Talk:Human skin color/Archives/2011/November

Help also with user 67.169.167.141, another East Asian supremacist and racist
I ask to forbid the user 67.169.167.141 to modify arguments in Human Skin Color: sources 52 says that East Asians belong to Phototype IV, not to Phototype II and to Phototype III as the user wrote. Thanks for attention.

— Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.248.31.25(talk) 19:17, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

I have marked the allocation of "East Asian" to Phototype IV as dubious for the following reasons:


 * 1. The table shown is the Fitzpatrick scale, which in it's original format does not mention East Asians.


 * 2. The only supporting source is Reference 52 which mentions East Asians in the Lancer Ethnicity Scale, a scale used to identify "healing efficacy and time in patients undergoing cosmetic laser or chemical peel procedures" - not skin colour/tanning ability. Although it provides a corresponding Fitzpatrick scale for each LES category, this can only be an approximation as the scales aren't measuring the same thing.


 * 3. The Fitzpatrick types assigned by Reference 52's LES table don't match up with the von Luschan map in the next section (Skin Colour Map):
 * Ref 52's LES table says the following:

East Asians (Chinese, Korean, Japanese)       IV   South East Asians (Thai, Vietnamese)           IV   Austronesians (Filipino, Polynesian)           IV
 * The von Luschan map says:

East Asians (Chinese, Korean Japanese) 12-14 = III South East Asians (Thai, Vietnamese)  15-23 = III-V Austronesians (Filipino, Polynesian)  18-23 = IV-V


 * 4. The LES table assigns dubious values to other populations - eg. "Native Americans" in Phototype II (von Luschan gives 15-24 (12-24 w/- Inuit), so III-V)

As it is primarily concerned with dermatological healing traits as opposed to skin colour, and as it is inconsistent with other sources that are primarily concerned with skin colour (eg Jablonksi's research and the von Luschan scale) I don't think Reference 52 can be taken as a reliable source for this article. I suggest we either remove the "East Asian" reference entirely, or add a number of "Asian" groupings under the range of Phototypes given by Jablonski and the von Luschan scale (III-V).

Tobus2 (talk) 14:18, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Fitzpatrick scale doesn't show skin colors, but only the behaviour of a certain skin in sun exposure. So, east-asian skin color can be light as von Luschan value 12-24, but under sunlight it behaves as Fitzpatrick value IV (so it doesn't burn but tans easily). A southern italian / southern spanish / portuguese skin color can be light as von Luschan value 12-24, but it behaves as Fitzpatrick value III (so it burns sometimes and tans). It is proper of caucasian skin to burn easily under sunlight regardless of the skin color. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.249.2.217 (talk) 15:05, 16 November 2011 (UTC)