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It's the truth!

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Submitted ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨ObviouslyNotBanana@piefed.world⁩ to ⁨[deleted]⁩

https://media.piefed.world/posts/fZ/dk/fZdk4pcqhhYZcNS.jpeg

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Comments

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  • Denjin@feddit.uk ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Red Onions (and every other not-red food that’s called red) is older in the English language than the word “purple”.

    Purple is a relatively modern concept in English having first been used circa 900AD. Before that basically everything towards the magenta part of the spectrum was all just called red.

    See also Orange, the colour is named after the fruit and not the other way round.

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    • Catoblepas@piefed.blahaj.zone ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      See also: ‘robin red breast’ to describe the European robin, which very clearly has an orange breast:

      A small brown and white bird with a very orange chest perched on a branch

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      • Zwiebel@feddit.org ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        Lil-red-throat in German

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    • Tar_alcaran@sh.itjust.works ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Before that basically everything towards the magenta part of the spectrum was all just called red.

      And before that we have people looking at colours entirely differently, like Homer calling the sea the colour of red wine.

      Which my Greek teacher would explain by saying “my pencil is the the same shade of yellow as your book is blue”.

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      • VindictiveJudge@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        Or perhaps Homer was colorblind?

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      • ChickenLadyLovesLife@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        Cultures around the world divide the color spectrum up in wildly different ways, which really highlights the absurdity of “color” being a real, objective property. There’s one culture (I forget which, somewhere in Africa) where all the “dark” variants of colors are called by the same name. Other cultures often combine texture and other properties into their words for colors.

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    • thomasloven@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      It’s the same reason why ”Violets are blue”.

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      • Denixen@feddit.nu ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        Roses are red and violets are blue, You have been misled, for that isn’t true

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    • kopasu22@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      The concept of purple is older than English, though. I guess when English chose to adopt it is the main question, but should be clarified that the term where “purple” derives from goes back to the ancient Romans, who recognized it as a distinct color used for royalty given the difficulty in obtaining it.

      It does have me wondering exactly when red onions first arrived in the UK, because the variety is native to southern Europe. And I wonder what the Romans called that type of onion, which was surely used there before those dirty Britons got their hands on it.

      I also know that, when boiled, they yield a very rich, red color. Could maybe be named “red” due to that? Some Orthodox Christians/eastern Europeans traditionally use red onions to dye eggs for Easter.

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    • undefined@lemmy.hogru.ch ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      I was always curious about this! I’m bilingual and I always get mixed up because they’re actually called “purple onions” in Spanish. I always forget which language calls it which, but knowing this is definitely helpful!

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    • SexualPolytope@lemmy.sdf.org ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      In Bangla, we call the color peyaji, which is basically “onion-y”. It’s also what we call onion fritters, and they’re absolutely delicious.

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      • AA5B@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        Yum, onion fritters!

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    • melsaskca@lemmy.ca ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Wasn’t purple a “royal” colour back in Roman toga times? Maybe it was called something different?

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      • vaultdweller013@sh.itjust.works ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        The Latin and Greek speaking parts of the world probably had a word for purple by that point. Remember the Angles, Saxons, and Jutes who would evolve into the medieval Anglo-Saxons were from around modern continental Denmark to about the modern Hanover region. This area didn’t really have the color purple all that much and frankly speaking Britain ain’t much better on that front, probably why it took till around the viking age to get a word for it since that’s when pan European trade started to pick up again to a large enough degree for purple dyes to start getting to Britain on a regular basis.

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      • jve@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        It was. It was the royal color because it was famously hard and expensive to make purple dyes out of sea snails.

        en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyrian_purple

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      • ChickenLadyLovesLife@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        It was “purpura” in Latin. OP said purple is relatively modern in English.

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      • Denjin@feddit.uk ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        Yes but not in English, which was my point

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    • a_non_monotonic_function@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Look, man, I’m not concerned with what middle earth or Mordor or whatever can see, I’m here on the planet U S of A.

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    • msage@programming.dev ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Wow, thank you!

      Now when people call me color-blind cause I don’t care about color matching or their names, I can just say I’m very old fashioned!

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  • Limitless_screaming@kbin.earth ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Red foxes are clearly orange. Black tea is clearly red. White grapes are clearly green.

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    • Warl0k3@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Black tea refers to the degree of oxidation of the tea leaves - yellow, white and green teas all do the same thing. Similarly, white grapes are called that because they produce white (clear) liquid (though it’s clearly yellowish so who knows).

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      • Limitless_screaming@kbin.earth ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        Black tea refers to the visible degree of oxidation of the tea leaves

        Makes sense

        grapes are called that because they produce white (clear) liquid

        Even if it produced indisputably white liquid. Why not call it after its own color while tea is named after the color of its processed leaves?

        You'd expect tea which is thought of as a drink to be known for the color of the liquid, and grapes often eaten as is to be named after their color.

        But it doesn't really matter, any of these could've been named after whichever color they were at any point of their making / preparation. It's not like there's a convention or something

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    • WanderingThoughts@europe.pub ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      A black box is orange. A red panda is brown. A great white is mostly grey.

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  • wewbull@feddit.uk ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    No. They are maroon.

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    • myster0n@feddit.nl ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      No need to insult them

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    • ObviouslyNotBanana@piefed.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Are you calling me a moron?!

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    • MutilationWave@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      And maroons are escaped slaves that set up their own communities in the Caribbean.

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  • shittydwarf@piefed.social ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Image

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  • dejected_warp_core@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    What really breaks my brain is that the pigment responsible for this purple hue are called anthocyanins. It literally has the root-word for blue in the name, even though that’s not the only color it can make.

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  • blackbelt352@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    If I pickle them in vinegar, they turn bright pink, if I alkalize them in baking soda, they turn blue, if I cook them slowly in butter they turn a deep brown color.

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    • worhui@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Red onion skin is part of kids science experiments about PH. I just did that experiment with my kids not long ago.

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    • prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Pickled red onions are next fucking level. They are so goddamn good its kind of crazy

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  • ceenote@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Grapes, too.

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  • workerONE@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Really blew my mind when I found out that red onions are just ripe white onions.

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    • Rooster326@programming.dev ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      That is not true?

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    • Hjalamanger@feddit.nu ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      WHAT!!

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    • HugeNerd@lemmy.ca ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      You’re thinking of bell peppers, not onions, they are distinct cultivars.

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      • workerONE@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        Shitposting is an artform

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  • FreshParsnip@lemmy.ca ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Green onions are green but not onions!

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    • GladiusB@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Not with that attitude

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    • ChickenLadyLovesLife@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      In Japan they’re called blue onions - neither blue nor onions.

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  • stupidcasey@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Red onions are all RED!

    I’ve never seen a red onion only purple but if I ever do see a red onion I guarantee it will not be purple.

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  • ChickenLadyLovesLife@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    In Japan green onions are called “blue onions”. I do not know why.

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    • thethunderwolf@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Japanese used to have no distinction between blue and green

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      • Overshoot2648@lemmy.today ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        Most people don’t have the distinction between blue and cyan despite the fact that it is the same distance as red is from yellow. :/

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  • halvar@lemy.lol ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    In my language it’s called a purple onion

    and the we call white onions red

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  • Xanvial@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Yeah, my three years old kid really debating me about this. Insisting that it’s purple onions. Can’t really argue

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  • fakeman_pretendname@feddit.uk ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Blue cheese is almost entirely creamy-offwhite coloured.

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    • Kolanaki@pawb.social ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      It at least has some parts that are a blueish green.

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  • hungryphrog@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    And pretty much everything orange is named red.

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  • DupaCycki@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Leave it to colorblind people to name everything color-related.

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    • tino@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      as a radical colourblind: colour is a construction of the mind. Colour names make no sense. The only thing that matters is contrast.

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      • Fedizen@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        Color is in the eyeballs. The proteins in your eyes that react to different wavelengths of light produce the network of colors we see. Your brain processes the image but all the color signals are assigned by your eyes.

        I believe there’s even lens tech that can help alter colors so colorblind can differentiate the colors easier if the colorblindness falls into certain variants.

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  • FranciscoLopez@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Team ‘red onion is purple’ reporting for duty 🫡 ‘Red’ is just marketing—someone at Big Onion is lying to us.

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    • Blackfeathr@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      This is a bot

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  • roserose56@lemmy.zip ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Maybe you all have color blindness.

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  • Tommelot@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    They’re in a red netting, obviously!

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  • ivanafterall@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    BURN HIM!!!

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