Your Infinite Wisdom

While I was experiencing some technical difficulties I got a most interesting comment in my mod queue for this post. My first inclination was to delete it, but instead I decided that I would write a post about it, because there are some points about it that need to be addressed.

Also, it should stand as a warning, that anything sent to me could be potential mockery fodder, as per my comment policy.

This problem is only with Whites…We see this in the Black community. Blacks passing for White??? Ugggg, they are white. We don’t have Chinese passing for White? Filipino’s passing for White. Wherever White people land their boates, they convert their ethnic background. You look White because this is 90% of your genes. Did you ever see a Native American? One close to full blood. Sorry, you don’t resemble one. They are not even close to European looking. Their features are related to Asian. You look European and this is what you mostly are, get over it. people closely mixed with Native American, are the most exotic least looking Whites I’ve seen.

Oh, so many things to say. I swear there are people all over Bloglandia crying “BINGO!” as I type. I can’t possibly address everything…but I will take a few points down.

The first thing I have to say: The only person who gets to choose a person’s racial identity is that person. There is no way for a person outside of a body to know their story, their background. The stereotypes with which people base their assumptions of what a particular racial group should look like are not the only defining factors that make a racial group. Race is made of so many components. History, blood, family…it doesn’t come from a passer-by shouting your identity at you.

The only point that is true in the screed is this: Wherever White people land their boates, they convert their ethnic background.

The systematic whitewashing of indigenous people has been responsible for practically demolishing their cultures and histories. We who try to grasp on to it are within our rights to hold on dearly to that which was violently torn from our ancestors. Your insistence that we assimilate into that which was forced upon us is not going to change us. I suppose the next time I go home to the tribe I grew up with I will just tell them all to give up? That we can just forget about holding on to any of our past because you said we just need to accept that we aren’t Native enough for you?

Did you ever see a Native American? One close to full blood.

Did you know that people are different? Did you know that there are hundreds of indigenous tribes in the U.S. and Canada alone? There may just be a slight variance in how those people look, first stereotypically according to your preconceived notions, and second due to years of systematic whitewashing, cultural decimation, and societal change. People from Northern tribes will look very different from people from Southern tribes for many reasons. I hate to rip your world asunder, but human beings have variations in them. We aren’t all copied from coloring books. Close to full blood is rare today. It is estimated that about eight in ten indigenous people in the U.S. alone is of mixed blood because of colonization. Wherever White people landed their boats they decided that they had to save us savages by intermarrying with us to make our children whiter. The lighter the better, right?

You look White because this is 90% of your genes.

You are wrong, and you could not possibly know this. Why? Because you are not me, nor are you my family. Plus, your maths are absurd. How can I be 90% of anything? It boggles me, truly. I will not and should not have to prove my racial identity to anyone. It is mine and mine alone. The only person who gets to label me is me.

You base all of this on one photograph. Good for you, being so awesome that you can gather all of that infinite wisdom from a quick glance. I wish I had your powers of intuition.

Excuse me now while I go weep at not being exotic looking enough for one drive-by commenter.