Talk:Albinism

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Contents

Search problem

Resolved. Search issue is moot; clarity issue fixed.

Can anyone tell me why this entry doesn't come up in the Wikipedia search engine for 'albinism', although it seems to be linked okay to the other four entries there?

It just means that the search index hasn't been updated since the Albinism article was created. By the way, is this article just about human albinism? If so, it should say so. If not, then it needs to make clear which things are general and which apply only to humans. --Zundark, 2001 Dec 16
Clarified point re albinism in humans. --Berek, 2001 Dec 16

Red eyes?

I was under the impression that albinos can have red eyes (or, perhaps more accurately, eyes that appear to be red). That seems to be supported by the William Blake quotation in this article (assuming it is indeed a reference to an albino): His head and hair were white like wool, as white as snow, and His eyes like a flame of fire. --[anon]

If this is true, it should be mentioned and explained. (Is it perhaps related to the red-eye camera phenomenon; i.e., too much light reflected from blood-rich retinas of relatively-pigmentless eyes?) -- Jeff Q 00:31, 3 May 2004 (UTC)
As of today, no one appears to have responded to my query here (which was, note carefully, whether albinos can have red eyes, not whether all of them do, and why their eyes would be, or at least seem to be, red). Someone added the following line:
The myth that all persons with albinism have "white hair and red eyes" is NOT true.
but this statement, besides being redundant (myths are inherently non-factual), merely claims that not every albino has "white hair and red eyes". It would be still be a true statement if 99.99% of albinos had both these conditions, but no other useful information can be extracted from it. -- Jeff Q 23:45, 17 May 2004 (UTC)
I have seen an albino human with red eyes. And another whose eye irises were pale blue with red meandering radial streaks (likely along large blood vessels in the iris). Anthony Appleyard 16:19, 23 May 2005 (UTC)
Recently, on my twelfth birthday, my aunt presented me with a copy of Dan Brown's 'The Da Vinci Code'. Consequently, I became rather interested in the subject of albinos, as one of the characters - Silas, was one. I heard tell somewhere that albinos can also have purple eyes. Is that true? I am not convinced, as I think it would have been mentioned in the article if it had. 202.156.6.54 00:04, 24 November 2005 (UTC) Autumn's Whisper
I'd like to clear this up, albinos do not have red eyes. I myself and am albino, and I've doen some research on the topic. The reason it seems like we have red eyes, especially in pictures, is because in a certain light, the eyes look red. Most albinos have blue eyes, liek me. Sorry I don't have much more ifnormation, but the myth is false. - 24.62.38.186 21:40, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
Whoever stated above that they are albino and that albino's can't have red eyes, I highly doubt is an albino. To the person below, much agreed, but blue eyes are eyes that lack pigment. The people with red/pink (purple eyes, not violet, let's not get romantic, but by some it can appear purple) actually have a lack of muscle tissue to produce pigment that did not FORM/form entirely. These people you can shine a flashlight into their eyes and have the inside appear hallow and glow. These people are usually blind or nearly.
http://www.campbell.k12.ky.us/programs/gtservice/Thingsforweb/albino11.JPG
[--anon.]
Do you have any citable sources for this information? ("lack of muscle tissue...") PS: "violet" is a perfectly appropriate word to me; "purple" to most people means a much darker hue. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 08:06, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

Answer regarding red and purple eyes in albinos

I have albino friends who do have red (pink) eyes. It's very rare because it means there is almost ZERO pigment in the iris, but does happen. If the iris are a sort of see-through blue (little pigment) then they can appear purple, because the red from the blood vessels and the blue from the iris makes them appear purple. I have also seen one with such eyes, so I have proof (at least for myself). I myself have Oculocutaneous Albinism Type 2 and have blue eyes with whiteish radial streaks. That means I have enough pigment in my eyes, because they only appear red on photos, not with common lighting. Allyddin Sane 23:03, 11 January 2006 (UTC)Allyddin Sane Edited on 6 January 2007

Fully red? I've done a bit more research and have read that some of slightly pink eyes, but I've always heard that the redy eye thing is a myth (And being an albino with blue eyes, it'd be pretty odd to believe it in the first place) Albinos do appear to have red eyes in certain light, like the flash from the camera, explaining the picture (My eyes look very much like that when a picture is taken of me) But, Allyddin, if you saw it, I really can't argue with that.
By the way, albinism.org is a good source on this subject --24.62.38.186 01:08, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
Some persons with albinism lack iris pigment to such an extent that the eyes can look reddish or pinkish under certain lighting conditions, due to light reflecting off the retina. They do not have red- or pink-colored eyes. Likewise the occasional purplish or violet appearance is due to the same effect, but showing though the more common light blue OCA irises (dig around in Google Images for photos of albinistic fashion model Connie Chiu for some pics that show this effect.) But again, such people don't have purple-pigmented eyes. I can't speak as to any of the other details mentioned above like the whole eye muscle connection. I agree the article should cover this in more explanatory detail cited from authoriative sources. See #Good news with regard to pics below; hopefully we'll soon have usable photos that show the different eye appearance effects of human OCA. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ
Do the eyes of all albinos shine red in the light? -Ruth-
Everyone's eyes do (cf. the "redeye" effect in flash photography). If you mean do albinistic people have reflectively red eyes under normal lighting conditions, definitely not. I'm not albinistic myself but know two people who are, quite closely; their eyes simply appear reddish pupiled and pale blue irised in one case, and reddish pupiled and kind of pink (or very, very pale blue depending on the lighting conditions) irised in the other; the former has mild nystagmus but not-too-bad vision, the latter has quite poor vision, marked nystagmus and slight lazy-eye. Both require sunglasses outside in the daytime or are very uncomfortable. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 08:00, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

"(assuming it is indeed a reference to an albino): His head and hair were white like wool, as white as snow, and His eyes like a flame of fire." Uh, guys, that's a passage from the Bible describing God, not a particular person with albinism. :P Or maybe God is albino, ya know... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.174.42.137 (talk) 07:00, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

Statistics

I'd like to see some statistics here on the frequency of albinism, and whether it's more common among particular ethnic groups. User:Palefire

I haven't studied this article super-carefully, but I am quite amazed that there seems to be nothing about the prevalence of albinism at all. Does anyone know approximately what percentage of people/animals are albino, and if there is any variation of prevalence among different continents/racial groups? It seems to me that this info is very important. --DreamsReign 07:50, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

Frequency info has now been added, where sourceable, but not enough on ethnicity (even if just to say it isn't a factor, but I don't believe that is actually the case; it clearly is a factor with some of the rarer types.) Each of the albinism types lists an incidence rate in humans (where known). Doing this for animals is essentially impossible, since in the wild most of them die (due to being easily visible to predators and having poor eyesight) long before they can be observed and counted, and in captivity, the numbers would be ridiculously skewed by intentional breeding for the trait, as is common with mice, ferrets, etc. I.e., I think the article already does the very best it can with available and meaningful information on the issue. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 16:07, 16 December 2006 (UTC)
Still out-standing: We need enthicity stats, if any exist in reliable sources. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 02:10, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

White cats & Deafness

Resolved. Article no longer makes false claim.

There are three ways that cats can be white. Albinism (recessive) is one way and is not linked to deafness. Deafness in white cats is linked to the other two versions, "complete white spotting" (Spotting gene (S), multifactorial inheritance) which can cover the ordinary coat color and the dominant white (W) which also produces blue eyes. Therefore, this article probably shouldn't say that albinism in cats is linked to deafness, as it is the only white cat genetic variant that does not produce deafness in and of itself. aec 22:17, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)

The counterfactual text is no longer in the article. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 07:50, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

Culture

[Much of this topic has been moved from this page to Talk:Albinism in popular culture after the "In popular culture" section merge from Albinism into Albinism in popular culture. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ

I'm personally thinking that the section on albinism in culture is rather lacking, to say the least. There's plenty that could be written on the subject, fro mthe occoaisional heartless joke in The Simpsons to the way albinos are treated in different countries (revered in some, outcast in others). There's also the current Hollywood trend of making bad guys albino for shock value. There doesn't seem to be much by way of positive portrayal of albinos in popular culture but if any of you guys know of any then that would make a nice addition too. [--anon.]

Still out-standing: What can be done to improve the cultural coverage here that is not already covered at Albino bias? The Hollywood/Simpsons issue is covered there, but the "treatment in different countries" issue is not, sufficiently. Anyone have sourced information that can be added? — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 01:10, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

"This article is intended to cover mainly human albinism" why?

Article split?

Resolved. No consensus to split article (new topic below re-opens issue); wording issues raised were fixed.

I am thinking we should have an article called "Albinism in Humans". Or "Albinism in human culture". [--anon.]

why not focus on albinism in general? from an objective point of view, what's so important about human albinos? [--anonymous]
Good question... I would think that the article would focus on it in general, and then human an nonhuman being the specific examples later. Beinh human-focused seems bizarre. DreamGuy 03:18, August 25, 2005 (UTC)
Yes, I like this idea. [--anon.]
The article now addresses these needs (though perhaps could go into more detail about albinism specifics in various non-human species at some point, given reliable sources for the information.) — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 01:36, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
I for one wouldn't mind seeing this split into two or more articles: Albinism, human alibinism, mammal albinism (including human, but not focused on such), and reptile/amphibion albinism. --Hakusa - Wiki addict: 04:24, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
FWIW, I generally concur, but would suggest:
  1. Albinism: general - most of the science should go here, along with the animal pics; it would have a tiny subsection on human albinism and a small pic, and a "See main article at Albinism (human) cross reference. Should also link to leucism, "albino" plants (see next Talk topic below) and other pigment-related stuff, without going into them in detail (should be separate articles).
  2. Albinism (human) - the bulk of the present article, with improvements. Focus on the human element - discrimination, culture, medical advancements, etc.
I empathically do not think we need redundant articles on mammal, amphibian, etc., albinism - there is nothing special or different about the condition in cats vs. frogs. The human aspect of the article needs a lot of work though. There's pretty much no discusson of things like nystagmus damping surgery, the "extreme glasses" (I do not know the technical term) that some OCA suffers can use to legally drive a car, etc., etc. The "world" of the human albino is poorly explored here (I don't mean anything negative about the current content; rather there simply isn't enough of it yet, on enough subtopics).
— SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 17:21, 25 July 2006 (UTC)
Hey SMcCandlish, thanks for the good job you're doing for the albinism article, but would you mind not calling it "albinism sufferers"? "People with albinism" would do the job nicely, especially since the term "OCA" excludes people who have ocular albinism (OA) - e.g. from the driving issue that you mentioned. Thanks. Allyddin Sane 23:11, 9 February 2007 (UTC)
Noted! Hadn't really thought of that at the time. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 01:51, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Inheritance

Resolved. Needed material added to article and sourced.

One other thing, the article does not mention how the albinism traits are inheritted, via autosomal (non sex chromosomes) or sex-linked. This would be very important information to someone that has a biology exam tomorrow :P [--anon.]

The article now does this, where this information can be reliably sourced. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 01:36, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Albinism in animals

Resolved. Needed material added to article and sourced; no consensus to split article (issue re-opened in new topic below).

For real, I came to this article looking for information about Albinism in animals, and the article is disappointingly sparse on that subject. i.e. does albinism happen in all animals? just mammals? I've heard of albino snakes, are those true albinos? -- GIR 06:16, 10 September 2005 (UTC)

The article now addresses this. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 01:36, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
Who cares about albino animals, when was the last time you saw a black person with white skin and blonde hair? I personally find albinism cool (of course sadly they suffer discrimination, medical problems ect..)--King of the Dancehall 02:38, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
Directed towards 'King of the Dancehall'... It's not exactly about whether you care about albino animals(seeing as, obviously, there are others who do care), but that the article should, in a logical and common-sense POV, cover albino animals and plants as well as albinism in humans, seeing as the article is titled 'Albinism' with no mention of the article covering only/mainly albinism in humans. Hm, I hope I'm posting this up right, this is a rather unique way of 'discussion'... XOSAF 03:00, 28 December 2005 (UTC)
Perhaps this results from the fact that affected animals and plants cannot contribute to this page??? I have albinism myself and am interested in spreading knowledge about it in order to MAKE LIFE BETTER for people with albinism and their families. I hope with the info in this article, we can reduce discrimination against people with albinism! Of course, albinism in animals and plants is interesting, but only from a scientific point of view, as there is no discrimination against them. In fact, many people find albino animals "cute", but treat people with that condition very badly.
Allyddin Sane 10:57, 7 January 2006 (UTC)Allyddin Sane
Citing the fact that animals and plants can be albino means that it's something natural for all life, which seems like the sort of understanding which would lead to less discrimination.
Either way, though, the article should discuss all forms of albinism, unless you want a seperate article for *just* human albinos.
ThatGuamGuy 17:38, 27 June 2006 (UTC)sean
The consensus to date is to keep exanding the article in both human and animal directions. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 01:36, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Lab animals

I agree, some info would be nice. Albino animals are disproportionately used in research. I don't think it's a coincidence. I'm not saying that albinism itself is the desired trait, but perhaps albinism is a by-product of getting traits desired in mice, rats, etc. And yes, albino snakes are true albinos. [--anon.]

As for albinistic lab animals, yes, there is a connection - they are bred for this trait on purpose; if a brown or grey one shows up (pigmentation being a dominant trait) they know their sample animals have been contaminated with an outside genetic source (e.g. some feral mouse got at the captives to breed with them). Lab mice/rats/rabbits are bred for consistency, and breeding for albinism helps ensure it. Something about this should be sourced and mentioned in the article. I know I have seen a reliable article about this, but that was several years ago, and I am not personally sure where to even begin looking for it again. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 01:36, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Expanding human albinism information

Resolved. Needed material added to article (and will continue to be added, as it is the focus of the article).

what about people that are albinos or mothers who have albino children that know nothing about albinism? i think that there sould be a section about just human albinos.The reson i think this is important is because i have a 1 month old baby and i just found out he is an albino and have no clue on what albinism is or the special care i am probably supose to be giving my child or what to expect in the future. -Ruth-

Ruth, I think you will find http://www.albinism.org very helpful, especially their message board. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 08:18, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
The human albinism section has been and continues to be expanded, though it cannot expand into the area of giving advice, as per WP:NOT policy. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 01:36, 16 January 2007 (UTC)


Albino squirrel?

Resolved. Photo removed.

The photo of the brown squirrel jsut looks like a light brown squirrel to me, what exactly about it is supposed to be albino? DreamGuy 03:18, August 25, 2005 (UTC)

Photo has been removed, so this is a moot topic, but to answer the question: Not all albinistic organisms are totally white; read the article. :-) — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 07:48, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

Plants?

I was actually looking for information on albino plants (plants without chlorophyll, usually caused by a genetic mutation). Is there another term which is used for this? --68.198.246.166 13:29, 9 September 2005 (UTC)

If you type "albino plants" into Google, quite a bit of information comes up. There are no other terms that I'm aware of, and research on the subject is pretty limited. Since there is no chlorophyll, an albino plant dies shortly after sprouting and there doesn't seem to be a reasonable method of keeping them alive. Supposedly there's a photo of a man keeping albino corn alive, but since it's a black and white picture I don't feel confident in the credibility.--Meghan Dornbrock 18:23, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
If you look at cacti, lack of chlorophyll isn't uncommon in cultivation, although I think the term albinism isn't always applied to it. Some Gymnocalycium and Echinopsis species cultivars without chlorophyll are or have been very popular; keeping them alive by grafting onto some other cactus is easy. Note though that these plants are bright neon red, pink or yellow, since the other pigmentation is still present, and not hidden by all that green.
Come to think of it, plant species without chlorophyll are not that uncommon: Neottia, Orobanche, Monotropa, Lathraea and so on all lack the green, and some of them are wax-colored, indicating no particular pigmentation at all. I don't think the term albinism covers this — "lacking chlorophyll" is the term you usually encounter. -- JöG 20:56, 27 July 2006 (UTC)
I would bet money that "albino plant" is just an imprecise shorthand term that some sloppy webwriters have been using; given that albinism is a disorder of melanin production, it's impossible for plants to be albinistic, because they don't have melanin (as far as I have been able to determine), but use completely different biological pigments. However, if the "lacking chlorophyll" trait/disorder has a name I think it would be a good addition of the article as a disambiguation, after leucism, axanthism, etc. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 07:46, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

"Albino": PC or not?

While the most common term for an individual affected by albinism is "albino", most of them prefer "person with albinism"
Could anybody cite the testimony of a real one to back this up? To my knowledge, the only people who claim that "albino" isn't politically correct aren't albino. I'm albino myself, and I believe we have the right to self-determination. —Saric (Talk) 22:40, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

I am an albino, and I call myself albino. Many of my friends, however, dislike that term because they hear it on the streets as in "Hey look at that albino freak over there." We can change it to "some of them" if that's more to your liking, but I think it should stay there because there's no harm in making people aware of possibly hurtful comments. Allyddin Sane 22:50, 11 January 2006 (UTC)Allyddin Sane
There isn't another term that's widely used for albinos (I've never heard one at all, ever). Souns to me like a case of your friends being overly protective. Durahan
All right, I changed "most of them" to "some of them", and "most often used" to "often used". I'm just afraid that the word "albino" might become really taboo. If that happened, English speakers would be left without a one-word phrase to describe people with albinism. That would be bad. —Saric (Talk) 00:46, 13 January 2006 (UTC)
Nah, we'd just use "albinistics" (cf. "bulimics", "paraplegics", etc.) — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 10:31, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
I don't want to make it taboo, but I want to make people aware of what this word can do when it's used thoughtlessly. What's so bad about "person with ablinism"? I will continue to call myself an albino, but when I'm talking about albinism, I say person with albinism. 80.120.193.82 11:24, 16 January 2006 (UTC)Allyddin Sane
I have albinism and I utterly detest the term "albino" partly due to experience in high school, but mostly because it's dehumanizing. I'm a person, not the albino. [--anon.]
Hey I'm sorry, but so few people have albinism that "the albino" is the way many casual acquaintances who don't know you very well are going to know you. It shall be your defining characteristic until or unless they get to know something more unique about you than your albinism and that's all there is to it. [--anon.]
Still out-standing: We need one or more reliable external sources for the "p.-c." concerns regarding the term "albino" being applied to humans. We do have anecdotal evidence here on this talk page, but it can't be cited in the article. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 01:39, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
Someone remind me about this; I did in fact find a source, but I forgot to use it. It'll take me a little while to dig it back up again. It's one of the sources cited at Albinism in popular culture (but not, I think, cited as to that particular point). — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 18:33, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

A recent search on Google yielded 11.5 million hits for the term "Albino" and only 24,000 hits for the word "Albinistic". My spell-checker right now is not even recognizing that word. Unless there is evidence that the majority of occurrences of the word on the internet is possible hate speech, 'Albino' is the word that is in over-whelming usage and therefore is the word that should be used throughout the article. I think we should preserve a blurb about some albinos seeing the term as pejorative and preferring 'Albinistic' but I don't think we should use 'Albinistic' throughout the article. 69.114.71.250 23:19, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Women with albinism raped

Resolved. The questioned points are now source-cited.

In any case, what was NOT PC was the phrase in the myths section on Zimbabwe, "this has led to many albino women and even some white women without albinsim in the area being raped." There's no evidence provided to back that up, I never found any information about rampant sexual assault against white women, leading me to beleive this is just some lame bigotry. Durahan

Hey Durahan, just google "albino Zimbabwe" you should get some news articles about it. I didn't want to link or quote it because who knows how long the info stays on these sites. 80.120.193.82 11:32, 16 January 2006 (UTC)Allyddin Sane
Article now cites source on this. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 01:41, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Infertile?

Resolved. The questioned points are now source-cited.

I was told that albinos are infertile. Seeing as there are several albinos posting here, and that didn't appear to be in the article, I'm starting to think it's false. So: 1) Is it false? 2) Is it, if true, common, rare or absolute? 3) Or is that a myth. And please add your answer to the article.

A while back this was added (and almost immediately removed again): "A common misconception is that albino individual of a species is sterile. This was originally forwarded as a prejudiced myth brought about to incur hatred against albinos(see sections further down). Albinos are fully capable of reproducing, and some reports of abundantly fertile albino individuals have been recorded." Probably for lack of sources. I've added an 'excerpt' of this to the Myths and superstitions paragraphs. -Shai-kun 23:22, 2 May 2006 (UTC)
Thanks. --Hakusa - Wiki addict: 23:56, 2 May 2006 (UTC)
It (the original) was also grossly non-neutral. Anyway, more info on the topic of overall health and stuff (with sources) has also been added now. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 07:41, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

Blondes are albinos (trolling; ignore)

Resolved. Apparent trolling; taken to user talk.

Cross posted from the blonde discussion forum:

"WTF?! who deleted the picture of the boy with platinum blond hair that I had?-busboy 03:12, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

"I wasn't the one who deleted it but I can imagine it was due to the fact that the boy did not have platinum blonde hair, but white hair due to albinism. The picture was also featured on the page for albinism in humans. Despite that someone said in here that they think light blonde hair/people are a type of albinism, albinism and being blonde are two VERY different things. A blonde person lacks pigment ethnicically and can pass down these colors. It is very possible for a person of northern European descent to be born so extremely fair that they have pale skin, white hair and blue eyes and NOT be albino. Albinism is a genetic defect that both normal colored parents must have and pass on to a child. If that child has children one day, unless they have children with someone else carrying the albino gene, their children have normal coloring. Same can not be said for the pale blonde person. So I can only imagine that was the only reason the picture was taken down, but I'm NOT possotive on the motive because I didn't remove it.
But I do stand by albinism not being the same as being born blonde. ;) Being blonde is not a form of albinism."

"Actually, depending on which type of blonde you are talking about it is. The yellow-haired toddler on this page has OCA2 or a subtype of OCA1 in conjunction with ocular albinism. It is even said on the albinism page that, people with albinism can have dirty blonde or light brown hair. Various subtypes of OCA1&2 exist mostl among whites, scince all blondes are some type of albino."busboy 16:50, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

"No, not depending on what type of "blonde" I am talking about, being born ethnically blonde and being born ALBINO are not the same thing. There is a difference between a "blonde" person and a "person with blonde hair." A person of African ancestry can have albinism and have blonde, or even white hair, (and rarer cases of red) and still not be a "blonde". And there is a HUGE difference between occular albinism (the dirty blonde/light brown hair you're talking about which only affects their eyes and not their skin and hair) and occulocutaneous albinism. Having blonde hair means you have Scandanavian ancestry, no matter what nationally you are, even if your family has lived in Japan for x amount of generations and you consider yourself Japanese. Albinism is a condition. No, all blondes are not some type of albino, please understand the difference between pigment (think of it as contrast) and melanin (think of it as hue/saturation, what makes red hair red and blonde hair yellow), and that albinism is a condition which must be diognosed by an eye doctor (sometimes even as late as 18 people are diagnosed). I know a few blonde people I can take to an eye doctor and they can have perfectly normal eyes, no matter what color, or even if they are near/far sited and still not have the condition known as albinism." [--anon.]
Busboy, you are definitely incorrect on this topic ("all blondes are some type of albino"), and bordering on trolling. See [1] for some facts. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 17:21, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

History

I have a question. Why is there no information on the history of albinism? I know it may not seem that important but you should have some form of a brief medical history on albinismit comes in handy when doing reports. [--anon.]

Might be an interesting addition, but sourceable information on the topic is pretty sparse. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 07:34, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

Category?

Resolved. Article is now categorized.

This article appears to be uncategorised. Category:Congenital genetic disorders could be appropriate here? --apers0n 09:17, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

I've changed it. :) NCurse work 06:43, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

White people (trolling; ignore)

Resolved. Apparent trolling; taken to user talk.

Dont they come from albino blacks thousands of years ago? — Deananoby2 (Talk | contribs)

Um, no. See Human genetic variation. While the core human genome almost certainly derives ultimately from Africa, the origin of the so-called "races" doesn't have anything to do with albinism, and "white people" are largely a western-migratory split-off of central Asians mingled with older Pre-Indo-European populations who may have been in Europe since the last Ice Age (depending on which theory you prefer, both Asians and indigenous paleolithic Europeans were descended from different groups migrating out of Africa, or even the "native" Europeans may have been descended from an earlier west-moving group of Asians). "Caucasian" people are, like the Japanese and other north Asians, lighter-skinned than equatorial peoples apparently because they simply don't need the sun protection, and thus over a long period of time evolved away from producing what for them would have been excessive amounts of melanin pigment. Cf. genetically caucasoid populations in southern India, who are much darker than Europeans generally and even than many northern (cooler climate) Indic populations. Compare also the skin tone of Polynesians, ethnic Filipinos and others farther east and south to that of central-east Asians in China; the complexion of Amazonian Natives to that of North American First Nations, etc. Basically, the closer you get to the equator (when speaking of populations who have been indigenous since prehistory), the darker the skin tone is, to protect against the more direct UV radiation of the sun (there are always exceptions of course - Australian Aboriginals are quite a bit more southerly than equatorial Africans but quite dark when not hybridized with European genes; but they also colonized an area that is basically a desert, with little cloud cover for most of the year). Personally I don't think anyone has an adequate theory yet why certain populations become much paler than others, such as Scandinavians and true Russians (by which I mean ethnic Russians in the area historically known as Russia, not Soviets or Russian Federation citizens in general, who are from a wide variety of ethnicities) - despite being commonly thought of as "extra-White" they have even more definitively Asian genes, on average, than most other Euopeans due to historical invasions of Huns, Avars, Tatars, etc. See also the Japanese who on average are paler than Koreans at roughly the same latitude (and especially see the Ainu, a unique and even paler ethinicity that lingers in a few places in modern Japan). Native North Americans have lived at climes just as temperate-to-cold and northerly as the aforementioned groups for seemingly about as long a period of time, but are uniformly darker than the Old World populations. The climate effect is clearly just one factor among many, with gene dominance being the prevailing one. If you sent a million Irish to a desert-and-jungle planet and a million Congolese to an ice planet, I do not believe that if you returned in fifty thousand years you'd find they'd traded skin tones. Rather, they'd probably both be a medium color, on the way to evolving to suit their environment better, and most of their non-hue-related ethic features would remain unchanged (though probably not all of them - some traits are probably genetically linked to others.) And to come full circle, the albinism gene woud not have helped those on the ice planet in evolving toward producting less melanin - the albinism gene almost certainly causes too many problems for it to be naturally selected for - the vision deficits easily cancel out, in surivability terms, the benefits of not wasting bodily resources generating unneeded pigment. Would an "anti-albino" hyperpigmentation gene do well on the hot planet? Dunno. I have not read up on hypermelanism at all, so I don't know if comes with any negative side effects the way albinism does, and it is (as a genetic disorder; I'm not speaking of an ethic tendency toward a darker shade than some other ethnicity) very rare in humans anyway, much more so than albinism. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 10:50, 23 July 2006 (UTC)
Well if it was about the equator at all than how come eskimos are darker than USA native americans? and how come Sami ppl are darker than germans? — Deananoby2 (Talk | contribs)
[Replying on Deananoby's talk page] — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 19:12, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

PIC????

Resolved. Picture in question was replaced.

I've always wondered, what caused the people in the family in that poster to have such incredibly huge hair? Was it done up that way as part of a stage performance or something?

Yes. Albinistic people don't naturally have bigger hair than normal! — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 22:05, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

This article needs a photograph of a person with albinism. The dumb old drawing seems like a curiosity and more appropriate to a freak show page or something. I say this because it tells me more about a certain historical family and the way they dressed and grew their hair, the way old drawings look, etc. than about the way albinism looks. The initial picture should be as narrowly informative as possible about the subject at hand. This drawing is not only off-topic it also does not get across well what albinos look like. I think from this picture albinos are identical to regular humans only they have copious amounts of white hair which a long time ago at least they styled in outrageous fashion.172.129.224.17 10:26, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

Should we put this image in the article: Image:Queen Two on TunHwa S Rd Taiwan Pride 2005.jpg? NCurse work 06:45, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
Yes but, a cropped version showing our intended main subject centrally; the foreground parade stuff is of no relevance, and turns the pic into a "Where's Waldo?" excercise. I'd keep some of the people next to her, for contrast, of course. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 18:24, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
Done. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 09:56, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

Good news with regard to pics

I'm working with photographer Rick Guidotti of PositiveExposure.org to get some of his images up here on Wikipedia or better yet Wikimedia Commons. For those unaware of him, he's by far the most proflific photo-documentor of albinism (and vitiligo, etc.) Some of his work is in a fashion vein, but he also does a lot of more documenary-style work. We should pretty soon have some properly licensed photos to use in this article showing various phenotypic effects of albinism in a variety of ethnicities, if all goes well. That embarassing 1800s painting can go away! — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 17:21, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Update: Still working on this. Guidotti is receptive; we've both just been busy with real, non-WP life. Delayed but not forgotten. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 09:53, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
Great idea! I was able to meet Rick in July 2006 and he is a real blessing for the albinism community! YAY! I have a few photos of people with albinism myself, but I was always too dumb to pick the proper copyright option and they were deleted. LOL Allyddin Sane 22:31, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
Just got back in touch with him today in e-mail. Will post about the results as they come in. PS: If you go to my userpage and click on the e-mail link you can contact me directly, and after you have my actual e-mail address, if you send me the pics, I can process them in the Commons system for you. I have some experience at that and all the licensing hoo-haw that's required. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 20:54, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Sunscreen and vampires

Resolved. Topic died out; to the extent it was revived it is not relevant here.

I'm an author doing research for a vampire book, and I have to ask: Is there some kind of super-extra-strength sunscreen that some people with albinism use for extended periods? Cam 05:28, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Sunscreen comes in various SPF ratings, some of them pretty high. But, eh, what do albinistic people and their sunscreen have to do with fictional undead things? Legendary vampires are supposed to be unable to stand the light of day because they are "creatures of the night" in a deeply metaphysical way, so it's kind of silly (even aside from the idea of vampires in the first place) to suppose that they could use some kind of prescription albino or photophobiac sunscreen to escape their banished-from-the-daylight fate. JMO... — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 09:51, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
I'm curious now. Does perscription sunscreen exist? What is the extent of protection? 3 hours? 6 hours? I think the highest I've seen for over-the-counter sunscreen is 120spf. I believe this is 120 minutes. I do not know any people with albinism, but I am very interested in the condition. Miggyb 05:15, 24 May 2007 (UTC)
This is not the sunscreen article; not relevant here. — SMcCandlish talk cont ‹(-¿-)› 05:31, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

A vandalism solution proposal

2006

Resolved. Outdated.

Wikipedia:Semi-protection policy could protect this page from the kind of "ALBIONOS LOOK FUNNIE!!!" vandalism this page gets hit with regularly (most of you probably don't see it "in your face", because it gets reverted fairly quickly, but it happens on a very regular basis, and you can see the reversions of it in the article History.) Applying for this protection would mean that anonymous (IP-address-only, and non-logged-in registered) users, and brand-new registered users, would not be able to edit the page. I'm opening the question of whether others here feel that this article is of enough value, and approaching "good article" status enough, to warrant such a semi-protection request and whether the disabling of anon/newbie edits would be a price worth paying for that protection. (Disclaimer: I am not a WP admin, just an anti-vandalism patroller and regular editor of this article who is tired of seeing it vandalized, and one who has no problem with the idea of disabling or restricting anonyous edits — a "wikipolitical" stance that others may disagree with.) — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 05:48, November 25, 2006

Well, after a few weeks and no issues being raised, it is done. This article is now "semi-protected", which should bring an almost total halt to wiki-vandalism here. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 16:37, 12 December 2006 (UTC)
Cool, well done. I recently had a look at the German version of the page. Pretty stupid comments on there (like "are there albino humans?". Sad. Allyddin Sane 22:34, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

January 2007

Resolved. Outdated.
NB: Admins may from time to time unprotect this page. I go to lengths to get it reprotected, but I may need additional support for that in the future. Keep eyes peeled for alerts about protection status here. I think the protection is important, because the vandalism is always anonymous IP vandalism, non-vandal edits are almost never from IP addresses on this article, policy does not state articles cannot be perpetually semi-protected, and the vandalism will never stop unless there is a sea change in our culture's perception of albinism, and this is a science article slated for inclusion on the CD-ROMs, so it needs to be kept "clean". — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 02:02, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
What's the status on that? And what kind of "support" do you need? Allyddin Sane 12:52, 3 March 2007 (UTC)
It's reprotected; support would be !votes in support of the SP when it is proposed. I'll try to given advance notice next time. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 19:59, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

March 2007

Resolved. Semi-protection achieved until May.

Wow, it has gotten much worse again in the last few hours... but that just reinforces my feeling that this page needs its semi protection back!!! Allyddin Sane 16:30, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

I think so too, but I meet a lot of resistance. Most admins seem to feel that if a page isn't being vandalized 10x per hour it shouldn't even have semi-protection. Still kind of reseaching how to make better headway with such people. The fact that this article has very few regular, watchful editors is a strong point in favor of SP, but not necessarily enough. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 18:25, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

I'm filing for semi-protection again; it would be helpful to have *'''Support''': ... !votes lodged at the RFPP. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 19:29, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Nevermind. Got it semi-protected for 2 months. Sought indefinite SP, but this is at least some breathing room. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 19:59, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
Well done! But couldn't you have aimed for July so I'm done with my thesis and have more time to continue this war against vandalism??? LOL Anyway, thanks on behalf of many people with albinism, and I will get back to you regarding the other issues. Allyddin Sane 20:58, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

May 2007

[Forthcoming. Expect vandalism to start up again on May 15.]

Merge with Evil albino

Resolved. Merge completed, and later re-merged; new article is Albinism in popular culture.

I'm about to propose a merge of one subsection of this article with another article that is more about the topic in question (though from a negative p.o.v.) I propose that the fictional characters list here be merged with the one at albino bias which is also being merged from evil albino; both of these articles have been the targets of deletion attempts, mainly because the lists in them overlap too much (including with the one here) and no one is "policing" them, e.g. to cite sources. I'll do what I can to merge and cite them into a defensible article. It may eventually fail AfD anyway, but if so, it will be good that this list is no longer in the main albinism article or it too will simply come under attack. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 02:15, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

Update: The "evil albino" article was pre-emptively deleted in an either improper or amazingly coincidental AfD immediately after I unprod'd albino bias and started doing the merge. I have moved for the article to be restored at least until the merge is completed. Please see this undeletion request and add support for having it temporarily restored. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 03:31, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
Update: Evil albino article history restored, so the merge can now commence. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 10:12, 15 December 2006 (UTC)
Merge of popular culture section with Evil albino and Albino bias into Albinism in popular culture is now complete. Talk topics that are now only relevant at Talk:Albino bias are being moved there. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 02:03, 16 January 2007 (UTC) Updated: 00:47, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

No references, and unspecifics in "Visual and other health problems"

Optic neural info

While interesting and valuable, this section doesn't contain any references at all. In particular, I find the statement "Abnormal routing of the optic nerve to the brain" highly unspecific, and there is no reasoning behind why this would be related to the genetic disorder that albinism is (missing melanin), and no references. It further states "the biggest problem arises from a [..something..] and abnormal nerve connections between the eyes and brain. These abnormalities define albinism, medically. While the effects of this condition are difficult to describe, it can be explained as seeing at a lower resolution.", which is interesting, but too unexplained to be appropriate. --Stolsvik 09:45, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

I can't remember if I wrote that, but I can tell you that I know FIRST HAND that it is true. Sorry I can't cite sources, but that is something that every (good) ophthalmologist I ever saw told me. Maybe I can look for sources some time - not so soon though. Allyddin Sane 22:38, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
The information is sourced now. Marking this subtopic "Resolved". — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 00:54, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
I just added the "neural pathway stuff" again and sourced it. I had forgotten this completely! There are actually many sources, should I quote more? I have German ones too, but there are several English ones as well on the internet. (Books on albinism??? I gotta write one, haven't seen a single one with up-to-date info yet) Allyddin Sane 00:49, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
An additional non-web, medical source would be best. — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 10:47, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Reverting many recent unsourced edits to this section

Resolved. Incorrect material replaced & sourced, inappropriate deletions reverted & sourced; unsourced facts sourced.

I agree it needs plenty of research and sourcing, but the recent edits by Morgan Wright (talk · contribs) were entirely unsourced, arguably factually incorrect in several cases (according to research I've already done, though some of it remains to be cited), and misunderstood the language of the article in others. Details:

  1. Removal of several types of eye problems was not justified with references. They've been restored (and I also retained Morgan's addition of a new one; it will be sourced and either kept or removed based on sourcing research when I or whoever else researches the rest of them; i.e., its addition isn't any better or worse than the existing examples). Morgan's claim that hyper- and myopia, and astigmatism, cannot be linked with albinism contradicts sourced and cited research I've alread done (on other points) elsewhere in the article (OMIM, etc.) They DO need to be cited here specifically, yes, but deletion without cited counter-evidence is unwarranted, I feel, because if anyone's been following my edits here they can see that I have been working from the top down, doing very meticulous sourcing, and the very next section I was about to work on is this one. The optic nerve bit has been challenged by someone else, but another editor here swears it can be sourced. I'm the one doing 95% of the sourcing here, so I'd like an opportunity to try to source this over the next month or so. If others insist on its removal right now, I won't fuss about it, however.
  2. "Eye conditions common in albinism may include (but will not necessarily be present for all)" was weakened, with the excuse that "these conditions are found in ALL albinos", which is factually incorrect according to the sourced and cited research I've alread done elsewhere in the article (OMIM, etc.) [citation in article text at this particular spot is still pending], and regardless is too extreme/categorical/generalized a statement to accept at face value without a source, even if I hadn't already seen counter-evidence.
  3. "People with albinism are also likely to have astigmatism and/or strabismus" - language restored, but clarified as written here; Morgan simply misunderstood the original text as meaning "...astigmatism, a.k.a. strabismus" (that's not what it said, but it was ambiguous enough that it could be interpreted that way; Morgan was correct that that interpretation is counterfactual, but his/her edit actually removed factual information [citation in article text still pending], i.e. regarding likelihood of a particular eye problem.)
  4. "Organisms with albinism suffer from impaired vision, but the degree varies greatly" had its 2nd phrase lopped off without any evidence to back the chopping. I know for a fact from direct experience and voluminuous citable research [citation in article text still pending] that the original language was correct, so it has been restored.
  5. Retained other edits (though they all need sourcing), and made some clarity refinements, new wikilink and the like.

— SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ 01:56, 10 January 2007 (UTC) [Minorly edited for clarity & typos 08:43, 10 January 2007 (UTC) by — SMcCandlish talk contrib ツ

FYI, Morgan and I have been replying to each other about this dispute, on our Talk pages. My summary reply is probably relevant here as further explanation of the partial revert:

I've responded at length to your reply on my Talk page. Super-short version: No disrespect intended; it's not about whether you are qualified or not, but rather about policy/process here. Replacing one unsourced thing with another unsourced thing is almost certain to get reverted by someone, because the original is presumed under WP:AGF to be valid, while WP:OR#Citing oneself (and see also footnote 1 on that page for further rationale) prevents us simply taking your word for the validity of your unsourced changes just because you happen to be a doctor in a relevant field and "know you are right". Wikipedia just doesn't work that way. Anyway, please see the longer reply. Your input would be actually genuinely valued on the article, it just needs to be sourced like everyone else's. No free pass for a medical degree.  :-)

— SMcCandlish