Why using neanderthal as an insult has racist connotation and undertone
I fear the more you will defend your usage of the term neanderthal as an insult the more clear it is to me that you are a racist who hangs around white supremacists
First off; neanderthals were not a race. Race is a "categorization of humans based on shared physical or social qualities into groups generally viewed as distinct within a given society" (wikepedia)
Neanderthals were not a part of the human race as they were a species that was closely related to humans rather than being humans. But of course that's cherry picking and semantics. However I think it is very important to remove the idea that neanderthals were a lesser version of humans. (Chris Stringer, n.d.) (Lisa Hendry, n.d.)
Neanderthals were actually very intelligent as a species; them being very skilled tool makers for the time, able to communicate, proficient hunters, and were able to create fire upon other things. (Ian Sample, 2014) (Chris Stringer, n.d.) (Lisa Hendry, n.d.)
NEANDERTHALS WERE NOT STUPID and the idea that neanderthals are stupid and the usage of the word as an insult has racist and colonial connotations.
"The way Neanderthals have been portrayed in modern science and popular culture is also a striking example of how racism works. Initially they were depicted as ‘brutes’, inferior and less ‘worthy’ version of humans. This served to justify discrimination of Indigenous groups that were deemed ‘similar’ to them, such as Aboriginal Australians. Neanderthals began to receive more favourable scientific attention when DNA studies revealed similarities between them and people of European heritage. Scientific interest then shifted toward finding proof that they were, in fact, just ‘like us’ - meaning, the inhabitants of the Global North." (Joanna Jasiewicz PhD, 2024)
"She traces the species’ bad rap back to the 19th century, when Europeans first started coming across their skulls in valleys and limestone quarries. “This was a time when many people, including physicians, thought that the shape of skull revealed the mental and moral characteristic of the person,” she writes. Neanderthal skulls, with their craggy brows and big teeth, were a phrenological nightmare, and “it became common to believe that [their owners] were primitive and brutish.”' (Cara Giaimo, 2016)
It should be noted that while the insult neanderthal in the current era does not directly mean something racist; the insult goes farther than the modern era and definition. The idea that neanderthals were brutish and uncivilized stem from the same racist pseudosciences that they utilized to excuse slavery, genocide, and white colonialism. Neanderthals are considered brutish for the same reasons that BIPOC (black indigenous people of color) were.
Furthermore throughout history white supremacists have compared BIPOC to animals and would constantly push the idea that people of color were primitive. The same thing is what was applied neanderthals; they had a different bone structure to humans and were deemed as unintelligent because of it, they were from a different period of time and therefore labeled at brutish, "not like us" in the same way people of color have been historically.
To conclude, yes, I am the friend that is "too woke" if being "too woke" means being a person of color who informs their less knowledgeable white friends about racial prejudice then I'LL GLADY be too woke.
like and reblog if I should do another tumblr essay on how the usage of the term barbaric is racist because of course mx. racist mc racist dug the hole further into the ground
citations:
https://www.moverooted.co.uk/blog/neanderthals-racism-and-the-patterns-of-othering
https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/please-stop-using-neanderthal-as-an-insult-say-neanderthal-experts
https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/who-were-the-neanderthals.html
https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/are-neanderthals-same-species-as-us.html
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2014/apr/30/neanderthals-not-less-intelligent-humans-scientists
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_(human_categorization)