african american athletes..does their ability have anything to do with slavery?

[shootthebandit]

I would just like to point out a few things here:
1. This is not justifying slavery
2. Im not saying black athletes dont have to work as hard


I was just thinking that a huge majority of successful track and field athletes are african american/african Caribbean. Ive seen a few discussions on this and I was wondering if you guys think there is a causal link between generations of selective breeding and the athletic ability of these athletes. Im not saying athletes from this background dont train as hard as white or Asian people but there is certainly a trend that supports these claims

I dont want this to turn into a race war or even worse people justifying slavery which was horrible

I dont know how much you agree with the opinions in the link although there is evidence to support this argument. Personally im sceptical but I thought it would be a good grown up discussion

http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/fourth-place-medal/michael-johnson-says-slavery-descendants-run-faster-because-155858303--oly.html

 

[Timotei]

It would make sense that through the selection of slaves who were taller, stronger, and more physically adept that the continual favoritism of individuals with said traits would be more desirable to potential owners. It'd also create a market in regions where people were sold into slavery and traded to capture only the tallest and strongest men.

Next create a slave trade system which lasts for several hundred years and the end result is a noticeably large portion of a population once subjected to it having traits ideal for physical activities, more so than others.

 

[Lilani]

I think there is something to the idea of only the most physically capable slaves being able to survive in those conditions. I mean, the theory I've heard to explain all of the top Olympic sprinters coming from sub-Saharan Africa is because the lack of food they often grow up with there causes more short-twitch muscles to grow than long-twitch (short-twitch muscles being responsible for the ability to put out short bursts of powerful energy, while long-twitch muscles are responsible for endurance).

However, I would give the idea a lot more credit if it came from a geneticist who can confirm a pattern of superior bone and muscle structures that is markedly greater than black people not descended from slaves. Not from an athlete who knows nothing about genetics and words his idea as having a "superior athletic gene."

The most interesting thing to me I found in that article was this:

"Johnson's views on the genetics of slavery and his allusions to eugenics have been mostly ignored in the United States. The interview with the Daily Mail was published last Wednesday and barely made ripples across the pond. For good reason: It's a third rail topic in the states. Even intelligent debate on the subject runs the risk of becoming controversial. Any statement is treated as polarizing."

And yeah, I think that's definitely true. I feel like to most people, black or white, it wouldn't be something they highly invest in either way, but people who are more outspoken or just look for any reason to justify talking about race and slavery would jump on it. And inevitably it would cause many famous people, both black and white, to say stupid things they regret later. There's really no way to talk about this without stepping on somebody's toes, especially since this isn't a geneticist who's actually done research on the subject, but just a guy saying words that may or may not even remotely come close to how genetics work.

And for that I'm glad this never made news over here (and I say it that way because that article came out two years ago). It's really not news at all, just a guy with an idea that might get looked into by geneticists someday, but really shouldn't be gossiped about until something substantial is found out about his claims.

 

[omega 616]

It is Chris Rocks theory, it was selective breeding the smart ones were killed and the strong ones lived to have kids. He then goes on to say that black people dominate every sport and as soon as they invent a heated hockey rink, they will take that sport as well!

If you think about it, he is right. Running, football, NFL, NBA ... not sure about about baseball though. In MMA two of the current legends are black guys (Jon Jones and Anderson Silva), though MMA seems to be mainly made up of Latinos.

 

[Atrocious Joystick]

Eh maybe, how much does nature versus nurture matter here? Has there ever been any large scale study that studies on the difference between people who have the same lifestyle but hail from either athletic or non-athletic families? It could be that blacks in the US and people in poorer nations in general tend to favor athletic pursuits while whites in the US and people in rich countries in general tend to favor academic and business pursuits. I have no data to back that up, just throwing it out there.

 

[shootthebandit]

If you think about it, he is right. Running, football, NFL, NBA ... not sure about about baseball though. In MMA two of the current legends are black guys (Jon Jones and Anderson Silva), though MMA seems to be mainly made up of Latinos.

Id argue that football/soccer is slightly different. Its more to do with skill rather than outright physicality. Central americans and central europeans tend to be better at football (regardless of creed) purely because its so hugely popular in those areas

Im still pretty sceptical but the evidence certainly points in the favour of Johnson's arguement

 

[omega 616]

If you think about it, he is right. Running, football, NFL, NBA ... not sure about about baseball though. In MMA two of the current legends are black guys (Jon Jones and Anderson Silva), though MMA seems to be mainly made up of Latinos.

Id argue that football/soccer is slightly different. Its more to do with skill rather than outright physicality. Central americans and central europeans tend to be better at football (regardless of creed) purely because its so hugely popular in those areas

Im still pretty sceptical but the evidence certainly points in the favour of Johnson's arguement

I actually think it's more to do with dominantly black countries are poorer, so things like computers and tv's don't really exist as entertainment (I'm sure they are there though) ... instead you get a ball, a can or whatever and play football. Football every day for 18 years, will certainly build skill, especially if you're playing on lumpy dirt with a crummy ball ... when you get flat grass with a decent ball, you wont be playing with a handicap and dominate people.

 

[JoJo]

There certainly is a noticeable talent upon sub-Saharan Africans and their recent descendants for running, I'm not convinced it's a result of slavery though. Plenty of the best marathon runners are East Africans, Ethiopian or Somalian in particular, who don't especially have a slavery background. More likely to be adapted due to their hunter-gather lifestyle in Africa over thousands of years than recent events over the last few centuries.

 

[Dr Ampersand]

I've heard before that Africa while not having the highest average height among people (Europe has the tallest average people) has a distribution that's more U-shaped than any other continent. That would mean that they have a higher number of extreme outliers. That could explain their dominance in certain sports and it could suggest that these physically higher up people were the ones taken as slaves. Not for instance, the pygmy people of Africa being the ones were enslaved.

 

[MysticSlayer]

You have to have a very narrow view of sports in order to come to the conclusion that blacks simply dominate. By that, I mean that you are basically looking exclusively at basketball, running, and American football. Sports go far beyond those three and include soccer, tennis, swimming, cycling, hockey, water polo, baseball, golf, volleyball, and rugby. In most, if not all, of those other sports, we see comparatively few noteworthy black athletes.

Part of it may have to do with genetics, but I think most of it has to do with culture. If your culture values a sport, then the children will feel much more encouraged to excel at that sport, which is a major factor in having more adults that can play it at an exceptional level. I'm not trying to take away the tremendous accomplishments of some black athletes and many of the social positives that come along with those accomplishments, but I have a really hard time saying that it is due to genetics without more to go on than some athlete's beliefs.

 

[lacktheknack]

The version I heard was that slaves often died in droves on the slave ships due to <spoiler=abysmal conditions>http://c.fastcompany.net/multisite_files/codesign/imagecache/inline-large/post-inline/inline-slave-trade-infographic-7368885460-550b83c0a8-o.jpg so the strongest ones that survived the trip over were the ones that stuck around after slavery was abolished.

If this was true, then African-Americans would be, on the whole, stronger and hardier than born-and-raised Africans (if only marginally), but I don't have a source for that.

 

[g7g7g7g7]

To justify slavery being a modifying factor you should compare the results of native African athletes with African American athletes, you see clearly that there isn't a massive divide between the two and all Africans slavery or no have characteristic strengths which are advantageous in most sports.

There are socio-economic factors in play here as well and exceptional African-American athletes are more likely than their African counterparts to access high quality training and sponsorship, as well as access to more lucrative and established sporting leagues.

The question of whether they "dominate" in all sports is still to be answered as more young African-americans become prevalent in different social classes with access to different sports that are traditionally closed, good examples are rowing clubs, sailing clubs, golf clubs, tennis clubs, private swimming pools and sports with higher monetary requirements for gear and training.

 

[lvramire]

http://www.forbes.com/sites/jonentine/2012/08/12/the-dna-olympics-jamaicans-win-sprinting-genetic-lottery-and-why-we-should-all-care/

I think it has a lot to do with the potential you're born with that you inherit through your genes. The discipline and hard work; the dedication and training that is required to excel can't and shouldn't be dismissed. But it's your genes that makes it even remotely possible in the first place. I believe that you tend to see many track-and-field winners of African descent because they're genetically-'optimized' to excel in that arena.

 

[Imperioratorex Caprae]

Its mostly genetics, muscle and bone structure mainly and not slavery. Hip structure and the associated musculature is why they're able to run faster. That gives a distinct advantage. I learned a lot about how muscles and bones work together while in a massage therapy class and I suggest people learn a bit about how it all works together before making wild claims like that.
I myself have an odd hip structure, making me wonder what my genetic line is because I can run like hell for a white guy (despite my left knee being pretty well fucked from an injury). I only have about an inch clearance between my floating ribs and my iliac crest (the top of the hip).

 

[Bocaj2000]

A ethnicity's relationship with sports is critically important to that ethnicity's culture. The best basketball players, for example, come from urban areas. For the first half of the century, urban areas in the US was saturated with Jews and now it's black people. Selective breeding is speculation at best and racist minded (not saying that you are; just that it's the mindset of one)

http://www.npr.org/blogs/codeswitch/2014/04/08/300279224/how-stereotypes-explain-everything-and-nothing-at-all

 

[DefunctTheory]

Its mostly genetics, muscle and bone structure mainly and not slavery. Hip structure and the associated musculature is why they're able to run faster. That gives a distinct advantage. I learned a lot about how muscles and bones work together while in a massage therapy class and I suggest people learn a bit about how it all works together before making wild claims like that.
I myself have an odd hip structure, making me wonder what my genetic line is because I can run like hell for a white guy (despite my left knee being pretty well fucked from an injury). I only have about an inch clearance between my floating ribs and my iliac crest (the top of the hip).

The idea is that slavery worked as an artificial selection device, culling those with poor genetics and promoting reproduction between good genetics.

Did you really think we were entertaining the notion that slavery in and of itself was good for sports?

 

[nathan-dts]

Nope. Pretty much evolution at work. White people have had an easier life for a longer time, with people living regardless of strength, were as many black people still live in poor conditions like in African countries where physicality is a huge benefit.

The fact that, in America, African Americans are less wealthy means that physical strength is still a necessity. Kill racism and afford African Americans better opportunities and then everyone will equalise in terms of strength and the like.