By Lily Bourne
“Everyone who is ginger; who has red hair; those are black people,” TikTok user @scorpiostellyla1meramera argues in her now-viral video. Sparked by this user’s claim, the new ginger race spread quickly across social media, igniting a trend of acceptance and solidarity for red-headed individuals across the globe. While the idea that red hair equates to a completely different race seems ridiculous, many gingers spoke out about how much this newfound community meant to them, explaining that they’d never felt so welcomed and loved for their physical appearance before.
This trend–and the redhead community’s overwhelmingly grateful reaction to it–illuminates an interesting phenomenon that ginger people face. While almost all ginger people are white, they are consistently bullied for their physical appearance, which is a direct consequence of their ethnicity. Rarely, if ever, are people criticized for an attribute in this way without a connection to their racial identity. For example, Black people face discrimination and bullying for their ethnic facial features, but this can be attributed to racism due to the color of their skin. However, as they are still white, gingers remain in a sort of gray area. Popular pieces of media, such as the infamous South Park episode claiming that gingers have no soul, can make fun of people with red hair without facing claims of racism or discrimination. Because of this “loophole”, many gingers have faced derogatory comments about the color of their hair and their appearance without much pushback. Both the fetishization of red-headed women and the idea that red-headed men are less attractive have pervaded modern culture in many ways. Although the trend was a joke, there is a real connection between the treatment of red-headed individuals and black people.
Ginger people not only share a common physical trait, but also often share a similar ethnic background. Specifically, many ginger people are Irish–a group of people who have faced often-overlooked discrimination throughout history. In the United Kingdom, Irish Catholics rivaled the rise of Protestantism in Britain, losing their rights to own land and vote, among other things, under the Penal Laws of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. During the nineteenth century, the Irish were portrayed as violent alcoholics and discriminated against as they made up a large portion of the laboring class, sometimes making half as much as their English counterparts. They were often portrayed as monkeys in British propaganda, and some stores even created signs with slogans such as “No Irish, No Blacks, No Dogs,” furthering a connection between Irish and Black experience. During the Irish Potato Famine, which lasted from 1845 to 1972, many starving people emigrated to America in hopes of a better life. Unfortunately, they found Nativist Americans who criticized them for their poverty and “lack of manners”, as well as their catholic faith and their physical appearance.
Now, obviously, ginger people are still white. They have not faced the same systemic oppression in America as Black people have, nor do they continue to face the same kind of ongoing racism in the present. However, there is something to be said about the lack of resistance against casual derogatory stereotypes towards redheads. This trend has shed some light on both the true history of discrimination against the Irish and also the unique paradox that ginger people face as they are bullied for their ethnic appearance, but not technically under the power of racism. Hopefully, this newfound solidarity between ginger and black communities provides comfort for the redheads who have felt ostracized for their appearance, and will encourage people to reexamine the comments and assumptions they make about their redheaded companions.