african american whaaaaa??????

[Al B. Sure!]

Black culture grew out of a synthesis of many African cultures plus the culture of the American South.

what the hell? the slaves had no connection with African culture. they were ripped from it and forced to repudiate all of their ancient culture. what you just said is a denial of the brutalities of the diaspora.

There are culinary similarities (yams for example).

yams were transported from Africa to the american south (just as cotton and rice were transported from Asia). this is irrelevent

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
Now we have self-segregation and the hypenated Americans, I think, are indicative of that.

You act like this is something new, like whites didn't self-segregate from everyone. When (some of) my ancestors came to American, they were called Italians. They were met my signs reading INA, Italian Need not Apply. It was multifunction, cuz it works for Irish too. You see, when they came over, they weren't considered real Americans.

The demand to be an Italian-American is not a demand to be Italian, it's a demand to be American. But then people don't like the way we are American. They say, noooooo, you can;t be Italian-American, you can only be an American. **** you. What the hell is wrong with being Italian? It's not a disease, there's nothing wrong with it. Don't you have enough problems in your life that worring about whether or not I like pasta?

[Imran Siddiqui]

You act like this is something new, like whites didn't self-segregate from everyone.

So two wrongs make a right, then, is it?

The demand to be an Italian-American is not a demand to be Italian, it's a demand to be American. But then people don't like the way we are American. They say, noooooo, you can;t be Italian-American, you can only be an American.

Bull****! No one today is going to say an Italian family eating pasta and in the waste management business () is not American. Oh, they did it a hundred years ago. Let it go!

Me or my family has never been told we're not an American, and our cultural practices are much more out of the mainstream than people descended from Italians.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Albert Speer
what the hell? the slaves had no connection with African culture. they were ripped from it and forced to repudiate all of their ancient culture. what you just said is a denial of the brutalities of the diaspora.

You seem to be under the misapprehension that it was 100% effective. If it was less than 100% effective, which it was, then small bits of African culture would be held.

You seem to think that in order for people to hang on to bits of their culture, they need to be in contact with the mother land. Did Jews stop being Jews when they were expelled from Judea? Does the fact the Lemba and Ethiopean Jews had no connection with Arab and European Jews mean that they somehow lost touch with their religion?

yams were transported from Africa to the american south (just as cotton and rice were transported from Asia). this is irrelevent

And how does that deny a shared culture?

[Al B. Sure!]

the expulsion from Judea was no where near the severity of slavery.

[Lorizael]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara

Originally posted by Lorizael
I call people whatever they want to be called, because I don't believe that I have any right to infringe upon anyone's identity.

Then why don't you just let it go with that? What is so ****ing hard with respecting peoples' self-identity?

Stop making assumptions. I do respect people's identity. But I don't respect people's identity for artificial things like race or religion or hairstyle. I respect it for their personality. I respect it for who they actually are.

However, I still believe the term African-American, as well as all the other -American terms, to be foolish, and I'll tell you why.

I don't really care.

And yet you kept going.

Unfortunately, their creation of a single identity detracts from the identity of America as a whole,

This is the essence of your objection. What it comes down to is, opressed groups are always belamed for their oppression. "African-Americans are treated differently because they call themselves a African-American." Okay, and why were they treated differently before the 1980s? Do you think racism just vanished?

I never said that. Stop putting words in my mouth. Racism came about because a bunch of ignorant ****heads thought that if someone had black skin, it meant they were inferior human beings. Racism still exists today because there are still people who think that. The ability to end racism, however, does not exist because people continue to feel a need to segregate themselves from one another.

In part, the call for the abolition of various hyphen-Americans is a call for the abolition of those groups. There should be no African-Americans. There should be no Irish-Americans. We should all watch the same tv shows, eat the same food, dress the same way, and listen to the same music. People should feel no connection to anywhere but the United States. People should feel no connection to others with similar cultural backrounds.

Why can't you look upon our differences as a strength, that what makes America great is that there are so many different kinds of Americans?

I think people should feel connected to each other because of the bonds they create, not the artificial bonds that have totally subjective meanings and unwanted connotations.

What if we don't want to be like you? What if we think your culture sucks? That you're boring? Why can't you respect our right to be different? Why does our difference scare you? Why does it offend you? Why should we be forced to be like you in order for you to respect us? Why do you need to make us just like you? Why do you need to ethnically cleanse us?

Who the **** said anything about my culture? Who the **** said I was scared or offended? I don't give a **** where you come from. It has no bearing whatsoever on what I think of you. I make opinions based on your personality.

Likewise, I hate it when people call me white. I don't want to be identified by my race, by my sex, by my heritage, by my religion. I think this merely creates walls that have to be overcome. I'd rather create community than rely on the community that we're supposed to live in.

That's why I use the internet for communication so often. I had no idea you were of Irish and Italian descent, and I didn't want to know. Now that I do know, it doesn't change what I think of you. I still respect you for your political ideals, and dislike the extremes to which you go. I have thought these things for a long time, and nothing about the identity you give to yourself is going to change that.

You didn't call me a racist, but you came damn close. Ethnic cleansing. Synonym for genocide. I think I'm too lazy to hit that report button. But for ****'s sake, stop tyring to anger us, it won't get you anywhere.

[chequita guevara]

All bonds are artificial. Why are ehtnicities inferior to nationalities?

[chequita guevara]

All bonds are artificial. Why are ethnicities inferior to nationalities?

[Al B. Sure!]

this debate is getting weird with the accusations of racism thrown about (I'm only calling chegitz a racist to be ironic) so let me just sum this up to get this back on course...

the crux of this arguement is over one issue, the two sides having little metaphors to represent their position. one, the melting pot, theory, which Lorizael and Imran support, champions assimiliation. Racism can only be overcome when we end that which is both the cause and the symptom of racism: division and segregation.

To them, racial labels are a new form of segregation. they are an indication of racism as well as the mother of future racism. transcending race, nationality, ethnicity, etc. and realizing that you and all people are individual humans is the goal of this viewpoint.

Chegitz, however, champions the salad bowl metaphor which sees America as a place of independent cultures being together but remianing independent. they are a part of the whole but are not of it. they can exist seperately.

this viewpoint combats the assimiliation position calling it inherently wrong but to be assimiliated, one has to repudiate one's own culture and accept a new one; that is, the American one. This in itself is bothersome as it would mean that assimiliation destroys cultures and denies people their histories.

furthermore, the so-called American culture which would transcend race is problematic as there is no set American culture. Who determines what is American? The majority? then the culture will be one of Anglo-German whites with some irish thrown in... the culture of baseball and apple pies? of suits and ties? of sex, drugs and rock and roll? of country music and pick up trucks? of gangsters and money? there is simply no proper American culture for people to assimilate to, making the assimiliation arguement impractical.

[chequita guevara]

Good lord, Speer acting as a mediator. . . . and getting it right.

[Arrian]

Holy ****. Wonders never cease.

I tend towards melting pot over salad bowl, but Che has made a couple of points that make me wonder if my preference boils down to me being of a group that doesn't suffer from racism (hell, I'm a WASP, FFS).

-Arrian

[Al B. Sure!]

Chegitz:

if you look at history, there has been a tendency for bonds to move up and beyond blood. the first consortiums of people were between immediate family members. These evolved into clan and tribal relationships between relatives who were a bit more distant (such as cousins). These tribes gave way to city-states and kingdoms and for the first time, people existed with those they were not clearly related to.

But kingdoms and nations were still based on racial lines so there was a blood kinship between members of a country. With the emergence of Liberalism and communism, however, this tendency in history to only be among your own blood relations ended. Liberalism championed individuality while communism championed a brotherhood of proletariat. an idealogy replaced the blood-ties of the past. the democratic US and the communist USSR were states with a racially diverse population, united by a shared general idealogy.

i fear that racial pride is a stepping back in the progress of civilization. our chance at brotherhood among men may only be possible through idealogical ties.

[Al B. Sure!]

chegitz and Arrian, don't act like you weren't aware of my relative intelligence. i just use some so-called bad debate arguements like red herrings, strawman arguements, and ad hominems. frankly, i dont see the problem with using them. appeals to emotion are part of converting someone to your side.

[Lorizael]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara
All bonds are artificial. Why are ethnicities inferior to nationalities?

I don't like national bonds either. I said it earlier. I am just a part of this universe. I don't even like to label myself human. You won't find any inconsistencies with me, Che. I think all division is stupid, artificial, and useless.

I create bonds where I think a bond is beneficial to me and the other person. If I feel that I have a connection to a person, which is based upon the interaction of our two personalities, then I seek to enhance the bond. There are no further considerations as far as I'm concerned.

I don't want people to become true and proper Americans. I want people to be whoever the **** they want to be.

But the people I will choose to associate with, I will choose to associate with based on personality, and because of this I think any other identifier is at best inconvenient and at worst counter productive.

When dealing with me.

[chequita guevara]

What it comes down to for me is, you should be able to be an American if you want, as long as you don't identify it with the only way to be American. I should be able to be Italian-American if I want, as long as I don't think any less of people because they aren't. I should be able to respect you for your choice (which I do) and you should be able to respect me for my choice.

If you have a problem with my ethnicity, **** off.