By Max Musson:
Today one of our readers posted a comment enquiring about the efficacy of DNA testing as a means of determining his genetic heritage, or as he also put it, “how white” he actually is.
He asked, “As a white nationalist I’ve always been intrigued by getting a DNA test done to see what my heritage really is, and how white I actually am. Has anyone else had this done?”
This is a question that is often asked as it is appears that scientists now have the technology to conduct tests of this type with some degree of accuracy.
In the field of medicine, doctors are able to carry out genetic testing in order to ascertain the likelihood that one might develop certain hereditary diseases and in order to determine whether or not transplant organs are of a compatible tissue type.
Furthermore, in the field of forensic investigation, DNA testing is used to determine the identities of bodies that have been rendered unrecognizable and to establish whether or not individuals have been to specific sites or have handled specific objects based on a DNA analysis of the traces of tissue and body fluids they leave behind.
In the field of paleoanthropology, anthropologists have extensively used mitochondrial DNA testing to establish the relationships between fossil hominid specimens that they have discovered in various places around the world and famously to provide the basis for the ‘Out of Africa’ hypothesis’ (OAH), according to which all human beings are relatively recently descended from the first anatomically modern humans, who allegedly originated in Africa.
As a consequence of the popular fascination people have for tracing their origins, a number of companies have emerged in recent years, offering a DNA testing service to determine the genetic genealogy individuals.
Notice here that I have in the preceding sentence used the term ‘genetic genealogy’, and this is a form of ‘genealogy’ based upon genetic information as opposed to traditional forms of genealogy based upon the records composing family histories.
Genealogy relates to what are termed ‘blood lines’ or ‘ancestral lines’ among livestock breeders, i.e. the information that is used to compose an animal’s pedigree, rather than it’s genetic composition, which relates to the actual genetic information inherited from previous generations.
The form of DNA testing that most readily indicates ancestral lines, i.e. genetic genealogy’ involves analysis of an individual’s mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) and in the case of males their ‘Y’ chromosome also. However ‘genetic genealogy’, just as traditional forms of genealogy, is not the same thing as ‘genetic composition’ in assessing someone’s racial character, with regard to how White or otherwise they are.
To illustrate my point we must first appreciate that an individual inherits their mtDNA from their mother and in the case of males, they inherit their ‘Y’ chromosome from their father. Furthermore, because our DNA is ‘diploid’ this means that apart from the mtDNA and the ‘Y’ chromosome, we inherit half of our DNA from one parent and half from the other.
Let us now consider two couples each composed of one White person and one black, who for whatever reason, decide to miscegenate.
The first couple is composed of a black man and a White woman, and they have a son. This son will have half White genes and half black genes, but he will be black in character and appearance because black genes are dominant and White genes are recessive, and his ‘Y’ chromosome will show only black ancestry, because he inherited it from his black father.
The second couple are composed of a White man and a black woman and they have a daughter. This daughter will also have half White genes and half black genes and she will be black in character and appearance because, as I have already stated, black genes are dominant and White genes are recessive, and her mtDNA will show only black ancestry, because she inherited it from her black mother.
Now let us suppose that the son and the daughter produced by the two original couples decide to have children.
There are three possibilities:
The first and statistically by far most common possibility is that they will have mixed race children, inheriting a mixture of black and White genes, but who will in character and appearance be more black than White, because black genes are dominant, and whose mtDNA and ‘Y’ chromosome DNA in the males will indicate only black ancestry, because these genetic elements will have been inherited entirely from the black grandparents. In terms of their genetic composition however, they will on average have 50% black genes and 50% White genes.
A second and very rare possibility is that a child will inherit only the black genes from each of their parents and will have an entirely black genome. They will be both black in character and appearance and their mtDNA and their ‘Y’ chromosome if they are male, will indicate entirely black ancestry, because these genetic elements will similarly have been inherited entirely from the black grandparents.
The third and very rare possibility is that a child will inherit only the White genes from each of their parents and will be White in both character and appearance. Their mtDNA and their ‘Y’ chromosome however will misleadingly indicate entirely black ancestry.
Despite the fact that from mtDNA and ‘Y’ chromosome testing, the grandchildren above will be designated as having 100% black ancestry, they will all from a genealogical record in fact have two White grandparents each, and in the case of children in the third category, they will be entirely White in character and appearance.
This example shows clearly that DNA testing based upon mtDNA and ‘Y’ chromosome analysis can be highly misleading, especially when one considers that if of the two original couples had produced children the other way around, such that it was the first couple that had a daughter and the second couple a son, then despite the fact that the grandchildren concerned, would in terms of character and appearance have been no different, all three possibilities would have indicated entirely White ancestry based upon mtDNA or ‘Y’ chromosamal analysis.
There are companies offering DNA testing in which they also test more than just the mtDNA and ‘Y’ chromosome, these tests are called ‘autosomal DNA tests’ and they examine up to 900,000 of the 3.2 billion base nucleotide pairs that make up the entire genome. DNA analysis of this type will help avoid the pitfalls described above, but the accuracy of their analysis will depend very much upon the base pairs they have chosen to examine.
When one considers that most geneticists today are induced into denying the existence of race and that many of them retain their academic positions only by perpetuating the nonsensical proposition that race is a social construct, can we actually trust such people to make sensible choices in terms of the base pairs they examine for markers indicating racial characteristics?
I have seen two videos where people who are racially conscious have undergone some form of DNA analysis with the results announced on camera and in both cases the individuals showed no outward signs of mixed racial heritage and yet were embarrassed to be told that they had a significant non-White genetic composition. I seriously doubt the accuracy of the tests conducted, as at some point, whether it be by the TV presenter, the TV programme director, their technical assistants, the proprietors of the DNA analysis company used, or the technicians within that company, many of which will have been non-White and/or pro-multiracialist, and therefore have a vested interest in corrupting the test, it is likely that the results were ‘fixed’ in order to embarrass the individuals concerned.
If anyone wishes to undertake a DNA test in order to determine their genetic ancestry, then I would not try to prevent them, other then to say that they should treat the results rather like one would treat one’s horoscope – if the result is pleasing to you them all well and good, but if the test produces a result that suggests something improbable, take the result with a ‘pinch of salt’ and regard it as a bit of meaningless nonsense.
At the end of the day, if someone looks entirely White, acts entirely White and there is nothing about them to suggest otherwise, I would assume that they are White.
By Max Musson © 2013
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