#these psychonational euro relationships have to be studied like a bug

[cparti-mkiki]

still thinking about the maria teresa author* who, when highlighting the physical differences between philip iv and his castilian subjects in passing, out of the blue, could think of nothing less strange than bringing up how "small and with rather developed body hairiness" the spaniards are. i think it was a french attempt at humor (haha! the spanish!) but it's just a very [?] thing to bring up specifically, given that the question of body hair was basically irrelevant with 17th century men's clothing.

it's a small thing but it stood out to me by its sheer randomness and the fact that someone thought it was either a relevant comment or a funny enough sentence to print. also my guy...... we are literally side by side. we are two mid sized to small countries glued together in a little peninsula-continent and we've had centuries upon centuries of exchanges. ive lived in both countries ive visited north and south and there is no big overarching "racial" difference between us............ i think there are obvious on-average differences in the extremes (pas de calais vs andalucia fight) but the way you see what's commonly attributed to the spanish you'd think we were different species. if you want to call us unattractive or more animalistic (not that i think the aforementioned traits are bad at all— but that's what the tone implies) you're gonna end up throwing a lot of stones at your fellow countrymen

*yeah, the one who did a biography of a spanish princess using only french sources lmao