The greatest Russian writer ever was black, Alexander Pushkin. Further the Russians tend to sympathise with subjects of racism as they for the most parts of the previous centuries were subjected to racism by countries to the west of them.

Oh, the great old anti-imperialism and victimhood of r-country. This story flies much better with people not exposed to russian language and prevalence of ethnic slur in it.

> The greatest Russian writer ever was black, Alexander Pushkin.

Wiki says his great grandfather was black. I am not sure how you jumped to the conclusion that Pushkin was black.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Pushkin

Isn't that the distinction used by at least some people in US - you're black if you had any black ancestors (at least in traced history)?

Not for 60 years or more. That's part of old slave laws and not popular with modern America except with the KKK crowd

Is this a joke in Russia, i.e. people referring to him as black in order to lessen the view of Russia's outlook to foreigners? I've never heard people refer to Pushkin as being black (and his parents indeed aren't), besides his great grandfather.

I guess you can tell us the percentage of someone’s blood that has to be black for them to be black. What is the percentage?

In America it seems to have more to do with culture than ancestry. I would bet that there are lots of people that think of themselves as white that came over on slavers ships.

Of course if you could trace ancestry back far enough we are all black.

The South Africans used to have a colour chart.

> The greatest Russian writer ever was black, Alexander Pushkin.

Is this using the Elizabeth Warren native american logic ?

Yup, and so am I. I'm also a Viking, when it suits me (I look more like a Viking although it's much further back in my ancestry than my Native American great grandfather. I get to be a French Gaulois and a Romney Gypsy too. The real question is how can I profit by what I identify as...

> ever was black

1/64th black…

Nobody says that Obama is half-black...

Yeah, because they talk about racial identity, not just ancestry.

Is there any evidence that Pushkin identified as black, rather than being selected as the historical “black friend” to dismiss criticism of a modern state that is actively sponsoring global white supremacy?

In this piece[0] "Пушкин - Юрьеву"

He refers to himself as "a disfigured descendant of negroes".

"А я, повеса вечно праздный,

Потомок негров безобразный,

Взращённый в дикой простоте…"

Also, here's an interesting article about Pushkin with some African Americans claiming him to be one of their own, with examples from 1929 and 1983:

https://www.livelib.ru/articles/post/63022-kak-pushkin-stal-...

[0] https://ilibrary.ru/text/182/p.1/index.html

EDIT: There's also this article exploring his African heritage:

https://daily.jstor.org/how-alexander-pushkin-was-inspired-b...

His grand-grandfather came from Ethiopia... Isn't it 1/8th?

Yes, your’e right..

My math was terrible

That's a laugh riot, as a Russian I've heard plenty of racist crap from other Russians unfortunately.

And the greatest Russian rock singer was Korean.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viktor_Tsoi

Just like Alexandre Dumas...

Russia isn't known as welcoming to Central Asians either, yet they still (used to?) come there to work. Money talks.

Tbf, it’s not welcoming for everyone. The issue you pointed out is of little to no importance for educated people. For uneducated - yes, but mostly in “the center”. If you understand russian names, you may see yourself in TFA that most of those interviewed aren’t even of slavic origin, at least by father (neither am I, if that’s important for some reason).