Free Republic

The identity politics industry is on the qui vive to discover symptoms of racism unrecognized until now. Whiteness, a barrier to racial justice, is a malign condition to which “white” people are peculiarly susceptible. Hidden clues are everywhere. None are too absurd to go unexamined by race-stalkers in academia. Even white paint is suspect. Are there racist implications to the many global uses of the chemical compound titanium dioxide (TiO2)? Has the pigment derived from it — titanium white — contributed to white supremacy? Is the universal prevalence of titanium white a signifier of oppressive Western ideology? Whiteness studies are...

Is white paint racist? Norway's University of Bergen is exploring that question, asking how the aesthetic of white paint helped the nation contribute to white supremacy and helped "[make] the world whiter." "Whiteness is not only a cultural and societal condition tied to skin color, privileges, and systematic exclusion, but materialize everywhere around us," a rundown of the study read. "Although Norway is not a conventional colonial power, this project will show how the country has played a globally leading role in establishing white as a superior color," it said. "Until now, however, this story has been lesser known to...

White houses are often boring, but they might just save the planet. As USA Today reports, Purdue University researchers have developed an ultra-white paint (it just earned a Guinness World Record) that reflects 98.1 percent of solar radiation while outputting infrared heat. As this leaves the surface cooler than the environment (regular paint warms the surface), it could effectively replace air conditioning in some cases — it produces a cooling power of 10kW for a 1,000sq. ft. roof, or more than a typical house AC unit. There are existing paints made to reflect heat, but they reflect no more than...

Hashem Akbari believes that whitening 100 of the world's largest cities could wipe out the effect of the expected increase in emissions over the next decade. White buildings and surfaces reflect far more sunlight than dark ones. Reflected sunlight does not contribute to the greenhouse effect, unlike the heat energy emitted by dark surfaces heated by the sun. Dr Akbari, of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, California, also argues that if built-up areas were made white, less heat would accumulate within them, allowing residents and workers to reduce their use of air-conditioning units, which use a large amount of power....