I had the TV on earlier tonight while I was doing other things and there was a PBS documentary burbling on about South Africa and what caught my ear was when they said that such and such tribe was going to be able to preserve its traditions now that Apartheid was no more. This got me to thinking: Why the heck would they want to do that? I’m not saying people shouldn’t be able to study their past and things like that, but really, should “ethnic heritage” be all that important? The Nazi’s were really big on ethnic heritage, so were the Croats, Serbs, and Moslems. I can’t think of a single instance in human history where promoting ethnic heritage has really been beneficial. I’m not dissing any particular ethnic group, or saying that we shouldn’t study the various histories of people, but are we placing too much emphasis on where people came from and who their ancestors were?
I’ve got a buddy who talks about being Scottish, and he’s said to me, “Yeah, the English really took a bashing in our house.” Uh, let’s see here, you’re family’s been in the US since the 1700’s, so why are you worrying about what the English have done to the Scots? I mean, I’m Irish, Welsh, Swiss, and god knows what else and I really could care less about how the Brits invaded Ireland and took it over. I could bitch and moan about how the Catholic Church destroyed Celtic culture, but I don’t. Why? Because there’s no point in it.
I once had a girlfriend who claimed to be part gypsy and she said she felt oppressed because of it. Why? I wouldn’t have known that she was of gypsy descent unless she told me. To me, it seems that promoting ethnic heritage leads to divisionism and hate, not an understanding that we’re all one species and one planet. Am I missing something here?