The Real Stuff White People Like (blogger analyzes OKCupid posts by race)

[woo me with science]

http://blog.okcupid.com/index.php/the-real-stuff-white-people-like/

The REAL ‘Stuff White People Like’

September 8th, 2010 by Christian Rudder

What is it that makes a culture unique? How are whites, blacks, Asians, or whoever different from everybody else? What tastes, interests, and concepts define an ethnic group? And is there any way to make fun of other races in public and get away with it?

These are big questions, and here's how we answered them.

We selected 526,000 OkCupid users at random and divided them into groups by their (self-stated) race. We then took all these people's profile essays (280 million words in total!) and isolated the words and phrases that made each racial group's essays statistically distinct from the others'.

.....

(statistical results at link)

[av8rdave]

1. Wow

The reading level vs. religion part is especially interesting.

[Tuesday Afternoon]

3. also, noteworthy (to me) was the fact that, across the board, those

who took religion less seriously were the better reader/writer.

[woo me with science]

4. Yeah, that was interesting. nt

[Crystal Clarity]

2. The 'white people' list is pretty f'n embarrassing

and lol funny at the same time. The next to last sentence about the over-arching themes explains alot though."Frat house" for white men... wtf, no wonder white women's themes rely on "escapism". :yoiks:

http://blog.okcupid.com/index.php/the-real-stuff-white-people-like/
In general, I won't comment too much on these lists, because the whole point of this piece is to let the groups speak for themselves, but I have to say that the mind of the white man is the world's greatest sausagefest. Unless you're counting Queens of the Stone Age, there is not even one vaguely feminine thing on his list, and as far as broad categories go we have: sweaty guitar rock, bro-on-bro comedies, things with engines, and dystopias.

As for the interests of white women, you have romance novels, some country music, and a broad selection of Good Housekeeping type stuff. It's also amazing the extent to which their list shows a pastoral or rural self-mythology: bonfires, boating, horseback riding, thunderstorms. I remind you that OkCupid's user base is almost all in large cities, where to one degree or another, if you find yourself doing much of any of these things, civilization has come to an end.

If I had to choose over-arching themes for white people's lists, for men, I'd go with "frat house" and for women, "escapism." Whether one begot the other is a question I'll leave to the reader.

[woo me with science]

5. i agree with this:

"wtf, no wonder white women's themes rely on 'escapism'"

[grace0418]

6. Well it just underlines how NOT like other women I truly am. I think my interests overlapped

maybe 5% of the white women's list.

[Crystal Clarity]

7. Me too. It kind of makes you wonder about the demographical

makeup of the sample group. Probably not too many DU type women or men otherwise we'd probably see at least some things we could relate too.

The only female interests/likes I have in common with that list would be thunderstorms and kayaking (kind of similar to boating I guess)... Not at the same time of course. Yikes!

And although I can identify w/escapism, it wouldn't be with romance novels, country music and Good Housekeeping magazines. :eyes:

[Chan790]

11. Well, the overall demographical makeup of the site is...

US-coastal, under 30, and urban. Slight skew towards liberalism and agnosticism. To get results to cover a wider demographic spectrum (divergent ages, locales, etc.) they've admitted in the past that they have to specifically cherry-pick candidates. The result of that often is of-course self-selection bias.

[flying rabbit]

8. Interesting.

Not life changing, but interesting.

[MorningGlow]

9. "Mascara"?

I am ashamed to be a white woman.

[kwassa]

10. Why do white women love the Red Sox as their most important item?

and as a white man that likes bachata and merengue, I must be Hispanic.

and why do Asian women love Alicia Keys?

Questions, questions.