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In reply to the discussion: Hollywood 'removes black actress' from Dune poster in China [View all]On the other hand, in 2009 there were about 50,000 black Russian citizens.
Population, 143 million.
0.035%.
Get 10,000 random people random people together, there's a decent chance 3 would be black. But still a good chance that 4 or 5 (or 1 or 2) would be black.
Moreover, Russia has no legacy of slavery. Almost all Russian blacks were immigrants that went there to study communism/socialism (or maybe something else, but not mostly), married a Russian, and stayed. Or went there as diplomatic corps, married a Russian and stayed. Or in a few cases moved there out of love for the CP USSR or was oppressed because he (usually) was a revolutionary and wanted for crimes in his homeland.
Easy to carry American attitudes into other contexts. When Russians abolished their version of slavery it meant not freeing Tatars or Greeks or Abkhazians or Yakuts but Slavs. It went as badly.
They're racist, sure. But again, it's easy to colonize others from afar. Putin actually squelched a lot of this by declaring that a real Russian bore Russian culture. Assimilationist, to be sure. But it revalued cultural identity over skin color.