im not sure if there had been a post about this b4 since im fairly new, but how do u feel about people who have haitian, jamaican, belizean, dominican, or whatever ancestry who appear to look black but hate it when people refer to them as such?
is that such a bad thing?
personally im imparital because i understand both sides of the argument. this girl i knew looked straight black but she was really of mixed ancestry. so whenever someone referred to her as black she made a big hoopla about how she is belizean and nigerian and she is not black.
is it our fault that we cant tell your race by the way you look? should we start off random conversation nowadays by saying:
"hi my name is ominy and im black and native american. whats your name and what are you?"
is the issue of race really as taboo as it seems? what do u guys think?
LOL...that's a good question...
one of my guy friends and I recently had a discussion about this...
because he says his parents are from Jamaica, but there ain't a HINT about him that says "Jamaica" to me...
yet he feels he is not an "African-American"...but a "Jamaican-American"...
or some ish...
i mean, i guess it's whatever floats your boat...
but like you said...they should understand that it's very hard for us to differentiate...
& i believe that when we're in this country....whatever ancestry you have however long down your line, be it to a country of the African continent...or Jamaica...
you're Black here...
i mean, they have to understand that in America, we put you in a race category...you can't just be hangin' out on the sidelines with your specific origin...either you're Black...White...Hispanic...Asian...or Native American - no in between...
maybe that ain't the greatest way of looking at it, but hey...that's how this place works...
i have some friends who r from Bermuda...but i refer to them as Black...i mean, if i were to tell other friends or people about them in addition to actual self-proclaimed "Black people", unless the "Bermuda" factor was pertenent to what i'm about to say, i'm not going to stop and clarify that they are Bermudian...i mean, i might because i'm patient, but not everyone will do that...because when it all comes down to it...in this country...you're just Black, bottomline...
but i guess that's like the Afrikan(<--i think it's spelled?)-Americans...those who look White & are probably White by ancestry, but were born in Africa....
even Europeans - those from France, Germany, Polland, Ireland, etc. etc. - and today's Jews....to me, they are all just WHITE.
No i don't think its anyone's fault that they can't tell someones race by the way they look, but that should be the main reason why people don't assume..because you can't tell..
because they KNOW the world is full of many diff. looks and colors for any background, so you can never be sure...so why assume?
If you can't tell someone's race by the way they look, what makes you think they are this, or they are that...by the stereotypes society has come to assume every ethnicity is made up of? If you have fine hair, you're not black? If you have full/big lips you ARE black? That's false..And there's no such thing as "good" hair, so i wish people would get over that. good hair is HEALTHY hair, regardless of its type.
I'm 100% Latina, both of my parents are Latino..although some people say i look mixed with black. black and mexican, black and white, thats what a lot assume. I don't go crazy about it, because anyone who is LATINO from the caribbean knows that we have african ancestry in our blood. Why deny something that may obvious in a lot of our features and skin tones. And America tends to think that LATINO or HISPANIC is a race, just because they've added it to the census list along with White, Black, Pacific Islander, Native, etc. They don't realize that Latino is a MIXTURE, it's made up of different nationalities that are made up of almost the same ancestry. It's a CULTURE. I don't expect anyone to know what I am just by looking at me, because although I am 100% Latina, both of my parents are half-&-half's of latino nationalities, so there are many looks that go with that, and i'm told i have an exotic look so where is there room to assume i'm just ONE of anything. People don't realize that there are Afro-latinos (which are just latinos whose african ancestry is more apparent in their ancestry, or someone whose ancestors were known or traced as being the slaves forced over to caribbean islands) There are black-latinos(Christina Milian), white-latinos(Cameron Diaz), there are ASIAN latinos, Italian-latinos, etc..There are black-mexicans, certain regions in mexico have mexicans whose ancestors were definitely african, theres a website, just look it up, with afro-mexicans..and that DEFINITELY seems abnormal for the simple fact that Mexico's ancestry is mostly made up of AZTEC INDIANS, and SPANIARDS ancestry, with no african ancestry included (only in certain parts)...its mostly the caribbean islands with the exception of Panama in central america that have african ancestry. We're made up of African ancestry(Yoruba, nigeria, etc.), NATIVE ancestry (TAINO, ARAWAK) and Spaniard ancestry. So its ignorant for a latino to deny their african ancestry, whether its apparent or not, its THERE...BUT...Latinos aren't just plain out BLACK...so that may be why some go wild when called that...Latinos are latinos. Any latino that has acknowledged their african roots mixed in or know their history wouldn't get mad about being called black, they'd just correct and educate the person. We just hate when people say "YOU DON'T LOOK LATINO!"..what does a Latino look like, if we have so many different looks involved with our culture? Curly hair, Crinkly hair, straight hair, fine hair, blond hair, brown hair, auburn hair, black hair, black skin, brown skin, mocha, fair skin, yellow skin, freckles, thin lips, big lips, short nose, long nose, round nose, tall, short, etc. So how can we LOOK a certain way, if we're mixed up with so many different things with diff. known-features involved with that ethnicity?
I guess people have their own way of terming but people confuse the term "Black" with "African-American".
You can be African-American, Puerto Rican, Afro-Cuban, Jamaican, Haitian, etc, but you are still Black. Basically anyone of African ancestry.
African-American is a term for those Blacks who's ancestors came from Africa during the **** trade to America. Those of us Blacks who don't have any knowledge of where we came from. People forget all the time that Africa is a continent. I, like many African-Americans don't know what country our ancestors originated, so the term African-American was giving to us.
That's just how I see it.
lol there were some people on another board just talking about that...how Africans should really be called African Americans, and how black people should go by Black Americans because they aren't African, and only have African ancestry. It was a heated discussion. That is to say, we(latinos) have 3 different(and some more) ethnic origins so we couldn't go by Taino American, AFrican American and Spanish American..and that is why America made that label "Hispanic" or "Latino"...basically trying to sum up what we are in one word, and a lot of latinos i've talked to totally disagree with that, they feel the world should be more detail-oriented, and have every nationality on the census and applications for people to check...do you know how many nationalities we'd have on that damn list?!?1
Also i believe, if both of their parents are Jamaican, but they were born in america, they ARE Jamaican..just like some people who are born in Jamaica, but have lived in America for say 20 years, begin to call themselves Jamaican Americans. If your parents aren't just black (blacks born in america), but are of some other descent, or were born somewhere else, than in my opinion, you should be called _____ American..whatever you are. Mexicans that were born in Mexico are called Mexicans, and Mexicans born here are called Mexican Americans.
I think its wrong for a person to assume they know what someone is, BUT its how Americans have been brainwashed to think...they've been brainwashed into thinking in colors, into believing that there are so many races, when there's only the human race, and you'd have to do your research to know what i'm talking about when it comes to that. If americans have gotten accustomed to ASSUMING what someone is, that's ok, that's the way it's been and it will be...but the one thing americans have to get past is criticizing the person AFTER they find out they're not what they assumed they were. If you think someone is black, and then they correct you, don't say something as ignorant as, you don't look ____, or "yeah right, you're lying" or "right, and I'm Cambodian and French *rolls eyes*"...things like that are ignorant...given: there ARE people around who may overexaggerate or lie about their ethnic origin, God Bless them and hopefully they get some help...but for the most part, a lot of people have pride in what they are, even if they know people don't think they look like the typical ______whatever they are. If my last name wasn't Spanish, if i didn't speak pretty fluent spanish, i believe people would assume I wasn't latina. regardless of my hair being naturally curly, regardless of my dark eyes, and it may be because my hair isn't straight-fine like the MEXICANS they're used to here in WICHITA, KANSAS, where I'm at. People wouldn't assume i'd be mixed with anything latino..maybe white and thats it..one time i got Filipino, but YEAH RIGHT...lol.. A lot of mexicans tend to be racist and in disbelief about other latino nationalities if you don't look just like them, and its usually the mexicans and chicanos in the south and midwest, and west(Cali)..but they will still try to holla at anything that looks good to them lol regardless. I find that a lot of the black americans here tend to be the same way..if you even LOOK like u have a drop of black in you, you're automatically black lol, and a lot of the guys here will be like "Why you speakin that mexican?" im like..um its SPANISH, and its my first language..problem with that? l0lz...i just don't understand how ignorant a lot of people in this world can be..at some point, the whole world will be mostly made up of mixed origin people, sorry to break it to the racists out there...although some people argue that almost everyone NOW IN THIS DAY are already mixed up, they just don't know their ancestral backgrounds and history.
I guess people have their own way of terming but people confuse the term "Black" with "African-American".
You can be African-American, Puerto Rican, Afro-Cuban, Jamaican, Haitian, etc, but you are still Black. Basically anyone of African ancestry.
African-American is a term for those Blacks who's ancestors came from Africa during the **** trade to America.
I understand what you're saying...i wouldn't sum it up as "they are still black" though. People just don't understand, that unlike the common way of blacks just being called blacks and whites just being called whites, latinos are MADE UP of native blood, spanish blood, AND..african ancestry, that means Latinos, and the culture are a mixed culture. Some of our musical influences are african, but also some are from the Taino, and a lot are from the Spaniards. Like my bestfriend(she's black) quotes people saying, "if you've even got a DROP of black blood in you, you're black..", but it just makes it seem like anybody with that drop of blood are being summed up as black. And i've heard people admitting that they'd consider a mixed black italian and costa rican person who looks like they had black in them to be black, before they'd consider a french, irish, german, and black person that looked only white to be black. Basically saying..'if you have even a LITTLE african(black) ancestry in you, but you don't look it, than you ain't black to us, only those who LOOK it'...and i think that's ignorant by all means.
^Yeah...I hear people say "predominately African-American universities" when we all know that everybody here ain't African-American. I'm cool with the Black American term though. It's a Pan-Black type of thing.
Kinda like White people. They have different nationalities like Irish, German, & Scandanavian but they are still White. Calling all Black people African-Americans is like calling all White people Irish-Americans. Get what I'm saying?
^Yeah...I hear people say "predominately African-American universities" when we all know that everybody here ain't African-American. I'm cool with the Black American term though. It's a Pan-Black type of thing.
Kinda like White people. They have different nationalities like Irish, German, & Scandanavian but they are still White. Calling all Black people African-Americans is like calling all White people Irish-Americans. Get what I'm saying?
lol DEFINITELY right. Another thing, some people say Texas is full of racism, and that may be true for certain parts, but I lived in DALLAS & Arlington, and people there, of every background were mad friendly...it was worse when i visited ST.LOUIS, Missouri, than in Tx. I guess there's just a lot of stereotyping in Tx, i can agree with that, but its just as much as any OTHER place in the states. It's all about society, the PEOPLE, not the land we live on.
^Yeah, that's a popular misconception. Racism is everywhere but White people pretty cool in Texas. Born and raised here and never reallly experienced racism. I hear of a lot of police **** and racial profiling on tv but that really doesn't happen a lot here. Besides, Texas does mean "friend".
