Posted on 05/03/2010 7:30:37 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
It was the United States Census. "Do you live here? What is your name?"
As I said it, a gleam came into his eye. "Are you a Ukrainian-American?" he asked.
It wasn't always like this. When we moved from Venezuela to America in 1956, the United States government was concerned that I become an American without ethnicity attached. The immigration agent at LaGuardia Airport wanted to change my name to Walter. He explained that it would be easier for me to have a name that sounded American as I grew up. My mother refused.
The government did not give up so easily. In school, Spanish and Ukrainian were not accepted languages. I needed to learn English quickly. I still remember my teachers. They took time to help me become an American.
They started with the basics, to help my transition from rural Venezuela to urban America. A sixth-grade teacher noticed I could not pronounce the "TH" sound and sent me to speech therapy for two years to learn how to place my tongue on my teeth to pronounce "the" just like the native-born Americans. The speech therapist also taught me to speak English without the Spanish cadence.
By high school, I spoke English like a native. The only giveaway that I was different was my name.
As I became more American, more Americans insisted that I really was an ethnic American. So by 1968, I was not sure who I was or to which country I belonged.
My mother once said, "There are only two things wrong with Americans. One, they are incredibly naïve about the world, and two, they do not realize how lucky they are."
In 1968, our family watched in disbelief and horror as the only country that offered hope and a future for planet Earth ripped apart. We saw an unpopular war, political assassinations, and riots. We saw freedoms fall, once again, behind the Iron Curtain in Czechoslovakia and an America too preoccupied with its own troubles to even protest.
It was during these turbulent times that I began the process of becoming an American citizen. But I was still unsure if this was my country. I finished college at the University of California, Berkeley. At the time, it was ground zero for the native anti-American movement. It was unbelievable to see American college students carrying the red flags of communism. To my parents, the hammer and sickle on the Soviet flag symbolized death and famine.
I was unsure if I was an American.
Foresters always have a strong attraction to blank places on a map. Canada had a lot of blank places. Confused and unsure of America's future and my own, I decided to move to Canada to attend graduate school.
Canada is a very different country. The first clue was when I changed my greenback dollars to the multicolored Canadian bills. There on the front was a picture of her, the Queen of the Commonwealth. When I went to the post office, there she was again beaming down behind the postal clerks. I remember thinking, "Who elected her queen?"
I was thinking like an American.
In response to the kidnapping of government ministers, press censorship was imposed throughout Canada. No one complained or demonstrated. It dawned on me that the First Amendment did not apply north of the border.
I had a hard time adapting to Canadian society and higher education. As I walked into a seminar on forestry research, little did I know that this presentation would change my life.
A graduate student spent ten minutes talking about the historical differences between Canada and the United States. He pointed out that a corporation, the Hudson Bay Company, founded Canada. There was no revolution in Canada. He joked that the reason Canadians have socialized medicine is that it began as a corporate benefit. Like most businesses, the emphasis is on fitting in with the corporate culture. Creativity and individualism are not encouraged in Canada.
During that brief lecture, I realized that I was never going to fit in Canada. Being born in one country, raised in another culture, and educated in a third, you are always guaranteed to be different. I needed to live in a country where individuals are valued.
America requires that you believe in the social experiment started over two hundred years ago. You must believe in America and the principles stated in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.
I packed my truck, stuck Allman Brothers into the tape deck, and left Canada playing "Southbound" at maximum volume. When I hit the border, the agent asked why I was entering the United States. With a grin, I said, "I'm coming home." He said, "Over to the side, and start unpacking the truck."
Even that request did not change my mood. America might have been going to hell in a handbasket during the early 1970s, but I was going to go along for the ride. There was not a better country in the world for me. For better or worse, this is my country.
Even so, I still viewed myself as a hyphenated American.
Change came in 1976. I got accepted to graduate school at Berkeley, so I quit my job, bought a bicycle in England, and started pedaling through Europe. The highlight of the trip for me was the time behind the Iron Curtain.
While traveling through the Soviet Union, I noticed that people identified me as an American, or as an American with Ukrainian parents.
I took a Soviet ship from Finland to England. At the registration desk a young, attractive Soviet woman asked my name and nationality. "Vladimir Steblina, Ukrainian-American," I answered. Her reply, in the best icy commissar style, was, "No such thing."
I had plenty of time to ponder her comment.
The reason we were in America was that the family farm in the Ukraine was confiscated, my grandmother shot, and my father made homeless and an orphan at the age of ten.
The Ukraine was part of our tragic family history. America, on the other hand, gave us not only one opportunity, but second and third chances.
I realized that I owed America everything. I was not born an American. English is my third language, but I take pride in the ideals, values, and achievements of this country.
I cheapen the value of America and give credit to a sorry chapter in our family's history by insisting on hyphenating my nationality.
Unfortunately, the American government now thinks differently.
The census taker repeated his question.
I replied, "I would rather be just an American, but I suppose technically I am a Latino of European origin."
"I do not have a box for Latinos of European origin," he said.
I just shrugged.
And your daughter, is she a Latino of European origin?"
I shook my head. "No, you don't understand. The reason we came to this country was so she could be an American. She is a good one, too. She has the poise, the confidence, the sense of fair play, the optimism, the drive to succeed, and the tolerance that marks America."
I am disappointed that my own government wants to hyphenate me.
At least my daughter is un-hyphenated. I hope she realizes how lucky she is to be just an American.
-- Vladimir Steblina, Wenatchee, Washington, is retired from the U.S. Forest Service
Wow... I want to shake this man’s hand! He’s absolutely right: We have no idea how lucky we are. My great-grandmother emigrated here from the Ukraine in the 20s after her entire village was wiped out by famine and the Soviet jackboot. She made a life here and lived in her little villas and cottages her entire life with little more than some crocheting needles and a black and white TV. The woman was grateful to have her life and her freedom (and her oven!).
She told me once that I should be thankful for everything I have and everything I will have because men, good men, died for me to have it all. As a 30 year old man now, I wish I’d known then what I knew now, because I would have myriad questions for my great-grandmother about her feelings on what’s going on in this country.
That part of my family has all passed on, but the ideals are fresh in my heart and mind as a conservative American. I never breakdown my ethnic heritage when asked “what [I] am,” I simply say, “I’m American!”
Once we can get past the hyphenations, the designations, the governmental separation of people based on heritage, we will truly become the melting pot that America is supposed to be. Until then, we will live under the jackboot of the American thugocracy, because the Federal government sees fit to divide us in order to conquer us.
I will proudly stand by any black, Indian, Ukrainian, Russian, Frechman, Brit, Canadian, Mexican, Cuban, Puerto Rican, Korean, Jap, or Chinaman provided we all consider ourselves AMERICAN first!
We had many german-americans up till about 1940, then they all disappeared.............
In the new Free America,
recognition of anyone’s “group status” based on ethnicity, skin color, origin, etc,
should not be allowed.
Sadly, many Americans will proudly ballyhoo their heritage when that particular country is doing good in the world, but as soon as negatives are associated to them, the hyphenation goes away.
It’s always been amusing to me that blacks consider themselves African-American when little more than death, famine, and the Religion of Peace comes out of the “cradle of civilization.”
THanks for the post.
Many Americans do not realize just blessed this Nation is every day. Since most American have never visited anywhere outside of the US, they just don’t know any better.
OTOH, a lot of GIs have lived overseas and know just how different (and some say better) the US is over what else is offered out there - warts and all.
Which is why I say each time the Customs person asks”HOw you got anything thing to declare?”
“Why yes sit/ma’m, I declare I am glad to be back in the United States of America!”
My mother once said, “There are only two things wrong with Americans. One, they are incredibly naïve about the world, and two, they do not realize how lucky they are.”
My grandfather used to say the same thing and his family arrived before the American Revolution.
“...when little more than death, famine, and the Religion of Peace comes out of the “cradle of civilization.”
Or ever did. I wonder if the ‘African-Americans’ here would survive ONE month in their homeland.
Wow
“Which is why I say each time the Customs person asks”HOw you got anything thing to declare?”
“Why yes sit/ma’m, I declare I am glad to be back in the United States of America!”
Great addition to this thread.
may I borrow your declaration?
I wrote about this yesterday in another post. If the “African”-Americans want to call themselves that, they should spend a few days in Africa to realize what they’re asking for. The lives they have in America, even under the most destitute of situations, is NOTHING compared to the squalor and homicide they would witness in their “mother country.”
I agree with your sentiment, but your statement is ironic.
Maybe if you said, “government recognition...shall not be allowed.”
Only if the Constitution is “ironic”.
The underlying assumption of the Constitution is that
the government is “not allowed” to do a lot of things.
That’s because the Constitution is considered the highest law,
and any act contrary to it is “not allowed”.
The most penniless and impoverished American (ANY kind of an American) lives in palatial luxury and has an infinitely more optimistic prognosis for his future than the poor of Africa... which is MOST people in Africa.
That Americans, even the affluent, cannot comprehend how truly fortunate and blessed they are, is beyond me.
In school, grade school all the way through high school, my classmates were children from every strata of American society. They sat in the same classes, had the same teachers, received the same books…etc. If they have not succeeded, it is not for lack of educational opportunity.
Once in a great while I see some of them who did not succeed. They made wrong choices, early and repeatedly…. They basically forfeited their opportunities and stunted their own futures for whatever reasons you would like to name. It is NOT my fault. I feel NO guilt.
That was my point. In a free society, it is specifically the government that is “not allowed” to do stuff.
It appears that we’re arguing about what we agree on.
Ironic, no?
Damn right, SMARTY! I’ve always said that our Founders guaranteed the right to Life, Liberty, and the PURSUIT of Happiness. They NEVER guaranteed your happiness; they guaranteed that you’d have the opportunity to pursue it. What you do with that opportunity is your business.
I have a 27 year old brother who lives with our mother, been unemployed for almost 5 years by his own choice, high school drop out, drug addict, and I just stand back, cross my arms and say, “You had your chance and you ruined it. The only way back to the top is to WORK FOR IT!” He doesn’t understand that, thinks that he’s owed something because he’s 27 and shouldn’t have to start over.
The mentalities in our youth are going to be a BIG problem in the coming years. I pray that America can heal itself politically AND spiritually, because without God, this fight is going to be fruitless.
LOL! True.
I guess I’ll just elaborate by saying that any individual or group of individuals may be free to form whatever ethinic based association they like. So we can still have our Italian and Jewish and Polish and Irish clubs, and even have parades and stuff. Hell, they can even have privately funded scholarships if they want. None of that can be “disallowed” in a free society, ever.
But government should not be in the business of classifying or granting any sort of special status to any ethnic group.
I would like to have a nickel for every time I started over. I could sit around and mope that I got a bad break or I could take what I learned and begin again.
Unless you are independently wealthy or you have some other kind of safety net, taking your lumps and bouncing back is a talent to cultivate.
It helps if you are not afraid of W O R K !!!!!
When I sit in my nice Lincoln's air conditioning waiting for the light to change, thoughts like this come to me and make me very humble and grateful to America. When I see the swastikas scrawled in refried beans on the walls of government buildings by the new generation of immigrants, I have thoughts which are not very nice.
I get ya now -
non-government folks are free to associate with whom they please,
and government policy is not “allowed” to recognize and therefore disparately treat groups based on their ethnicity.
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