Posted on 08/28/2004 1:30:11 PM PDT by Pokey78
BC ping
Don't blame him. he doesn't want to be indentified with Ter RAY zuh Heinz Ferreira Kerry.
American will do just fine.
An American citizen born in Africa, IS an African-American if they so choose to be called (but most of the ones I've known actually prefer simply "American"). An American citizen born in this country is NOT African anything.
I have a good friend who is a white, female, South African born American.. she calls herself African American and gets dirty looks from American blacks when she does so, even though she has more right to the name than they do.
"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..."
Theodore Roosevelt, 1915
I can't recall any other ethnic group that has redefined itself as much as the American negro. I firmly believe that white liberals have had a large part in this redefinition.
White Liberals are control freaks who will screw up any ethnic group that lets them get close.
Back around 1980 I had the pleasure of working with a Sargent from New Guinea. He was a deep black color, kinky black hair, broad nose, thick lips - and had his clan’s facial tattoo. He spoke English with a very slight educated New Zealand type accent.
We often went bar hopping together, and he would become extremely indignant when he was referred to as “African-American”.
“I’m not African and I’m not American!” It was very highly insulting to him, not only because of his ethnicity and nationality but also because he had little but contempt for American “African-Americans”.
I have refrained from using that term since - unless I’m 100% sure of the person’s true ethnicity and nationality.
Yep, you gotta blame this on white people.
I prefer to ask someone's name and shake their hand as opposed to trying to figure out what "category" to stuff someone in based on skin color, ethnicity, etc.
Personally, I'm a northern-european,scots-irish, welsh, english, ...where was I, oh, damn, who am I?
I knew a girl whose father was Egyptian. I told her to put herself down as African American and go for all the Affirmative Action goodies she could snag
THAT should be on the front page of every conservative paper in the country. We already know the nazis won't publish it.
No, skippy you are not.
You are an American of African decent.
An American-African.
Get it?
LVM
You're either an American or you're not. If you are, it doesn't matter what you look like, or which boat your parents got off of.
I know a few African immigrants who live in poverty housing and work minimum wage jobs, but work like hell, save their money, and go to school for better education.
All of them have told me that they cannot believe how lazy the "african americans" who share their project are and are they not used to seeing grown men laying around all day and not working, it makes no sense to them.
African - Irish - German - Italian - American has long been a craw in my throat.
As Teddy said ... American first and above all others.
Good reminder.
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