I pit my fellow whiteys who think they are Native American

The BBQ Pit
21

There may have been a reason for that: back in the days when there were miscegenation laws, they varied from state to state, but in many states, someone who was “black” (1/8 or more) couldn’t marry a white person, but if your dark skin was due to being native American, even fully so, you could marry a white person in those same states. If you were 1/4 black, and had straightish hair and a long nose, and wanted to marry a white person, putting “Little Bird,” or something as your middle name on the marriage license application, so the clerk wouldn’t even ask, made perfect sense. Which is to say, it was through-the-looking-glass behavior, when that was where you were. You can hardly blame people for doing what they needed to do when faced with things like miscegenation laws.

That said, I get what the OP is talking about. Every now and then, we get someone at the synagogue who had one Jewish grandfather (or great-grandfather), wasn’t raised with anything Jewish in the home, and may even have been raised in another religion, who demands to be treated like a regular Jew with no need to convert, who ought to be eligible to be synagogue president tomorrow, ought to be called to Torah, even though he knows no Hebrew, and it goes on.

It would make me mad if I grew up on a reservation, and lived an authentic life, which meant that I didn’t have some privileges, and someone came out of the woodwork, and demanded to get the same few benefits I might also have from being authentic, and he had some thin trace of ancestry.

It’s one thing to say that you have an native American ancestor, and another to assert that you are Cherokee, or whatever, which I would understand to mean tribal membership. I mean, I have a single Irish great-great-great-grandparent (maybe just two greats-- I can’t remember), so I can say I have some Irish ancestry, but I’d be lying to say I’m Irish, or even that I’m Irish-American.

22

In my opinion, if someone is 1/32 or 1/64 Native American, that’s simply too diluted to proclaim such ancestry as one’s main heritage in good faith.

23

My husband is light haired and blue eyed, but when we were going out he spent a lot of time in the sun and had a quite ruddy complexion. My friend’s mother was asking about his heritage, and I told her that he was Hungarian and German. She sort of laughed and told me I shouldn’t be ashamed to marry a Native American.

I didn’t quite know what to say to that.

24

Right, there’s two distinct issues in the OP rant – one is the already well discussed one of a whole bunch of people claiming “native” heritage just because it’s more chic, and the other is the appearance of people in modern recognized tribal groups.

The first of course is silly people being silly. The second…
…well, it’s awkward, isn’t it? What makes you part of a nation or tribe? Can you marry into it, be accepted into it; does the one-drop rule apply affirmatively or negatively; does feeling and living the culture count more or less than the bloodlines; is it better for a distinct community to accept extinction by genetic collapse than to embrace those of mixed heritage?

From my limited exposure to this, that by itself is *not *enough. That bunch of people may form a “tribe” (any bunch of people can call themselves whatever they want to call themselves), but legally they would have barely taken the first step towards *starting *a *claim *for federal recognition, which can take decades and has rules and requirements about continuity of community to be met.

25

I’m 1/4 Native American, but I only consider my mother to be actually Native American. At 1/2, it shows. At 1/4, I’m just a regular white dude. Albeit with a full head of dark hair at 40 where most of my classmates have graying or receding hairlines.

26

We have a woman friend. She’s really a nice person, educated, etc. She volunteers at the local museum and she usually does tours of the Native American section. She’s also on the Native American Arts Council. She wears Indian jewelry and wears her hair in a pigtail, and her clothing is highly suggestive of Indian styles. She has a somewhat dusky complexion. She’s 100% Italian. She never has claimed to be Native American and will quickly tell people who ask that she is not, usually with a confused look on her face. I refer to her (to my wife only) as “Fake-ajawea” or “Faux-cahontas”, and I really don’t get her shtick. Perhaps she just likes the jewelry and clothing? Beats me.

27

Does pollution make her cry?

28

There aren’t many Native Americans who have nothing but Native American Ancestry. There shouldn’t be a line drawn based on strict percentages of Native ancestry, the participation in the tribal nations should be considered a factor also. Some people have been adopted by tribes as well.

Still, I agree with the general rant as there are too many people with no connection whatsoever to their Native American ancestry, which is often dubious in nature anyway. If you don’t belong to a tribe, or participate in Native American affairs in any way and you have no recent Native American ancestors then don’t claim that as your heritage. Your Cherokee great-great-great-great aunt may not even be a blood relative.

29

John Ross was only 1/8 Cherokee by blood quantum.

More important than blood is involvement in tribal life. My grandmother, Marjorie Ross, was 1/32 Cherokee, but lived in Tahlequah her entire life and was very involved in tribal business. (For example, many artifacts in the Murrell Home were Ross family heirlooms that she donated.) It would be silly to say someone that involved in the Cherokee community doesn’t count as Cherokee.

If you have a Cherokee ancestor and you are active in the modern Cherokee community, then you’re Cherokee.

30

[Devil’s Advocate]

There are plenty of Americans who go around talking about their German, English, Irish, Hungarian etc. heritage, but who have never set foot in their respective motherlands. They don’t know the language or anything else about the culture. Their ancesty is just trivia for them–something to bring up when asked what their genetic roots are. Is claiming Native American ancestry any different?

When I was younger, I used to attribute my light skin and funny hair to Native American ancestry, like a lot of black people do. As I grew up and I learned more about my genealogy and African American history in general, I stopped saying this…realizing that I was perpetuating a myth likely used to cover up the stigma associated with miscegnation. It’s possible I do have Native American “blood”, but I just don’t feel comfortable claiming it. Yet I don’t hesitate to say I have Scots-Irish ancestry. My ass has never been to Ulster and I’m not particularly interesting in visiting any time soon, or learning the history. So should I not “claim” this either?

[/Devil’s Advocate]

31

It’s a good thing your view doesn’t mean jack shit in the law.

My cousin’s father is Hawaiian, so she and all of her family look dark to being with, and is in fact, darker skinned than her husband, who is a member of a registered tribe. Skin color means nothing.

32

If you call yourself Irish except on St. Patrick’s day it’s kind of dubious. If you are 1/32 Irish by a distant ancestor you know nothing about then it’s kind of the same thing.

Perhaps it’s too easy for me to say, I can only trace my family back to my grandparents with any reliability.

33

Pretty much this. Me, I’ve definitely got Native American blood in me. My dad’s side of the family is Mexican (Mestizo as it’s charmingly called in the home country) with a little Greek and African thrown in, just for flavor. My mothers side is Hispanic (Spanish, actually) and English/Welsh…just to provide some color. So, what’s that make me, according to the OP? Well, I most closely associate with my Hispanic side, so I guess that’s what I am. But that doesn’t negate the other things, and I’m not ashamed of any of my various parts or blood lines.

Personally, I think you are what you want to claim, ‘race’ wise, since to me ‘race’ is such a silly thing anyway. If someone wants to call themselves Native American while being blonde haired and blue eyed, well, that’s fine by me. Life is too short to get bent about what labels people want to apply to themselves, or what blood lines (real or imagined) they want to claim.

34

I agree that someone shouldn’t call themselves Native American if they only have trace amounts of Native American ancestry.

But it seemed to me you were saying that a person with trace amounts shouldn’t claim this heritage at all–like in the way that someone will mention they have English or Scottish ancestry while talking about their roots. I think that’s different than saying “I am X”.

Apologizes if I interpreted you incorrectly.

35

I’ve got one line traced back 11 generations. That’s one line out of too many to count. Even in that line, there’s a little bit of everything imaginable, including first cousins marrying first cousins (not uncommon back then), a baker in Napoleon’s army, etc. And that’s just one patriarchal line. If you factored in all the possibilities from those lines we haven’t researched that in some way contributed to the family tree, then the chance of finding a little of anything in your DNA is pretty strong.

Frankly, if you want to be Native American, so be it. If you want to be female, so be it. I’m not about to question your motives or your sincerity. I just don’t care.

36

Sorry, got interrupted before, I hadn’t finished. The main thing I was talking about was from the OP where there seems to be some kind of mystique associated with being Native American. I’m not saying anyone should deny their heritage, or don’t mention it at all, but if you know you have an _______ ancestor don’t just say I’m ________. I could have been more specific about that point before. It’s interesting to hear about the diversity of people’s ancestors, it’s different when someone claims the heritage to the coolest ancestor even if there’s only a tenuous connection. So I think we are agreeing.

37

Speaking for MYSELF only as a Native Alaskan, Choctaw Indian, with a smattering of Norwegian and some other fisher-type peoples…I don’t really care.

There was a lot of shit that happened in the past. IN THE PAST.

I’m not saying stuff isn’t good for all Native Americans but a lot are making moves to get better. There has been a lot of focus on people getting education in legal/financial fields.

So if someone comes up saying that they are Native American or Eskimo I don’t care. It doesn’t affect me at all. What affects me is how you act and treat me and mine.

38

All the people saying “I don’t care what you call yourself”, and yeah, I get your point. But at the same time, when alleged humans like Ward “Lies Like Rug” Churchill uses his fake Native credentials to steal set-aside positions for real Native Americans, it’s a problem.

39

Maybe you’re Dutch. (Runs hand through his dark extremely thick and in no way receding scalp locks.)

I live on a street full of men about my age, or a little younger, nearly all of whom are balding to the point of just shaving their domes. It gives me pleasure. :slight_smile:

40

I think the OP was on about people who were laying claim to that native American mystique (which is a weird sort of myth, kind of like what Spike Lee calls the Magic Negro), without actually being in a position to call themselves native American, and having to tribal affiliation, albeit, if they really have a little ancestry, they may know which tribe-- or may not. But you end up with the most ignorant and tenuously native people being the ones who often end up as self-appointed ambassadors to white people who claim to speak on behalf of all native people, while people with real tribal affiliation, who live or have lived on reservations, are the least likely to communicate with white people. Unless they are sought out, they may not have a lot of contact with large groups of white people.

I met a woman who claimed to be “from” a tribe, and who was whiter than my Swedish step-mother-in-law. It turned out she gone to some six week “spiritual” workshop led by someone whose own credentials were rather dubious, and who told her she could “convert” to the tribal religion at the end of the workshop if she wished. She had some kind of document printed out on a bubble-jet printer, that reminded me of the “Ph.Ds” in religion from unaccredited religious universities that were given after a year of online classes, and printed out on 8.5x11" paper.

I don’t know if this is a problem. Fraudulent service dogs are probably a bigger problem, because I think for the most part, land rights and college scholarship awards are pretty well vetted, but it does kind of insult my sensibilities that people do this.