White person
"White person" was a broad umbrella term used in to refer to humans with fair skin who were of European descent.
While the term could be used neutrally as a physical descriptor, to the extent that it could be used when describing humanoid aliens like the Doctor, (TV: The Eleventh Hour) it often carried the implication of privilege, with some individuals noting that 21st century white people had a tendency to hold racist beliefs, or to, at the very least, be "clueless" about issues of racism. (PROSE: Head of State)
From the perspective of certain non-human species, white people would appear to be pink. The Tenth Doctor noted that the blond haired Rose Tyler would be "all pink and yellow" to the Catkind, (TV: New Earth) and that Ross Jenkins would look like a "pink weasel" to a Sontaran. (TV: The Sontaran Stratagem) The Abzorbaloff regarded his true form as "better than that crude pink shape [humans called] a body." (TV: Love & Monsters)
References
Sunday Herald journalist Rachel Edwards had pre-conceived notions about white people, remarking that "cis straight white people" were a clueless bunch, many of whom "bought their personalities at Hot Topic". Rachel claimed that the dominant voice on the American political right was "the petulant shouting of the over privileged angry white men who [were] finally having to give up a tiny bit of their power and [were] reacting like a dog whose dinner bowl was being stolen before it's finished eating." She believed that Ted O'Brien was "as good as an old white straight man can be on the matter" of civil rights.
Rachel observed that everyone was white in "Bumf*ck", Iowa, which she likened to being at a Conservative Party conference, "except without the all-pervading stench of repressed homosexuality." Being "fat, white, baseball cap, forty", Dave Larsen was deemed by Rachel to be normal for the area. In what she acknowledged to be a racist observation which she did not like to make, Rachel commented that there was "a definite face some of the white people in the midwest have, which suggests there's no-one home". She stated that "some things [were] more important than which rich white man gets to play at being Top Rich White Man." (PROSE: Head of State)
While acting as a policewoman talking into her walkie-talkie, kissogram Amy Pond identified the Eleventh Doctor as "a white male". (TV: The Eleventh Hour) Clyde Langer, in the midst of a biological swap with the Doctor, found that his hand had been replaced when it became white. (TV: Death of the Doctor)
Detective Sergeant Vincent Russell identified Gustave Lytton as a white male suspect. (TV: Attack of the Cybermen)
Matt Nelson was white, as was Carl Ingleton. (PROSE: Head of State)
Travelling with the Tenth Doctor to London in 1599, Martha Jones asked if she would be "carted off as a slave"; pointing to her face, she acknowledged that she was "not exactly white, in case you haven't noticed." The Doctor assured her that Elizabethan England was not so different from her time. (TV: The Shakespeare Code)
Travelling with the Twelfth Doctor to London at the 1814 frost fair, Bill Potts observed that Regency England was a "bit more black than they show in the films." The Doctor revealed "so was Jesus. History's a whitewash. (TV: Thin Ice) Father Roberto explained to the Eighth Doctor that the myth that the Holy Family were white had caused great damage to the self-esteems of brown and black people who had to pray to a white God: "No matter how much they prayed, how penitent or good they were, being white was something they could never be. That kind of patronage does damage." (PROSE: Halflife)
Rupesh Patanjali observed that none of the five hitchhiker hosts were white: one was of West Indian descent, one African and three Chinese. (TV: Children of Earth: Day One)
In an interview with "Sofia Afzal", Daniel Barton attributed his success to a "combination of inspiring computer science teacher, plus being one of the few non-white faces at my school." adding "I spent a lot of time in my bedroom with my computer." (TV: Spyfall)
Tanya Adeola figured correctly that April MacLean liked Downton Abbey, describing it as "a bunch of white people being nice to each other." In a private conversation with Ram Singh, Tanya voiced her pleasure that the two of them were "talking about something other than what the white people are doing." (TV: For Tonight We Might Die) Tanya observed with frustration that white people were "always so optimistic" and "always so certain things are going to work out for you. Oh, well, because they usually do." When April MacLean noted that her dad tried to kill her when she was 8, Tanya retorted that she "got your mum up walking again", what she saw as a "typical white person happy ending." (TV: Detained)
A few centuries before 2020, African men, women, and children were forced into slavery by several European countries, around this time the term "White people" came into being. When Lucy Wilson and Hobo Kostinen were brought back in time by Lucy's time ring, they witnessed several chained-up African slaves being herded into a log cabin, and Lucy was forced to bite her lip upon seeing a little girl screaming while being torn away from her mother. (PROSE: 8.46)
In the Southern United States of America, white Anglos defeated five Native American tribes including the Seminole in battle. Their President drafted the Indian Removal Act, forcing the tribes to be driven westward to the Indian Territory, where they began living fewer than fifty winters before Spring 1880. The Seminole had been driven westward by 1832. Thousands of them died to cold, disease and hunger during the months-long march, which became known as the Trail of Tears. Totika, a Seminole woman who lost her child on the Trail, made a pact with the Stikini, who believed would devour the Anglos in their cities as justice for all the pain inflicted on her life, but they were just using her to escape the Red Skies. Ultimately, the Stikini were defeated by the Twelfth Doctor and Bill Potts, and Totika was told the error of her ways by her husband Holata. (COMIC: The Parliament of Fear)
Segregation of black people was rampant in the USA in the 1950s, in which black people were required by law to use separate facilities to the whites, particularly in Southern states like Alabama and Mississippi. These policies were in place from at least 1943. On 1 December, 1955, while travelling home from work, civil rights activist Rosa Parks famously refused to give up her bus seat when the bus became crowded, leading to her arrest, an event that the Thirteenth Doctor, Ryan Sinclair, Yasmin Khan, and Graham O'Brien witnessed. Her arrest lead to the Montgomery Bus Boycott, and a further chain of events that would result in the abolishment of segregation a year later. (TV: Rosa)
Mexicans and those of Mexican heritage were also segregated in America during the 1950s. Yasmin Khan was mistakenly perceived as Mexican in a Montgomery diner so was denied service. She also had to discreetly enter a "whites-only" motel because of this prejudice. However, she was permitted to enter through the front door to board a segregated bus and could use the "white" seating area. Such mixed treatment caused Yaz to remark she was unsure of her place in Montgomery given the scarce number of people of Pakistani heritage in the city. (TV: Rosa)
As well as segregation, black people suffered racial violence in the 1950s. After Ryan Sinclair attempted to return the glove of a passerby, Lizzie, he was slapped by her husband and ordered to get his "filthy black hands" off his wife. The husband alluded to Ryan being lynched were he to disturb a woman in Montgomery. After Rosa Parks calmed the man, she explained to the Thirteenth Doctor, Ryan, Yasmin Khan and Graham O'Brien that outsiders were not safe in Montgomery. Having read about the death of Emmett Till in the newspaper, she explained that the northern Till was found dead in a river after a "couple words to a white woman" while he was on vacation in Mississippi. (TV: Rosa)
As Ace recalled, the house of her friend Manisha Purkayastha was firebombed by "white kids" in 1983. (TV: Ghost Light)
In the 21st century, Sheffield, racism existed on a lesser scale than that of the 1950s, bearing a massive difference. While not physically assaulted as he was in the past, Ryan Sinclair still remarked he would be stopped by the police more often than his white peers. (TV: Rosa)
