Discussion with an asshat on FB

[Otterdaemmerung]

5. Jesus was Caucasian, but not white.

Caucasian means basically anyone spanning from the Atlantic coast of Europe through the Middle East, bounded by Africans to the south and Indians and Asians to the east. As with most racial designations, it's arbitrary with no fixed boundaries, and it seems to have more to do with physiology than skin color. From dictionary.com's definition: "Anthropology. (no longer in technical use) of, relating to, or characteristic of one of the traditional racial divisions of humankind, marked by fair to dark skin, straight to tightly curled hair, and light to very dark eyes, and originally inhabiting Europe, parts of North Africa, western Asia, and India."

That said, "white" as we use it here in the U.S. is a subset of Caucasian, meaning northern European. Traditionally, the "white" designation excluded people from Italy, Greece, Turkey, and the rest of the Mediterranean coast.

There's a great meme going around that asserts (in my opinion, correctly) that there are no "white" people in the Bible.