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eugene20 t1_jec9dkn wrote

Reply to comment by katsu_kare_raisu in TIL in the 1920s, Coco Chanel accidentally got a tan, and helped inspire the trend of sunbathing. Soon "sunlight therapy" was prescribed for almost every ailment from fatigue to tuberculosis. Before this, tanned skin was associated with the lower classes who work outside, and fair skin was revered. by Pfeffer_Prinz

What's odd is when light skinned humans get racist on other humans for dark skin and forget that they would also get as dark under the sun after a few evolutionary cycles.

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rlaxton t1_jedm59w wrote

Not so sure of that. Skin cancer is not likely to kill you before you can breed. The mutations that give me white skin and blue eyes are not going to just breed out. I would need to mutate a melanin gene back or breed it in.

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PublicSeverance t1_jeebny0 wrote

> get as dark under the sun after a few evolutionary cycles

Roughly 100 generations is the quickest it can happen.

That's 2500 years.

For context, in 500BC the global population was 100 million, the iron age had not yet started, none of the Abrahamic religions would exist for another 4 centuries, Rome had just become a republic but was still just a random unimportant little city, Buddha was born and Pythagoras discovered how to talk about triangles.

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