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Question about race: Is a white south african, who immigrated to america....

Is a white South African, American citizen...considered an African american?

  • Total voters
    51
MichaelJR said:
Okay, I'll play technicalities. I'm first generation. My mom's family is from Sicily, is now American. My dad's family is from Belfast-rock-city, now American (I know, odd mix).

I don't identify myself as being either. Sure, I eat Sicilian food, drink Jameson, but I'm not Sicilian or Irish. I'm American.
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You sound like a Sicilian food-eating Irish-American to me.
 
What do you call a black man born in Germany?
 
ecofarm said:
Wait a minute, I'm very PC and proud of it. I see PC as social intellectualism. Nonetheless, I see no harm in someone recognizing their ancestry.
I don't see it as a divider but a celebration of diversity.
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That's the way that you see it.

Some people call it playing the race card.
 
Peter Grimm said:
Nah I had some buddies from South Africa in college who tried to call themselves African American.... the university offices disagreed with them.

"African American" is a race.
It really has nothing to do with being from Africa, it has to do with coming from a certain extended "family tree" and having the telltale phenotypes.
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Can you prove that some 'White' South Africans don't have those telltale phenotypes?
 
APACHERAT said:
John Kerry's wife is an African-American. She was born in Africa and was naturalized as an American citizen.

Before all of this PC bull #### hyphenated-Americanism of the mid 1970's was started by the radical left, an hyphenated-American was a foreign born person who was naturalized as an American citizen.


But that progressive, Thodore Roosevelt looked at it a diffrent way.

Teddy Roosevelt: "No Room in This Country for Hyphenated Americans"
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>" “There is no room in this country for hyphenated Americanism. When I refer to hyphenated Americans, I do not refer to naturalized Americans. Some of the very best Americans I have ever known were naturalized Americans, Americans born abroad. But a hyphenated American is not an American at all.”
“This is just as true of the man who puts “native” before the hyphen as of the man who puts German or Irish or English or French before the hyphen. Americanism is a matter of the spirit and of the soul. Our allegiance must be purely to the United States. We must unsparingly condemn any man who holds any other allegiance.”
“But if he is heartily and singly loyal to this Republic, then no matter where he was born, he is just as good an American as any one else.”
“The one absolutely certain way of bringing this nation to ruin, of preventing all possibility of its continuing to be a nation at all, would be to permit it to become a tangle of squabbling nationalities, an intricate knot of German-Americans, Irish-Americans, English- Americans, French-Americans, Scandinavian- Americans, or Italian-Americans, each preserving its separate nationality, each at heart feeling more sympathy with Europeans of that nationality than with the other citizens of the American Republic.”
“The men who do not become Americans and nothing else are hyphenated Americans; and there ought to be no room for them in this country. The man who calls himself an American citizen and who yet shows by his actions that he is primarily the citizen of a foreign land, plays a thoroughly mischievous part in the life of our body politic. He has no place here; and the sooner he returns to the land to which he feels his real heart-allegiance, the better it will be for every good American.” "<
Theodore Roosevelt
Address to the Knights of Columbus
New York City- October 12th, 1915

Reaganite Republican: Teddy Roosevelt: "No Room in This Country for Hyphenated Americans"
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Teddy Roosevelt has been dead and buried for 94 years and the USA is full of hyphenated Americans.
 
DDD said:
Not so fast! :)

You could make a DNA test and see from which ingredients you are made of. Then you can contact people whom call themselves pure of a certain ingredient and see what they have for you in building meaning for your life.

You may be a certain breed alone after all.
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 Did you made any tests?
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He could be the Last of the Mohicans for all we know.
 
Papa bull said:
Who said anything about truth being an adversary of social harmony? Do you really think it would be deceptive NOT to use hyphenated-American labels? Do you need to stick an "African-Hypehen" in front of your "American" label in order for me to not confuse you with "Euro-Americans"?
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It is neither a case of 'need' or 'deception' .. it's about what I choose to call myself and identify with .. just as millions Americans have done since this nations inception. It's not about what you may confuse me with .. in fact, it's not about you at all. It's how I choose to identify with my heritage .. which should not be a problem for you or anyone else at all.

How does my identification as an African-American disrupt the harmony of anyone?

What benefit do we get from that except proper maintenance of the "us vs. them" mentality such labels help ensure? Whether your avatar actually reflects your status in active duty or not, assuming you are on active duty, do you think it's important that you describe yourself as a "female soldier" instead of just a soldier? It's the truth, isn't it? If you were a doctor, would you insist on being called a "female doctor"? Or an "African American Doctor"? It's the truth, so why not? As long as it's the truth, it can't be adversarial to social harmony, right?

Think about it.
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What I get from it from it is exactly what it looks like .. an identification with my heritage.

My avatar is my daughter .. who also identifies herself as an African-American .. when it suits the circumstances. She's in the military and a leader, so there are all manner of things she is restricted by circumstance from doing. She recognizes that the military is not society.

I, her father, have no such restrictions.

What changes when I meet someone who identifies themselves as 'Indian-American' rather than 'American?' Answer, absolutely nothing.

If that affects you .. then you have the answer to what disrupts social harmony.

My question for you .. being a conservative .. is when did the right become aware of 'social harmony?' Surely you are aware of the intense adverarial relationship between conservatives and just about everybody else? How does that on-going hate-hate relationship add to social harmony?
 
Kreton said:
Mostly because most people dont live in, werent born in, and havent been to America. :2wav
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And most of the people on this planet don't give a **** about America, they're way more concerned about what's for breakfast tomorrow morning.
 
Ad_Captandum said:
Oh, yeah, that's what all Europeans think is so funny about the American 'race' categorisation -- Hispanics are white! They're of Spanish blood,
and guess where Spain is? You got it -- Europe!
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Spain is also in Africa and in the Atlantic Ocean (The Canary Islands.).
 
shrubnose said:
That's the way that you see it.

Some people call it playing the race card.
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Those people don't know the difference. Those (most) are stupid.
 
Jango said:
Yeah, I've seen pics of ya before. Could have sworn that long hair was a mullet though ;)

Me? I take the clippers to my head once a month at zero guard.
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Why don't you just use a straight razor and get the whole job done at once?
 
:0) TRUTH be told .. everybody on this board and who has ever lived as a modern human is of African descent.

Truth be told, a sample of your mitochondria would reveal what region of Africa YOU come from. :0)

You could call yourself an African-American and have a point. :0)
 
MichaelJR said:
Culturally ignorant? Please. Historically ignorant? Oh boy, let's have a debate, this will be comical. First off, it's a melting pot. I know you'd love to see every flag of the world waved in America, just to show how we are special little snowflakes and oh so accepting, I would just like to see the stars and stripes.
You know, since this is America...the lack of nationalism in the left is absolutely baffling.
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 Is it so bad to be American? The phrase "I'm an American" is like mental pepper spray to the lockstep liberal.

As mentioned, I was raised by a Sicilian and an Irishman, that upon getting citizenship, no longer referred to themselves as the such. Recognized the melting pot ideology that made this country great, and embraced it with both arms (like real Americans do). I am far more "cultured" (if that's what you call traveling to foreign places, eating food, seeing historical objects/sites/buildings/artwork, I just call it traveling and eating) than you give me credit for, I've seen, well quite a bit. Been quite a few places. There's no-place like home. Home is not where your ancestors or parents came from...it's here.

My parents call themselves American. What's your excuse? Embrace your country, I promise, it's not so bad.


and what the hell was I baiting? Someone clue me in here. Catalyzing a conversation many don't want to have isn't baiting.
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The relative lack of nationalism on the left is more than made up for by the extreme, xenophobic hyper-nationalism of the extreme-right losers in the USA
 
shrubnose said:
Bull****.




Tolerance is giving to every other human being every right that you claim for yourself.
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I've got to side with you here....I believe they were here before all this migration business.
 
shrubnose said:
And most of the people on this planet don't give a **** about America, they're way more concerned about what's for breakfast tomorrow morning.
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Where did I say anyone did? I was responding to the question: Why can't everyone just be....Americans. Call your ass down.
 
shrubnose said:

And the debate will continue as long as people use and abuse the English language.
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All people use language to express themselves. The words they use are not abusive to themselves, and it shouldn't be abusive to you either. Just hear them out as individuals. Some prefer lables like Hispanic, Asian, African American, and others do not.
 
shrubnose said:

And the debate will continue as long as people use and abuse the English language.
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Your earlier comment regarding Egypt gives clarity to African-American. I believe the nomenclature should refer to Black African Americans as opposed to African Americans. Qaddaffi was a African. Nasser. Mubarak. African American is a poor choice and inaccurate as well.
 
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