Posted on 02/05/2012 7:49:11 AM PST by Libloather
Some blacks insist: 'I'm not African-American'
By JESSE WASHINGTON | Associated Press – 21 hrs ago
The labels used to describe Americans of African descent mark the movement of a people from the slave house to the White House. Today, many are resisting this progression by holding on to a name from the past: "black."
For this group — some descended from U.S. slaves, some immigrants with a separate history — "African-American" is not the sign of progress hailed when the term was popularized in the late 1980s. Instead, it's a misleading connection to a distant culture.
The debate has waxed and waned since African-American went mainstream, and gained new significance after the son of a black Kenyan and a white American moved into the White House. President Barack Obama's identity has been contested from all sides, renewing questions that have followed millions of darker Americans:
What are you? Where are you from? And how do you fit into this country?
"I prefer to be called black," said Shawn Smith, an accountant from Houston. "How I really feel is, I'm American."
"I don't like African-American. It denotes something else to me than who I am," said Smith, whose parents are from Mississippi and North Carolina.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
My favourite example of something similar was an introduction of somebody or other as a 'South African African American'.
My favourite example of something similar was an introduction of somebody or other as a 'South African African American'.
Hopeless slaves to the Democratic Party (for close to 200 years) arguing how to properly name their chains.
Perhaps they need to be recognized for what they seek: reparationists.
I remember when the Olympic sprinter Ben Johnson, who was born in Jamaica and competed for Canada, was haltingly referred to by television reporters as “African-American.”
Idiots.
my wife does the same
when will those people who call themselves African American unuderstand they are about as African as me.
Next time you ever hear the term then ask what country.
I asked two black guys which country they were from and they said America, I asked why are you saying to me then African American to which they replied, because we come from Africa
I asked what country.
No answer they had no clue what countries are in Africa or who in their family came here hundreds of years ago .
Also I point out that whites too come from Africa as well as blacks of which those who say it too look all confused and even had some say no whites from from Africa
I have a buddy who is half white and half black who calls himself “halfrican”. He is shameless in admitting that his racial status got him his fire depratment job.
The FRENCHMAN was not pleased.
Well, I'm a melanin enriched American, so I may as well chime in here.
We called ourselves 'negro' when I was a young child, but for a whole lot of reasons you might not be familiar with, most of us black folks weren't all that keen on the term. For one, it was a term that was more or less assigned to us - not one we chose for ourselves. Secondly, the word simply means 'black' in Spanish.
When negroes started calling themselves 'black' in the 1960s, it was a causative act, and an affirmation of personal and group identity and pride. It caught on nearly instantly, and stuck hard. It made a lot more sense to most of us, than the term, 'negro'.
Over the next 20 years or so, black folks did a lot of reflecting on where they came from. Remember the movie, "Roots"? I believe it was somewhere around that time that more radical blacks began looking to further individuate black people from the rest of America. Adopting the term, 'African-American' accomplished that nicely, and served the purposes of the hard left, to further consolidate their hold on that segment of the American people (and their votes).
Even before I rediscovered my core conservatism, I hated the term, 'African-American', and never accepted it. In my mind, I've always been nothing more than an American. I've got ancestral roots that go back to other continents, but so does every other American. Should they all hyphenate their identity like 'African-Americans' do?
It's just silly, and I don't support it. It's just an insidious way to divide Americans. Are we a country, or are we not? It doesn't matter where ones ancestors came from. You're here now, and you either identify with this country or you don't.
Not just no, but HELL no.
It may be stamped on my birth certificate, but I threw off that disgusting label half a century ago.
How about “American”, “Un-American”, and “Foreign”.
African American, Negro, Black, White, Hispanic are all Un-American terms, IMHO; we’re Americans first, the rest are just visiting.
I always wondered how those from the Caribbean felt calling themselves AA when their origins are far from Africa? I think the best argument I ever heard was between a foreign exchange student from Africa and an American black.It was like who’s on first....the exchange student kept asking “where are you from in Africa” and the black student kept saying “I’m not from African I am African American”....
“When negroes started calling themselves ‘black’ in the 1960s, it was a causative act, and an affirmation of personal and group identity and pride.”
We, us, our, American... are all prefered terms to labeling people by color, but when such labelings are required, I have never met a black that didn’t simply prefer “black”; at least among regular folk.
That's very true for those of us in the baby boomer generation, but there's a great amount of confusion with the whole racial labeling thing among younger blacks. They've been subjected to pc brain washing about this their whole lives.
“How I really feel is, I’m American.”
Great!
You missed one - prior to being negro, they were "colored people" (Ref: NAACP). Also, if I'm not mistaken, the term "Afro-American" was in there somewhere.
We are not in Spain and one doesn't hear of the negro death or the negro plague in the 14th century. Nor do we hear phrases such as his icy negro heart; etc.
Incidentally, I attended out of curiosity a John Birch meeting once and I met a cop there. He was a JBS member (such incidents make me doubt these guys are racists) and he described himself as a negro because he thought the term black for those with rough, bumpy melanin (as opposed to the smoother melanin of white people) was too associated with Communists for him to ever use the term to describe himself.
I guess he was talking about the late Kwame Ture (Stokely Carmichal).
However my friends and acqaintances do not like the term negro, so I use black most of the time in public anyway.
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