[Clemenza]

Italians and many Hispanics have a better claim on whiteness (in the sense that both are European) than Armenians, Persians, Arabs, Jews, etc. "Whiteness" is relative and Italians were not considered "white" in much of America until WWII, when we were finally "accepted" as "white Americans."

The late Irish Gangster Mickey Spillane (NOT the mystery writer) once remarked that he couldn't get control of the waterfront unions because "there is not one white man working there these days." This was in the 1930s, when Italians dominated unskilled dockwork in New York.

[sydney smith]

Now I get you. My father tells me that he wasn’t considered white where he grew up. He is Sicilian. I didn’t get your point earlier. Sorry.