Perhaps you should quit thinking about quantity and start thinking about geography. North and South America are half the physical world.
FYI, here is my 23andme results…not how their “specific” populations don’t have “Cherokee”, or even North American Native groups?
Those are their reference populations and this is where they call “Native American” every native population from the Western hemisphere “Native American” Which is why I said it was like someone matching an Irish individual and claiming to be Chinese earlier.
rat avatar, thank you for your postings here. I saw the comment about the Cherokee Nation being upset in one of the articles, but wanted the argument elaborated on. You have done so thoroughly.
I see your criticisms with respect to the DNA testing and how it lumps all American indigenous groups as one entity. This is an unfortunate result of the lack of participation by North American tribes. As frustrating as it is, not even the DNA scientists feel this is ideal.
The argument you are making with respect to her is that she is looking at DNA results at all rather than letting the Cherokee Nation decide if she’s Cherokee at all. That seems to be missing something. She was looking at her own heritage and trying to confirm her own family stories by the only tool available. It’s a flawed tool, but nevertheless it gives some indications. She has repeatedly stated she does not claim Tribal affiliation, only some weak family heritage.
I get that you are advocating that the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma (and only they) has the right to decide if they are offended, and the Eastern Cherokee Nation doesn’t speak for them - they are a separate entity (people, tribe, government) with some shared history and heritage. That said, it is fair to point out that not everyone who considers themselves Cherokee has a problem with what Warren has done and said.
Your argument that there is a racist underpinning to all of this is troubling. It seems to be that any attempt at looking at ethnic heritage is polluted by racist ideas lumping groups. I think as long as there are phenotypes that we can see versus genotypes that we cannot, this will be an issue for humanity.
To the more specific issue of Elizabeth Warren, you seem concerned that her attitude has offended some disenfranchised minorities in a way to keep them from supporting her, when every vote she can get will matter in an potential campaign against Trump. I can see this being an issue during the Democratic primary, where she will face a lot of other candidates with varying degrees of competitivity with Trump. I can only hope that if she does win out the Democratic Nomination, that those angered by her can get past it and look at the true record - the attitude and harm caused by Trump and the Republicans and the actual steps Warren has taken to support minority and Native American issues - and decide who is best for their interests.
Sure, if we can get better than Warren, go for it. But if she’s the best we got, let’s not trivialize how much better than Trump she is.
Perhaps you are unfamiliar with the problems around tribal sovereignty in the US, that continue even today.
Trump challenges Native Americans’ historical standing
It is the federal government who instituted the idea of blood quantum with the effect of mathematically terminating tribes is a large reason these datasets don’t exist.
I think you are trivializing the promises that Elizabeth Warren made to native people earlier this spring and are ignoring the current attacks against them. She made claims and promises that she broke with the DNA claim that her latin relatives match her claim to be Cherokee. Looking at ethnic heritage is polluted by racist ideas lumping groups when one of the major ways those groups are being discriminated is based on trivializing their distinct treaties and identity.
Instead of trying to justify that lumping of heritage, maybe reframe it in the case that having French markers would be acceptable for denying immigrants as being from Iran or Syria. Within the U.S., there are 562 Native American tribes, why shouldn’t Levantine ancestral component be usable as to apply to other broad population groups?
The Levantine ancestral component is just as valid.
As Joe Biden is French, if Trump chose to troll him with a claim he is Muslim would you use the same DNA claims to prove that he is if he has a few Levantine markers? Why make the exception for American colonialism? I know I would have a problem with it.
BTW, “my $minority friend doesn’t have a problem with it” is generally not accepted with other racial issues, why are the Natives subject to it? If I found a black person who was OK with being called the N word, would it be OK if we started to use it in general public again?
Thank you for the links. I note that it is Trump’s administration that is pushing an agenda against Native Americans. Hard to lay that at the feet of Warren.
And that is a strong justification for the refusal of Native Americans from participating in any DNA endeavors.
And I don’t see how Warren broke any of the promises she made here. Though I agree it is for the Cherokee Nation to decide if they support or reject her based on her actions. I just wonder at the strong Pro-Trump postings on that twitter feed, when by any objective measure it is Trump who is wreaking Native American lives and Warren who has pledged to fight for their issues.
I accept your concern that the markers are not indicative of what she is claiming. She’s making a narrow claim of ancestry based on data markers that are too wide to support that. Although the basis of her claim is not solely those markers - it includes her family’s personal history as shared with her. She’s got a wide set of markers, but a story of how they came there that includes Cherokee heritage and does not include Latin or Hispanic or South American heritage. Could she be uninformed of other possible sources for those markers? Certainly. Is she stepping beyond what the DNA really said? Yes.
It feels to me you are trivializing the very harmful and direct actions of Trump and harping on a very minor and indirect harm by Warren, especially when Warren has shown her commitment to the cause in other ways. What actions would you recommend for her at this point to make amends?
I really don’t see the parallel.
The real problem related to Warren’s DNA test results is not whether this kerfuffle might undermine her 2020 presidency bid but how easily it led to internecine warfare among people on the left side of the political spectrum. If this is a preview of what 2020 is going to be like for the Democrats, Trump’s going to end up winning by default.
My god! She heard her mother claim that one of her ancestors was part Charokee and believed her!! and worse than that she actually tried to look into the veracity of the story using an ancestry test! Stone her at once!!
Anyone who wasn’t an outright Nazi would disowned her mother the instant she dared suggest that she might have some family connection to a tribe. As soon as that ancestor mated with a white person her name should be struck from history and never be mentioned again lest some future generation might deign to feel undeserved kinship with them!
My god! If she hadn’t held onto the claim for so long it wouldn’t be an issue.
Hyperbolic straw-man claim with exclamation points! Another hyperbolic straw-man claim with exclamation points! One last hyperbolic straw-man claim with exclamation points to ignore the fact that her holding onto those false beliefs for years and escalating the family myths at the expense of minotrities isn’t important!
Being ignorant isn’t the problem, refusing to move forward and apologizing is.
For liberals who still don’t get that the “Indian” is a political status label, here is a news source that is liberal leaning and will try and describe why. Seeing as native voices are dismissed as being being irrelevant or some Republican agent provocateur.
https://www.thenation.com/article/dna-tests-elizabeth-warren-native-american-race-science/
I think the most important thing to remember is that it doesn’t matter too much election wise if the Cherokee Nation is all pissy about this. Not really an important voting demographic. Not really even good for much of a rallying point demo like latino immigrants.
So what is your point? She repeated the oral history of her family that one of her relatives was Native American and that their family had disapproved. After being mocked, she used DNA testing to show there is at least some evidence the story is true. She didnt claim to “be an Indian” and certainly never claimed tribal identity.
Would it be better if she were a racist that was ashamed if one of her ancestors was Native American?
Maybe she was unaware that NAs have an issue with DNA testing. I was too. So sue me.
There is a 40+ page thread in the pit called “Interesting podcast conversation between Sam Harris and Charles Murray (of “Bell Curve” fame)” where you can read all the cites. I am not going to make the case to try and convince you that there’s no scientific basis for race.
I am not going to get into a debate with you trying to explain that the pseudoscientific belief in a biological basis for race is not supported empirical evidence. I guess we will just have to wait another century for the majority people to figure this out. Seeing as you ignored a cites I provided in the post you quoted which explained this, and why this is particularly sensitive to Native Americans, yet refused to mention it’s points I am assuming you just decided to ignore it but let me quote part of it.
I get that these ideas have been sold to you, but did you even read that page? Did you choose to ignore it like people did with the eugenicists in the past?
The TL;DR version is that ethnicity is not something measured by genes, unless one subscribes to the discredited pseudoscientific belief in a biological basis for race. I was hopeful that the Democrats did care but it is apparent that they only care about racism when they can fling it at an opponent and when it is convenient for them. I stupidly keep thinking that they actually care about progressive causes like equal rights. It appears given the right numbers the Democrats would also have had no problem supporting a Trump like candidate just as long as the number of minorities being discriminated against doesn’t risk losing an election.
Just curious, was that story about everyone outside of Africa having Neanderthal genes a pseudo scientific lie?
It was a stupid own goal. The merits of the claim were irrelevant.
She is 1023/1024 European.
Nothing, It is then trying to map that to culture to DNA or to an attempt to justify a claim to a biological basis for race that it becomes pseudo scientific.
But that is your strawman, so why don’t you expand on it. As the Americas were peopled 14,000 or more years ago, and Motala-2 in Sweden from 8000 years ago is more related to them than Modern Europeans, which is about the time that light skin arose in Europe, justify your “white” vs “Indian” modern racialism claims.
Trying to shove people into Caucasoid, Mongoloids, Negroids, and Australoids (or Native Americans as a sub type of Mongoloids) is the problem here.
The use of this data and research to seeming scientifically justify racist ideology is the problem. It is not science that is ignoring the evidence, that is done by those claiming the existence of races in the first place.
The Americas have been peopled for far longer than “white people” even existed with their current traits across Europe, yet you will assume that all Native peoples are the same over a longer time period because you can’t tell them apart?
This is a pure colonialist view, People living in Briton 1000’s of years after the Americas were peopled were dark skinned but all those “Natives” who have been developing into their own groups are all exactly the same because …?
Even if DNA passed heritage and culture, which it does not, the fact that you are still using these dated 1800th century “races” to categorize these groups should help you see that this line of thinking is racialism and not science.
I get that direct to consumer companies repackaged racialism in a cute package, but that doesn’t change what it is if you just rename the “races” as another term and use it to justify the exact same oppression of minorities. Those racial categories are just as invalid no matter if you use Craniometry or 23andme.
If you think that there is any scientific evidence that makes race biological you are very mistaken. The fact that you and Elizabeth Warren
I am frustrated that the left seems to care about racism against people lumped into the “American Indian” grouping of the social-construct of race when it is a close election but really show that they don’t care about the people at all when they are being discriminated against in other ways.
CarnalK, weren’t you a participant on the threads about North Dakota voter suppression? How to you self justify being an ally when it is convenient for your needs but then dismiss the same issues for the same people?
I get that we all tend to be more likely to support causes when they benefit ourselves, and that people who participate in this area of the dope are more likely to be partisans, but I am curious about why it is so easy for people to hand wave away these very real concerns for native nations and populations in this county.
You obviously don’t realize it, but you ascribe a whole tonne of opinions, beliefs and stances to me without any evidence and are not true. I haven’t made any ‘white" vs “Indian” modern racialism claims’, 'assume[d] that all Native peoples are the same, it wasn’t “convenient” for me to be “an ally” in the North Dakota thread - I was just giving my opinion on the happenings, and I’ve never said there is a biological basis for race - what I actually believe is that there are genetic clues that can mark certain population clusters.
Why did you say I was trying to deny people who left Africa interbred with Neanderthals then? What use did that offer outside of trying to justify a biological basis for race, which is the issue in this case? Elizabeth Warren’s DNA claims where she was compared to people from Central America as providing proof is completely based in that claim.
I didn’t say that. I was just trying to suss out how far you went with genetic markers not meaning anything with regard to ancestry.
To add to above.
Elizabeth Warren’s DNA claims where she was compared to people from Central America as providing proof is completely based in that claim.
Why are those placed in the racial group of “Native Americans” uniquely tied to “certain population clusters” (which is a branch off of Asian or Mongoloid in these DNA services BTW) when you seem to be saying that you are not making a claim for a biological basis for race?
Why are the 100’s of tribes in the US uniquely required to be homogenized into these historical racist categories, to the point that a few matches from Central America are “acceptable” as proof when those groups most likely split from their common Ancestor with the Cherokees farther back than your relatives from Europe split from the same common ancestors?
Present-day Europeans are a mixture of these two ancestral populations who are are also admixed with a population related to Native Americans within the time of the first peopling of the Americas. Yet for some reason Native Americans “all look alike”?
DNA is not nearly as useful for racial categorization as those who do support the concept of race claim, and the fact that we can track broad migrations at choke points like leaving Africa or the new world doesn’t validate that. The concept of race, which “Native American” is an example of is entirely a social construct (with very real impacts).
You seem to be searching for something to be pissed off about.