Realizing I live in 2 worlds....

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:"I never had to check boxes to tell what my color, ethnicity or race is until the day I applied for a visa to come to this country."
So there are no foreigners or foreigners who count as far as distribution of community resources, if any, in your home country?

You quoted me... what does skin color, race or ethnicity has to do with nationality when distributing resources?
I understand nationality counting but skin color, ethnicity or race? That's ridiculous!

[Anonymous]

arghh! and I think it is just plain stupid that people from south america are accepting to be called "latinos" and just look over to the big mistake when refered to it as a race. So much ignorance there. How come an indian from Mayan or Aztec descent who inmigrates from Mexico to the US be called "Latino" that person has not a mililiter of Latin blood, nor his/her 1st language is Spanish. But the worst is that this ignorance-based coined term is being used in Europe too! In Spain and Italy they are calling people from South America "Latinos" as in the US. What are they then? I know this is probably way away from the OP post but I inserted it here as it relates to the box marking process.

[Anonymous]

10:11 - Maybe in your country there's no checking the box. But please don't pretend that this is unique to the US, or uniquely harmful. That box checking isn't because Homeland Security cares about your ethnicity particularly, but because we do a darn good job here studying our own population for perfectly nice purposes. Try France: It is illegal to ask about background which means they have no clue about who lives there and the particular needs of different ethnic groups. There's a non-profit group trying to replicate a census outside the government so that social services could do a better job than they currently can at targeting the "at risk."

As for OP. There's something to what you are saying, but it isn't about Americans. It's really about grown up life. What some may call "shallow" I would argue is the public sphere giving me private space and someone to chit chat with at lunch. I really don't want to talk about much more than Seinfeld at lunch.

[Anonymous]

The key is to just be confident in yourself. Being your best self is ALL that matters. Don't think too much about this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The key is to just be confident in yourself. Being your best self is ALL that matters. Don't think too much about this.

Unless you are trying to go about your business and you continuously face subtle discrimination. I am a child of immigrants (from southern europe) - we have a generically "foreign" look and sound -- we could be taken for south american, middle eastern, greek, italian, north african... I grew up in a family business where we dealt with the "public" -- and don't be fooled, there was alot of "you're taking our jobs" and "go back to where you came from" nonsense being spouted from customers. Granted, these customers tended to be uneducated jerk-wads, but still, the sentiment is out there. I also am regularly called on by my parents to conduct certain business dealings because they have found that people with an "accent" are frequently not taken seriously. I sound generically american and don't have to deal with this BS like they do.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The key is to just be confident in yourself. Being your best self is ALL that matters. Don't think too much about this.

Unless you are trying to go about your business and you continuously face subtle discrimination. I am a child of immigrants (from southern europe) - we have a generically "foreign" look and sound -- we could be taken for south american, middle eastern, greek, italian, north african... I grew up in a family business where we dealt with the "public" -- and don't be fooled, there was alot of "you're taking our jobs" and "go back to where you came from" nonsense being spouted from customers. Granted, these customers tended to be uneducated jerk-wads, but still, the sentiment is out there. I also am regularly called on by my parents to conduct certain business dealings because they have found that people with an "accent" are frequently not taken seriously. I sound generically american and don't have to deal with this BS like they do.

I've had a similar experience as the PP whose family originates from southern Europe. My parents have an accent (don't live in this area) and they are treated like idiots. For those of you who are not recent immigrants or descendants of recent immigrants, you don't experience many overt and subtle reactions from "Americans". Simplistic advice rather diminishes my feelings rather than help me process and come to a resolution. Being "confident" may be the final result, but there is a whole process of growing and making sense of one's identity based on negative treatment by ignorant people, whether they have an education or not.

[Anonymous]

PPs are so completely right!
I noticed the difference on how people treated me as my accent has been reduced throughout the years. It's amazing!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:10:11 - Maybe in your country there's no checking the box. But please don't pretend that this is unique to the US, or uniquely harmful. That box checking isn't because Homeland Security cares about your ethnicity particularly, but because we do a darn good job here studying our own population for perfectly nice purposes. Try France: It is illegal to ask about background which means they have no clue about who lives there and the particular needs of different ethnic groups. There's a non-profit group trying to replicate a census outside the government so that social services could do a better job than they currently can at targeting the "at risk."

As for OP. There's something to what you are saying, but it isn't about Americans. It's really about grown up life. What some may call "shallow" I would argue is the public sphere giving me private space and someone to chit chat with at lunch. I really don't want to talk about much more than Seinfeld at lunch.

So I'm from Argentina, my husband is from Pakistan, which box do I check for my child born in the US?

This is BS!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:10:11 - Maybe in your country there's no checking the box. But please don't pretend that this is unique to the US, or uniquely harmful. That box checking isn't because Homeland Security cares about your ethnicity particularly, but because we do a darn good job here studying our own population for perfectly nice purposes. Try France: It is illegal to ask about background which means they have no clue about who lives there and the particular needs of different ethnic groups. There's a non-profit group trying to replicate a census outside the government so that social services could do a better job than they currently can at targeting the "at risk."

As for OP. There's something to what you are saying, but it isn't about Americans. It's really about grown up life. What some may call "shallow" I would argue is the public sphere giving me private space and someone to chit chat with at lunch. I really don't want to talk about much more than Seinfeld at lunch.

So I'm from Argentina, my husband is from Pakistan, which box do I check for my child born in the US?

This is BS!

I check the "other" box and where it says specify, I write "human."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

So I'm from Argentina, my husband is from Pakistan, which box do I check for my child born in the US?

This is BS!

While I agree that this is BS, your child would check off "white" or "caucasian". What really stinks about this type of classification is that it ignores much institutional bias against immigrants in this country. To qualify for certain types of aid and/or scholarships you have to be an immigrant from a particular part of the world (or a recognized US minority group). If you are not, you're out of luck. No matter that a child or his or her parents may have had to overcome horrific poverty, ethnic cleansing, illiteracy... you name it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

So I'm from Argentina, my husband is from Pakistan, which box do I check for my child born in the US?

This is BS!

While I agree that this is BS, your child would check off "white" or "caucasian". What really stinks about this type of classification is that it ignores much institutional bias against immigrants in this country. To qualify for certain types of aid and/or scholarships you have to be an immigrant from a particular part of the world (or a recognized US minority group). If you are not, you're out of luck. No matter that a child or his or her parents may have had to overcome horrific poverty, ethnic cleansing, illiteracy... you name it.

"The term Caucasian race (also Caucasoid) has been used to denote the general physical type of some or all of the indigenous human populations of Europe, North Africa, the Horn of Africa, West Asia, Central Asia, and South Asia."
How come my child is Caucasian?

[Anonymous]

me again.. we're anything but white! lol

[Anonymous]

So I'm from Argentina, my husband is from Pakistan, which box do I check for my child born in the US?

This is BS!

I check the "other" box and where it says specify, I write "human."




I like this
The truth is everybody lives in the shadows when it comes to race in America (or the western world for this matter). There are serious research and many scholars interested in the subject and I advise everyone involved into reading a bit about a Post-structuralist approach to our idea of race, culture and gender how our identities are shaped and the idea we have of others.

[Anonymous]

You should have seen how bad it was for immigrants in the 40's. Talk about discrimination - and **lack of civil rights!** Comparatively, there is far little to complain about. I am not saying it is right. I am just saying that progress, believe it or not, has been made and continues to be made. Be grateful it wasn't back then.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What's "bi-racial" anyway?
I hate such concepts. If the whole point is to mix it up why do we need to label people?
I'm Brazilian, my husband is Indian, my children are American. Does the color of our skin, the shape of our noses, the texture of our hair really matter?
It really pisses me off!
Why when we go home nobody mentions the differences between our looks? Why only here?

Aaaah, welcome to the great American obsession. When you figure it out, come explain it to me. According to my American friends (and I mean the ones born and raised here), my kids are biracial. But we're German, so they're really only.....German.