This article was SO well done. Thank you for writing this and for taking the discussion I started seriously and moving it further. I particularly relate to this discussion because although I am open about my Indian ethnicity online, people online don't interact with me irl. In real life, wherever I have travelled, people have been confused about where I am from and now, living in Dubai, I have Indian people asking me why I have an Indian name, only to be surprised when I tell them I have 100% Indian ancestry. I understand there must be some mixing somewhere in all the conquest and movement that happens at the borders of places such as where I am from, which is what led me down this path of thought. There is no gene that tells us which country exactly we belong to. At most it can tell us a region in which most people historically shared our genes. I don't think that's a solid enough basis to shape a passport or citizenship for example. I believe culture and cultural values are far more relevant. However I loved the point you brought up about the double standard in the West vs the Rest of the World. Only westerners are being told to be blind to ethnicity. Everywhere else, westerners are considered outsiders and "will never belong". Living in Dubai with an English Anglo-Saxon husband, I feel this keenly. It is only logical and fair that European countries should begin to administer the same exclusive standards onto their societies if that is the reciprocity they are experiencing.
Thanks for the voice of confidence 👍. I can sort of understand your situation. Whenever my dad went to China, he keeps getting mistaken for a native. To my knowledge, he doesn't have Chinese ancestry. And then there's my mom who was raised in a Dutch-ish household, to the point of being able to sing Dutch Christmas carols. But she doesn't have Dutch ancestry. It's just that her parents were amongst those in Indonesia who had internalized the Dutch colonial culture. And after Indonesian independence, they carried that culture over to their children somehow. It's not a simple question and anyone who says otherwise is kidding themselves.
As for the double standard with the West, I brought it up because otherwise I wouldn't be honest in tackling this issue. It's the elephant in the room. I suspect a lot of the pushback I got in my initial comment is people ascribing to me something that I never said. But that's just how social media is, it's Coolee Bravo effect: https://knowyourmeme.com/photos/2233529-twitter-x
This article was SO well done. Thank you for writing this and for taking the discussion I started seriously and moving it further. I particularly relate to this discussion because although I am open about my Indian ethnicity online, people online don't interact with me irl. In real life, wherever I have travelled, people have been confused about where I am from and now, living in Dubai, I have Indian people asking me why I have an Indian name, only to be surprised when I tell them I have 100% Indian ancestry. I understand there must be some mixing somewhere in all the conquest and movement that happens at the borders of places such as where I am from, which is what led me down this path of thought. There is no gene that tells us which country exactly we belong to. At most it can tell us a region in which most people historically shared our genes. I don't think that's a solid enough basis to shape a passport or citizenship for example. I believe culture and cultural values are far more relevant. However I loved the point you brought up about the double standard in the West vs the Rest of the World. Only westerners are being told to be blind to ethnicity. Everywhere else, westerners are considered outsiders and "will never belong". Living in Dubai with an English Anglo-Saxon husband, I feel this keenly. It is only logical and fair that European countries should begin to administer the same exclusive standards onto their societies if that is the reciprocity they are experiencing.
Thanks for the voice of confidence 👍. I can sort of understand your situation. Whenever my dad went to China, he keeps getting mistaken for a native. To my knowledge, he doesn't have Chinese ancestry. And then there's my mom who was raised in a Dutch-ish household, to the point of being able to sing Dutch Christmas carols. But she doesn't have Dutch ancestry. It's just that her parents were amongst those in Indonesia who had internalized the Dutch colonial culture. And after Indonesian independence, they carried that culture over to their children somehow. It's not a simple question and anyone who says otherwise is kidding themselves.
As for the double standard with the West, I brought it up because otherwise I wouldn't be honest in tackling this issue. It's the elephant in the room. I suspect a lot of the pushback I got in my initial comment is people ascribing to me something that I never said. But that's just how social media is, it's Coolee Bravo effect: https://knowyourmeme.com/photos/2233529-twitter-x