# Do you put little stock in your ethnicity? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [November 12, 2003, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-put-little-stock-in-your-ethnicity/212906 "2003-11-12T21:19:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![CaptBushido](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a88e4f/32.png) [@CaptBushido](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CaptBushido)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2003, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-put-little-stock-in-your-ethnicity/212906/41 "2003-11-14T03:44:47Z")
> [@](#): > > my great uncle was Walter Dornberger, the V2 missle guy Wow. That impresses me SO much more than anyone’s claim to be related to celebrities or politicians. Then again, I’m a history buff, so my world is topsy turvy… ---
**Author:** ![Seven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Seven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Seven)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2003, 4:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-put-little-stock-in-your-ethnicity/212906/42 "2003-11-14T04:07:55Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by CaptBushido \* > \*\*Wow. That impresses me SO much more than anyone’s claim to be related to celebrities or politicians. > > Then again, I’m a history buff, so my world is topsy turvy… \*\* Unlike my family, I think it’s pretty cool myself. His team pretty much helped humans get on the moon. Granted, they didn’t have to lob V2’s at people. heh heh ---
**Author:** ![Hot\_Buttered\_Toast](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b38774/32.png) [@Hot\_Buttered\_Toast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hot_Buttered_Toast)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2003, 8:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-put-little-stock-in-your-ethnicity/212906/43 "2003-11-14T08:32:08Z")
Half-Indian, half-Chinese, I study in a Chinese school but don’t put much stock in either side of my heritage. ---
**Author:** ![BraheSilver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ecccb3/32.png) [@BraheSilver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BraheSilver)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2003, 9:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-put-little-stock-in-your-ethnicity/212906/44 "2003-11-14T09:04:11Z")
I’m half-German on my mother’s side. This doesn’t affect my day-to-day life at all, aside from a propensity to crack jokes about sausages, ornamental spikes, dependable machinery, and the occasional foray into world domination. I don’t have any special urges to visit the land of my ancestors. Although backpacking across Europe, wearing a Hawaiian shirt and a cowboy hat while passing out ketchup to every restaurant I stop in sounds fun. My father’s side is one giant mutt-mix labeled under “North American.” We don’t have a clue what all is in there past three or four generations. ---
**Author:** ![Cardinal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cardinal/32/4000_2.png) [@Cardinal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cardinal)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2003, 10:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-put-little-stock-in-your-ethnicity/212906/45 "2003-11-14T10:42:17Z")
I was just talking about this with a guy from church on Sunday night. We agreed that you’re an individual first, and a member of some ethniciity second. If you want to keep things going for the tradtions, great. I’m glad that someone still speaks Navaho. It would be sad if it were completely lost. He told me that he has been told by his mother that he should name his first son after his father, because that’s what Greek people do. I don’t think she’s going to get her wish. Pushing people into molds based on their backgrounds is inherently racist. It says, “I know what you should be doing and not doing based on what you look like and where your ancestors were from.” Try translating that into “Black people should all go back to Africa and forget English”, and see how far you get. ---
**Author:** ![FairyChatMom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fairychatmom/32/22080_2.png) [@FairyChatMom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FairyChatMom)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2003, 11:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-put-little-stock-in-your-ethnicity/212906/46 "2003-11-14T11:11:22Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by liirogue \* > \*\*[hijack] **Fairy** , I don’t understand. Enlighten me, please? > > [/hijack] \*\* Not a big deal, really, just my own quirk. I spent my formative years listening to people saying “Everyone’s Irish on St. Patrick’s day” and, by golly, I am not Irish. So I didn’t wear green. In fact, I usually wore red. Yeah, I know, real mature… No logic. Just a quirk. Pay no attention to the weird woman. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![ccwaterback](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/df705f/32.png) [@ccwaterback](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ccwaterback)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2003, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-put-little-stock-in-your-ethnicity/212906/47 "2003-11-14T12:39:14Z")
I’m a United States mutt, so who cares 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![RobertP](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8e8cbc/32.png) [@RobertP](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RobertP)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2003, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-put-little-stock-in-your-ethnicity/212906/48 "2003-11-14T12:55:36Z")
I am the usual American mutt as well, though there were definitely times when I envied my friends who got to practice cool traditions, eat different foods, and to speak other languages with relatives. I had culture envy. However, nowadays I think of myself not as an American, but as a human being (and it’s really too bad Dubya can’t do the same – he might feel differently about taking over other countries). And if you think about it, enthnicity is not about place, but about time. I am American now (accordingly to my passport). 150 years ago I was an Italian. 500 years ago I would have been a subject of the Kingdom of Naples (just an example; excuse my lack of knowledge of European history [more proof that I am American!]). 2000 years ago I might have been a member of a Jewish tribe in the near East. And 15,000 years ago, perhaps my ancestors were hunter-gatherers in the Tigris valley. So actually, I am Iraqi (don’t tell Dubya!) So you get my point. I do attach value to ethnicity as a nominal indicator of common practices and interests at a point in time, but as a hard-wired identity, I think it means very little. ---
**Author:** ![ccwaterback](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/df705f/32.png) [@ccwaterback](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ccwaterback)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2003, 2:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-put-little-stock-in-your-ethnicity/212906/49 "2003-11-14T14:18:57Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by RobertP \* > **I am the usual American mutt as well, though there were definitely times when I envied my friends who got to practice cool traditions, eat different foods, and to speak other languages with relatives. I had culture envy.** I have had many friends from all over the world. I always enjoyed visiting them when I was the only non-member of their ethnicity. I ate some real interesting food (ever have milk fish? yum yum). I also found it interesting to hear their views on world politics and social issues. Most of these people were from other countries, so they rarely expressed their political opinion in public (they were taught with an iron fist to keep their views to themselves in their native lands). It was also interesting to hear them talk about Americans, sometimes humorous, usually derogatory. I suppose I am mostly Irish, who knows? I know I have been sloshed out of my head at funerals, so I guess that makes it official 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![wolfman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a8b319/32.png) [@wolfman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfman)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2003, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-put-little-stock-in-your-ethnicity/212906/50 "2003-11-14T17:35:00Z")
It’s kind of strange, but I consider my self to be ethnically Coloradoan more than anything. American just seems so big, and largely unfamiliar to me in the popular perception. People who eat cheez-whiz on a cheesesteak, have never touched, let alone fired or owned a gun, say “soda”, think paprika is a spice, make barbeque without sauce, or say “pahk the cah” just seem so different as to be a bunch of different cultures in my mind. As for farther back ethicities I once asked my grandma(who was born in Russia and moved as a young child) if she liked being Russian Her answer was that she was American, and if they had wanted to be Russian they’d have stayed in Russia. Which made sence to me. ---
**Author:** ![Ca3799](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9f8e36/32.png) [@Ca3799](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ca3799)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2003, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-put-little-stock-in-your-ethnicity/212906/51 "2003-11-14T17:56:39Z")
I don’t have any ethnic identity at all. I’m so very completely anAmerican. I’m actually embarrased to say I don’t know where my family(ies) came from origionally, except that I know I had one Swedish great grandparent. In defense of my ignorance, I have no living parents, granparents or great granparents, and so noone to ask any questions of, and I don’t know of any written histories or family tree type stuff to exist about us. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-put-little-stock-in-your-ethnicity/212906.md?page=2)