I'm going to be blunt - these types of anecdotes are just plain stupid. It's people picking and choosing examples to support their desired narrative, and just ignoring anything that contradicts it. There are just as many "bad" things in English that are also white - white elephant, white ant, whitewash, white whale. Why didn't he mention those?
The colour comparisons are also dumb, because "black" skin is actually more like dark brown and "white" skin isn't white at all, unless you're albino or incredibly sick (which again, points to how stupid it is to make comparisons like "white==good").
No, of course not. Look at his list. A "white whale" is something you especially DO want. "White washing" is making something bad look good by covering it in white. A white elephant is something so precious that it's inconvenient. The only word on that list that makes a white thing actively bad is obscure Australian political slang: white ant.
Meanwhile, I can just go black sheep, black magic, black market, black mark, blackmail, black hand, blackball, black mood...
> A "white whale" is something you especially DO want. "White washing" is making something bad look good by covering it in white. A white elephant is something so precious that it's inconvenient. The only word on that list that makes a white thing actively bad is obscure Australian political slang: white ant.
The white whale was an aberration, a freak of nature (just like a black sheep). White-washing has indisputably negative connotations. A white elephant is something that is incredibly expensive but fails to deliver any value.
> Meanwhile, I can just go black sheep, black magic, black market, black mark, blackmail, black hand, blackball, black mood...
I can play this game all day, too. "White as a sheet", "deathly white", "bleed someone white", "wave a white flag", "white feather". But again, none of this has any relevance whatsoever because white people aren't literally white and black people aren't literally black. We know racism exists, you don't need to manufacture some supposed linguistic association to prove it.
The colour comparisons are also dumb, because "black" skin is actually more like dark brown and "white" skin isn't white at all, unless you're albino or incredibly sick (which again, points to how stupid it is to make comparisons like "white==good").