.
Seriously though, I wouldnt change my race, none really appeal to me. Cept maybe Japanese, they're pretty interesting. If I could change Id probably just add some Japanese into my bloodline.