[Sacajaweau]

If I was born in Africa...and both my parents are English, and we come to the United States, I am not African American...I am English.

[Lurker]

Both of Elon’s parents were born in South Africa so your analogy is flawed.

L

[hanamizu]

If I was born in Africa...and both my parents are English, and we come to the United States, I am not African American...I am English.

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The quibble is over what ‘African-American’ means. Like many things dealing with race, things apparently don’t mean what the definition of the words mean.

‘Black’ doesn’t refer to a person’s skin color (many from India are much ‘blacker’ than people descended from Africa) but rather means someone whose ancestors are from sub-Saharan Africa, no matter what their actual skin color might be.

‘African’ apparently doesn’t mean someone from the continent of Africa, but rather someone from sub-Saharan Africa who happens to also be ‘black’. People from Egypt or North Africa who become Americans are not ‘African-Americans’.

Elon Musk was born in Africa. He became an American. Logic would say he must be, in some sense, an African-American. But apparently, that label is reserved for those whose ancestors, or at least one of whose ancestors might have been sub-Saharan African.