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Because there are a lot of ignorant, stupid folks around (this is NOT directed at you, btw).
Yes, doesn't it drive you batty? I know it drives me batty.
Blacks or African Americans can not redefine the English language. Certainly you can call yourself African American but when you use such a vague term don't be surprised when others who you don't consider African American use the term as well for their own benefit.
I think the negative side of this all encompassing term plays out in college admissions where individuals like myself (first generation Black Americans) take advantage of programs specifically targeted to remedy the historical discrimination faced by the descendants of African slaves in the USA.
It seems like this all boils down to appearance. If I was Asian-looking, I'm sure people would be much quicker to call me some kind of hyphenated American (Chinese, Cambodian, whatever). I think the second someone looks non-white people are quicker to call them Japanese- or Syrian- or Ethiopian-American. But if someone looks white and speaks English without any foreign accent, they're much more likely to get called American, even if they spent part of their lives in another country.
You are 100% correct. People love to put humans in categories. It seems as if it's a priority for Americans to categorize people by their ethnic heritage based on how they look.
Frankly I think it's fairly obvious when someone looks black you can assume there's some African ancestry in there somewhere, or if they look asian there's some asian ancestry... etc.
What's the purpose in overstating the obvious? I'm Asian-American, I'm Latina, I'm African-American... Taking pride in something you have no control over, had nothing to do with creating is egocentric. And that's the battle right there - ego.
Why should I care that you're so proud to identify so strongly with a "racial" category? Why do you wear it around like a badge of honor? I have no idea why that's so important to people. You may think it's important, but all it does is reinforce racism. Keeping those categories alive reinforces racism and it divides people into categories and social/racial hierarchies. I guess if that's the goal - to reinforce racism then by all means keep it alive. And don't make any threads about how blacks/African Americans are discriminated against by race because I have observed that African Americans do a very good job of making sure they are discriminated against. If that's the goal then keep up the good work.
I didn't even mean to include any response to that statement - I had not intended to put a period there.
On the West Coast or among Mexican/Central Americans, they often speak Spanish in front of me (and sometimes say really racist stuff) because they don't realize I speak the language. On the other hand, in New York, Philly, Puerto Rico, etc., people assume I do speak Spanish.
All true.
Happens to me all the time. People also assume I don't understand Chinese, Farsi, or Spanish just because I'm white. I've caught people saying some really racist (or other generally obnoxious and rude) things in those languages.
I asked this a while back, but did not get an answer. Can you give an example of WHY "some word needs to be used?" What is the context when you, a presumably white person, NEED to refer to a black person as a black person . . . why do white people need to talk about black people as black people and not just people?
When someone asks me what race someone is. Also people ask me a lot as a blind person if I can tell races apart, and I need a way to talk about race, including Americans who have African ancestry.
Here's a more specific example. The other night, I was at a Deaf/Blind LGBT event, and the facilitator was talking about how his experience was different as a Black Deaf Gay man compared to a White Deaf Gay Man. There needs to be a word to express a sentence like I just did, and I chose the word Black. In American Sign Language, "Black" and "White" is just what people use to refer to race. There aren't really terms like African American and Caucasian in ASL, but having that same discussion in English might have left me and others wondering if we should say "Black" or "African American".
Well, both of those are blogs, which mean they're based on opinion.
A DNA ancestry test will give you an accurate haplogroup assignment. Haplogroups are shared by people with a common ancestry. Tracing your DNA to a specific tribe is not useful because there are no national borders on DNA, they can give you information on genetic clusters of a population that share common DNA markers.
When someone asks me what race someone is. Also people ask me a lot as a blind person if I can tell races apart, and I need a way to talk about race, including Americans who have African ancestry.
Here's a more specific example. The other night, I was at a Deaf/Blind LGBT event, and the facilitator was talking about how his experience was different as a Black Deaf Gay man compared to a White Deaf Gay Man. There needs to be a word to express a sentence like I just did, and I chose the word Black. In American Sign Language, "Black" and "White" is just what people use to refer to race. There aren't really terms like African American and Caucasian in ASL, but having that same discussion in English might have left me and others wondering if we should say "Black" or "African American".
Very interesting. I wonder if people who are blind from birth can describe what it is to be black or white since it's a superficial physical quality that can only be discerned by sight, you can touch faces and get an idea of what someones features look like, but you can't touch a skin color.
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