How can they tell?


I am so sorry to sound ignorant but all of these people look alike how could they tell on Rwandan form the next?

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Actually, its not an ignorant question.

Some have distinct features while others don't. You can easily mistake a Hutu for a Tutsi or a Tutsi for a Hutu. That's why they were demanding to see Identity Cards, you can't really tell.

I made that mistake once and thought I was going to get killed. I said a Tutsi man was a Hutu man and he was furious! I swear he looked more Hutu than Tutsi if you want to go by the 'so called' guidelines.

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The Hutu and Tutsi are marked mainly by their height. This race system was devised and imposed upon the Rwandan society by the Belgian colonialists. The Tutsi were more favored (and educated) by the Europeans because they were believed to have somewhat lighter skin than the Hutu.

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marnie-mccook,

It's more than just skin color, because there are dark Tutsis as well. Yes, most Tutsi are tall, but they also have long noses and straighter hair. In other words the Beligians saw that even with their dark skin they had some European features.

Even so over the years there was a lot of mixing between Tutsis and Hutu's.In the genocide the Hutu had so much hatred that they even killed half Tutsi's. They really wanted to exterminate the Tutsi.

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That's horrible. I guess it is similar to how white's in America, particularly down south favored light skinned blacks over darker ones, believe it or not it's still like that. I once had a job at a family owned bank, and was told tha the only reason I got the job was because of my long hair and my paper bag skin........

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Nurse_1118,

Wow! They were so forthright. Well, I live in Boston, a friend of mine worked for a Temp agency. Well she sent a dark skin lady for a job. Can you believe the Supervisor called and said, please send someone lighter in color!

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[deleted]

I live in South Carolina and although I'm only in high school, I experience it just as harshly if not harsher. I'm sort of a dark reddish-brown complexion, boys will make you feel as though you need to be lighter in order to be prettier or just to be pretty at all. My own cousin said that only light-skinned girls are pretty and most dark-skinned girls are not! I see it light-skinned girls also. Some girls at my school brag about being the lightest in their family. I love my black people but if there is one thing I would change about us its how we divide ourselves that way.

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Actuallly, you couldnt tell who was hutu or tutsi just by looking at them. Ages ago, Belgian colonist came to Rwanda and decided to devide people into two "groups". Hutu and tutsi....Back then, tutsis ( if i remember correctly) tended to be taller with broader shoulders, but that was ages ago. There is no way to predict how genetics will play out in a person's family so as time went on, by their parents, babys were born either hutu or Tutsi. Because hutus and tutsis began to intermarry, the childeren's "classification" were based on their fathers. EX: If a hutu woman and tutsi man have children, their children would be classified as tutsi. Does that answer ur question??

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Yes, it's true; even in Rwanda, many people can't tell the difference.

Aside from the Tutsi being tall and lanky, with more European facial features (although, again, with the intermarriage, the distinctions are blurred), there is also the idea that the Tutsi were pastoral herders while the Hutu were farmers and that Tutsi made up most of the ruling class (although a "Tutsi" and a "Hutu" could easily exchange roles and become a part of the other group)... still, that is history by now.

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Alot of you have it wrong. It's like Jews and Gentiles. For some you can't tell but for others it's very obvious. I'm a Tutsi living in the U.S. and I go to Rwandan conventions annually. There has been alot of intermixing as there has been in many cultures but it still remains very easy to distinguish one from the other in most cases. If you look in the Guinness book of world records Tutsi's are listed as the tallest tribe in the world. There are also differences in facial structure and hair. When I go into black owned barbershops here in the U.S., the barber often makes remarks about how "weird" my hair is. They're not just arbitrary designations forced on us by Belgians.

These, differences, however are meaningless and superficial and shouldn't have created divisions between people who had lived together in peace for centuries.

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@therach1025, nice post, there are definitely phenotypical differences between a substantial proportion of the Hutu and Tutsi individuals, but also some overlap.

In Kigali identity cards were frequently checked, so that ethnicity could be verified, but in rural areas people knew each other, so it was easy to determine who was Hutu and who was Tutsi (it appears that identity cards were usually not needed).

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It was Scientific Racism. It stems from Hamitic theory, that North Africans were Hamitic (descendants of Noah's son Ham), and that Ham is the ancestor of these Africans, who are supposed to be distinct from the Negroids of Sub-Saharan Africa. Of course none of this makes sense. Shem (ancestor of Semitic people) and Ham are brothers, and sons of Noah, so therefore Noah is the Ancestor of all, which includes Africans, Asians, and Europeans. This is according to the Bible, if we interpret what the Old Testament says. Of course there must be differences between the Twa, Tutsi, and Hutu, otherwise they wouldn't be different ethnicities, but I'm not sure the Belgians, in 1916, really had any idea what they were doing or talking about, other than dividing peacefully, coexisting ethnic groups and setting them up for this kind of conflict.

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It was Scientific Racism. It stems from Hamitic theory, that North Africans were Hamitic (descendants of Noah's son Ham), and that Ham is the ancestor of these Africans, who are supposed to be distinct from the Negroids of Sub-Saharan Africa. Of course none of this makes sense. Shem (ancestor of Semitic people) and Ham are brothers, and sons of Noah, so therefore Noah is the Ancestor of all, which includes Africans, Asians, and Europeans. This is according to the Bible, if we interpret what the Old Testament says. Of course there must be differences between the Twa, Tutsi, and Hutu, otherwise they wouldn't be different ethnicities, but I'm not sure the Belgians, in 1916, really had any idea what they were doing or talking about, other than dividing peacefully, coexisting ethnic groups and setting them up for this kind of conflict.

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There's no such thing as "scientific" racism. It's just racism.

When the colonial powers invaded and occupied they artificially created two classes - one became the rich controlling class, the other became the poorer ruled class. It's the easiest way to control foreign territory. To justify their class system was through racism (we are different in some way, and one is better than the other).

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I have just returned from Rwanda - there is no difference between Tutsi and Hutu other than that imposed by the colonialist Belgian government - which was the Tutsi owned more than 10 cows. That is it.

The most awful genocide happened due to the number of cows you own - not that genocide for religious, ethnic, height.colour or any other excuse lets you machete, bludgeon or thrown into pits small children, women and men and kill them in the most horrid way imaginable, or rape the women with HIV+ men - this is the most disgusting act in our human history (and that is saying some) and if you think otherwise walk through the Children's Room in the Kigali Genocide Museum and come out the other side a different person

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