Why are Eastern European Jews White?

chavamom

Tue, Jun 15 2010, 4:40 am

chanchy123 wrote:

Hashem loves me wrote:

entropy wrote:

Right, that's common.

Does anyone know of 2 blue-eyed parents with a brown-eyed kid?

Yes. and it's definitely their kid. legitimate

It is virtually impossible genetically.
lighter colors are recessive genes.

That's only based on a Medelian understanding of genetics, which we now know is exactly correct. IIRC, there are 8 alleles that code for eye color, not the simple BB/bb/Bb that we learned in Bio 101 - and yes, it is possible in rare cases to have blue eyed parents with a brown eyed child.

shalhevet

Tue, Jun 15 2010, 5:07 am

Hashem loves me wrote:

shalhevet wrote:

entropy wrote:

Right, that's common.

Does anyone know of 2 blue-eyed parents with a brown-eyed kid?

Yes, me!!

Two of my kids have brown eyes. (But both my father and my dh's mother have brown eyes)

Also I have red hair and neither of my parents or their parents do/did - my mother was extremely surprised when I was born. But her father a"h had a gingery moustache.

Both you are your dh are blue eyed and 2 kids are brown? but someone just said that's impossible genetically? Even though I thought I knew someone that has the same in their family. I'm confused.

If it makes a difference, we don't have blue, blue eyes - more bluey-grey.

(Oh, and no milkman in the picture before someone asks... Smile

)

sarahd

Tue, Jun 15 2010, 5:24 am

Chloe wrote:

Quote:

I think that in the Holocaust, the largest percent of survivors were the 'aryan looking' ones, which may account for the fact that there are so many Caucasions.

I also think that must be one of the reasons. Fair colored children had a higher percentage survival rate.

But how many hidden children survived and returned to the Jewish people? Relatively few. Concentration camp survivors did not look less Jewish and there were more of those than hidden Jews - adults or children.

Hatemywig

Tue, Jun 15 2010, 5:57 am

The thread title reminded me of a joke I once read in The Readers Digest:

A baby Camel goes up to its mother and says "Why do we have long eyelashes," and the mother reply"To stop sand from getting in our eyes."

A few moments later the baby camel comes up to his mother and asks" why do we have long toes" and the mother reply's " To stop us from sinking in the sand."

A few moments later the baby camel walked up to his annoyed mother and says "Why do we have these humps on our back" and the mother replys to store water in them.

"So we have eyelashed to stop sand from getting in our eyes, long toes to stop us sinking in the sand and humps to store water in".

The baby camel thinks for a bit, then comes back to his mother and asks: "Mum, why are we in London Zoo?"

entropy

Tue, Jun 15 2010, 6:21 am

Hashem loves me wrote:

entropy wrote:

Tamiri wrote:

Even if the eyes LOOK brown, the child of 2 blue eyed parents can't have a brown-brown child.

If it quacks like a duck..

Personally, ever snce learning this in HS biology I've bee on the lookout for a contrary example and the best I've managed is internet strangers who claim they are certain a child is legitimate. HLM, how can you be certain? maybe there was a mix-up in the ivf lab, or who knows what? People wouldn't advertise these things, would they?
(I have heard of more such cases btw, and I tend to believe there exists a very rare dominant blue gene somwhere, I just never saw it myself)

I know the couple well and I thought I was sure but if you're saying it's impossible I guess not. It's possible that the child's eyes are not really brown brown just a very dark hazel as someone mentioned.
I'll have to check into it more.

I am not knowledgable enough to tell you it is impossible. It certainly contradicts the classic model and my own oservations, but I don't know enough to confirm or refute the claim that the reality is more complex than the model. Nor do I know the family in order to be sure their kid is their joint biological child. So, you know more than me here.

HindaRochel

Tue, Jun 15 2010, 7:44 am

entropy wrote:

Tamiri wrote:

Even if the eyes LOOK brown, the child of 2 blue eyed parents can't have a brown-brown child.

It is very possible that the child is legit and that there are other factors involved.
Well according to this site...sorry if this was answered haven't gotten through all the pages yet.

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/c.....x.htm

solo

Tue, Jun 15 2010, 8:21 am

chanchy123 wrote:

Hashem loves me wrote:

shalhevet wrote:

entropy wrote:

Right, that's common.
Does anyone know of 2 blue-eyed parents with a brown-eyed kid?

Yes, me!!
Two of my kids have brown eyes. (But both my father and my dh's mother have brown eyes)
Also I have red hair and neither of my parents or their parents do/did - my mother was extremely surprised when I was born. But her father a"h had a gingery moustache.

Both you are your dh are blue eyed and 2 kids are brown? but someone just said that's impossible genetically? Even though I thought I knew someone that has the same in their family. I'm confused.

It is very unlikely, but as someone mentioned, eye color genetics are complex and perhaps there are other genetic factors in play here. The fact is this is extremely rare.

my mom has blue eyes my dad has green. all my siblings have light colored eyes. as do 3/4 grandparents
I was the only one in my family to have brown eyes.
although my mom always insisted there just a dark shade of hazel everone else agreed theyre brown.
so as im aging theyve become lighter and are now green! guess she was right.
also my grandma who has brown eyes has a blue ring around them - kinda like shes wearing tinted lenses.

hadasa

Tue, Jun 15 2010, 8:34 am

solo wrote:

chanchy123 wrote:

Hashem loves me wrote:

shalhevet wrote:

entropy wrote:

Right, that's common.
Does anyone know of 2 blue-eyed parents with a brown-eyed kid?

Yes, me!!
Two of my kids have brown eyes. (But both my father and my dh's mother have brown eyes)
Also I have red hair and neither of my parents or their parents do/did - my mother was extremely surprised when I was born. But her father a"h had a gingery moustache.

Both you are your dh are blue eyed and 2 kids are brown? but someone just said that's impossible genetically? Even though I thought I knew someone that has the same in their family. I'm confused.

It is very unlikely, but as someone mentioned, eye color genetics are complex and perhaps there are other genetic factors in play here. The fact is this is extremely rare.

My eyes were also brown when I was a child and are lightening to hazel/green with the years.

My first batch of kids all had dark brown eyes, then I have a series of blue-eyed blonds. I thought maybe it was the influence of the local climate, but my youngest is dark again.

amother

Tue, Jun 15 2010, 8:35 am

I think I learnt that all people were originally white, until cham the son of noach turned black.

remember, all humanity come from one person- adam the first man.

that being said, living someplace for a long time can affect your features and genes over generations.

someone living in africa will slowly get darker from the sun and climate.

someone living in europe will slowly get lighter, also from the climate.

Ruchel

Tue, Jun 15 2010, 10:54 am

Think about it ladies, if it's so easy to spot a Jew, why the yellow star/yellow hat/etc? Because it's NOT so easy. No, you cannot always tell. Even the Germans didn't always tell. One of the "icons" of Aryan looks they had was a nice Jewish boy who hid his identity that way. He was photographed, measured, everything they liked to do at that time, and they thought he was "purely Aryan", not even some Italian or Spanish or French blood. Yeah right!

GreenEyes26

Tue, Jun 15 2010, 11:02 am

imamama wrote:

I think regardless of skin tone, which could be attributed to intermarriage, rape or simply just evolution, that Mediterranean Basin look is still pretty obvious among Jews. You can tell a non-Jewish Pole from a secular Polish Jew in ten seconds.

All my red-headed, blue-eyes siblings (and there are a lot of them), still have the big nose and the long face Smile

My kids have it a little less, but that's probably because one of their grandparents is not Jewish, and originally from Wales.

Um no, not really. No one in my family looks the least bit Jewish, and that goes for my mother, father, his parents, all his siblings, and one entire family of 11 blond-haired, blue-eyed, small-nosed, Gentile-looking children. My mother looks so not-Jewish that people used to comment on it, and when she first moved to NY they called her the "shiksa". (True story!) Me and all my siblings have blue or green eyes, blondish hair (the boys stayed very blond, the girls got darker, but we were all born with white-blond hair), pale skin....put me in a pair of pants and you'd never know the difference.

Actually, I'm always surprised when I see a Jew that looks "So Jewish!" (like my husband and his family), because I don't see it THAT often.

ora_43

Tue, Jun 15 2010, 11:09 am

GreenEyes26 wrote:

imamama wrote:

My kids have it a little less, but that's probably because one of their grandparents is not Jewish, and originally from Wales.

I think that just proves imamama's point. Your family doesn't look Jewish - and that's so unusual that people referred to your mother as "shiksa." Because the non-Jewish look stands out. Because most Jews look Jewish (not that you could be sure they were Jewish if they weren't dressing the part, but people's appearances tend to vary only within a certain spectrum).

JRKmommy

Tue, Jun 15 2010, 12:32 pm

amother wrote:

Why is this posted as amother? Is this is joke, and someone is pretending to not know how genetics work as a way of making fun of frum people?

If this post is legit: no, genetics do not work that way. The fact that you get a dark tan in the sun will not make your children have darker skin. What happens is this: genes naturally mutate (change). Sometimes, the change is bad (such as in the case of genetic diseases). Sometimes, it may not have much effect, or it may even be positive.

If an albino child is born in Africa, they will have more problems than an albino child living in Northern Europe, because of the risk of sun damage (societal issues are a whole other discussion). Someone like me, with light skin, will avoid the sun, so I probably would be less likely to want to live in a place with constant strong sunshine, and would choose to tolerate a harsh winter as a trade-off.

People who survived in different locations were the ones who were genetically suited to do so. For example, groups that often encountered starvation often tend to have genes that allow them to store fat more easily. If social conditions change, however, these genes can become a liability, and they may start to die at earlier ages than the general population. The genes themselves don't suddenly change - just the process of natural selection.

Raisin

Tue, Jun 15 2010, 12:58 pm

amother wrote:

Climate definitly has an affect on color. I know a family that had several dark hair-eye children while living in the USA. Later they moved to Canada, were they had another few chidren all of them blue eyed light hair.

it's almost impossible for there to be a connection.

scandanavia has a huge muslim population, recent immigrants. they all seem to be dark skinned still.