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PaperclipPerfector  5mo ago (text post)   3793 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for June 14, 2024

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

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I wouldn't be surprised if the way people speak or express emotions on their face over a lifetime affects how they look, as well as things like diet and lifestyle, all of which will differ between countries. Rishi Sunak for example has a face that looks very British to me in a way I can't fully articulate, despite his ethnic background.

Rishi Sunak for example has a face that looks very British to me in a way I can't fully articulate, despite his ethnic background.

British or British public school in particular?

The latter.

Sunak’s face reminds me a little of Tobias Menzies’. Menzies is a Scottish name, apparently, although his mother was a Simpson which could be Scottish or English.

I don't agree, Sunak looks very American to me.

I’m gonna go out on a limb and say he looks Indian.

Indian facial features are extremely varied though. Many Indians, even some with very dark complexions, have essentially European or Levantine features.

Right, I’m well aware of that, and obviously my comment was intentionally flippant. However, I don’t see anything in Sunak’s phenotype that looks “more British than American” nor vice versa. He’s obviously quite visually distinct from any European-derived person. I wouldn’t consider him one of the Indians who has European or Levantine facial features.

I think he has some hard-to-define Britishness to his look, too.

I've seen some speculate on Twitter that talking a certain languge (a certain accent?) for all of your life will subtly change your facial structure by reworking the musculature of your mouth, making people who grow embedded in some culture from birth on bear this sort of a hard-to-define resemblance through almost invisible subconscious clues, even if their genetics remain distinct.

It's hard to imagine such an effect, if it exists, could be observed between any but significantly phonologically distinct languages. It sounds like a stretch to imagine it could play a role in why some British-English speakers might look different from American-English speakers.

Must be all those hard r's Romney's been slinging that give him that jawline. #cancelmitt

I’m not seeing it at all, and I think any speculation about the effect of accents on facial musculature development is probably pseudoscientific cope.

Top Gear fans often characterize Hammond as "the token American" due to his propensity to crash expensive vehicles and put cheese on everything.

Edit: this comment was supposed to be a reply to @pusher_robot above.

I remember when they got him to review the new Escalade because he was the yankeeboo. The size mismatch was comical, to say the least.

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