I got involved in a discussion yesterday on the Chess.com message boards. Someone started a thread titled, “Is Chess Racist?” The guy was asking if racism is the reason that the White pieces always move first. The answer is no, though certainly people are free to interpret things however they like. And I thought the story of how this tradition started might interest some of you, so I’m reporting it here.
Most people, of course, came on the thread and told the OP (original poster) that he was an idiot for even asking the question, or saying that the people calling the OP an idiot were idiots themselves (whenever the word racism is used publicly this happens). A few people replied thoughtfully, though. One guy in particular seemed to be carrying the day before I got there. He had responded that, no, it isn’t racist, since the game was invented in India, modernized (to a great extent) in Persia, and introduced to Europe by the invading Moors. All these people were darker than Europeans, so it wouldn’t make sense for racism to be behind this tradition. This argument sounds pretty good if you don’t know the history of the game, but unfortunately it’s invalid. See, the Persians etc. had no tradition of White always moving first. That tradition is only about two hundred years old, and it originated in Europe, in the earliest chess clubs of London and Paris. This sounds bad for folks who don’t want the tradition to be racist, but hear me out before you judge.
See, here’s what happened. You know how, before a football game, there’s a coin toss, right? Most people think that the team that wins the toss automatically gets the ball first, and then the losing team chooses which goal to defend, but that isn’t true. The winning team can either choose to kick off or receive, or choose which goal to defend. The losing team then gets to choose on the other option. But since almost everyone always chooses to receive the opening kickoff, it’s easy to assume that winning the toss=having the ball first, and losing the toss=choosing the direction.
In those early Continental clubs, something similar happened. Before a game, the players would toss a coin, just like football teams. The winner of the coin toss could either go first, or choose which set to play with. Now, going first is a much bigger advantage in chess than in football. The player who goes first starts off with initiative. He’s always one step ahead, unless the player moving second is clever enough to wrest control of the board from him. It takes more work to win, in other words, as the second player. Given that, you would expect the winner of the coin toss to always elect to go first.
However, that isn’t what happened, for two reasons. First, the Black pieces were considered lucky; it was a very prevalent superstition at the time among this small group of players. Second, the theory of the game was more primitive at the time than it is today, and going first wasn’t quite the overwhelming advantage it is now. So, many times the winner would grab up the lucky darker set, leaving the loser to go first. Even if the winner of the toss did elect to go first (the savvier move, obviously), the loser would then “even the odds” by taking the lucky black pieces. So, in practically every game, White went first. And eventually, realizing this, they just streamlined matters by making that a rule: one player would have the privilege of the first move, balanced by using the “inferior” white set; the other player, using the “superior” black set, would start off on the defensive.
So, the White pieces go first because they were actually considered less desirable. And these were the people who gave us the game we play today. They would eventually form FIDE, the international governing body of chess, and they would hold the first-ever World Championship tournaments. Even though there weren’t very many of them, their influence is widely felt, because we still play by the rules they set up (the FIDE rulebook is still the standard), including this silly, superstitious one. Whether the players involved were racist or not is an open question; the rules themselves, however, aren’t racist at all.
Most people, of course, came on the thread and told the OP (original poster) that he was an idiot for even asking the question, or saying that the people calling the OP an idiot were idiots themselves (whenever the word racism is used publicly this happens). A few people replied thoughtfully, though. One guy in particular seemed to be carrying the day before I got there. He had responded that, no, it isn’t racist, since the game was invented in India, modernized (to a great extent) in Persia, and introduced to Europe by the invading Moors. All these people were darker than Europeans, so it wouldn’t make sense for racism to be behind this tradition. This argument sounds pretty good if you don’t know the history of the game, but unfortunately it’s invalid. See, the Persians etc. had no tradition of White always moving first. That tradition is only about two hundred years old, and it originated in Europe, in the earliest chess clubs of London and Paris. This sounds bad for folks who don’t want the tradition to be racist, but hear me out before you judge.
See, here’s what happened. You know how, before a football game, there’s a coin toss, right? Most people think that the team that wins the toss automatically gets the ball first, and then the losing team chooses which goal to defend, but that isn’t true. The winning team can either choose to kick off or receive, or choose which goal to defend. The losing team then gets to choose on the other option. But since almost everyone always chooses to receive the opening kickoff, it’s easy to assume that winning the toss=having the ball first, and losing the toss=choosing the direction.
In those early Continental clubs, something similar happened. Before a game, the players would toss a coin, just like football teams. The winner of the coin toss could either go first, or choose which set to play with. Now, going first is a much bigger advantage in chess than in football. The player who goes first starts off with initiative. He’s always one step ahead, unless the player moving second is clever enough to wrest control of the board from him. It takes more work to win, in other words, as the second player. Given that, you would expect the winner of the coin toss to always elect to go first.
However, that isn’t what happened, for two reasons. First, the Black pieces were considered lucky; it was a very prevalent superstition at the time among this small group of players. Second, the theory of the game was more primitive at the time than it is today, and going first wasn’t quite the overwhelming advantage it is now. So, many times the winner would grab up the lucky darker set, leaving the loser to go first. Even if the winner of the toss did elect to go first (the savvier move, obviously), the loser would then “even the odds” by taking the lucky black pieces. So, in practically every game, White went first. And eventually, realizing this, they just streamlined matters by making that a rule: one player would have the privilege of the first move, balanced by using the “inferior” white set; the other player, using the “superior” black set, would start off on the defensive.
So, the White pieces go first because they were actually considered less desirable. And these were the people who gave us the game we play today. They would eventually form FIDE, the international governing body of chess, and they would hold the first-ever World Championship tournaments. Even though there weren’t very many of them, their influence is widely felt, because we still play by the rules they set up (the FIDE rulebook is still the standard), including this silly, superstitious one. Whether the players involved were racist or not is an open question; the rules themselves, however, aren’t racist at all.
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