Native American?

Elizabeth Warren is running for Senator in Massachusetts.    The fact that she may or may not have Native American ancestry has been the subject of heated debate in the press and on social media.   Apparently, she is listed as minority faculty at Harvard University.    She has contributed to a Native American cookbook collection, in which, beside her name she has identified herself as a "Cherokee".    Some of her extended family supports her claim, some does not.    There is no written documentation that proves her connection one way or the other.    I suppose if she was a suburban housewife laying claim to Native American ancestry at cocktail parties, no one would really care.  But, because she is running for a national office, and some feel she has used this connection in a divisive manner to become a tenured "minority" professor at Harvard University, it merits discussion.

Does she have a right to call herself a minority?   I think when you look at her blond hair and blue eyes, it is easy to dismiss her, and her supposed Native American ancestry.    She looks like she would be much more at home on the Pilgrim's side of the first Thanksgiving table, than the "other" side. 

Or would she?  Would she be more credible if she was a brunette and had brown eyes?  I wonder.

There are things about all of us, that we feel inside, that is not visible to the naked eye.  Does it make it less so?   On the other hand, I doubt that Elizabeth Warren has ever truly felt what it feels like to live as a minority.   Has she ever been eyed suspiciously when walking into an elite country club?   Did kids taunt her as a child with Native American monikers such as "pale moon face"?    Did she ever live on a reservation?   I know that she did not grow up wealthy and I'm sure there are times when she has felt like an outsider, or an intruder, in the wealthy, elite, predominantly male Ivory Tower.    But, how seriously should this minority thing be taken?  Is she being divisive? or is this a case of a bit of information turning into a giant snowball, that is out of her control.  More likely the latter.

There are many mixed race kids who are applying for college this very minute who are pausing at the "race" box.   Most of these kids are making a quick decision based on what is in their best interest.   There has been a lot of press about how it is most difficult for Asian students to get into college, followed by whites and then blacks and latinos.   So, when kids get to that race box, they check the box that works best for them.  Why not?   If they are a fraction latino or black, it serves them well to check that box.  On the other hand, Asian students do the opposite.   There have been documented cases where Asian students have changed their last name to that of their white parent, so they don't even sound Asian.    Yes, this is ethically wrong, but it is also ethically wrong for colleges to make it harder or easier to get into college based on race.    It is quite possible that the decision they are making right now, at 17 years old, to get into college will come back to haunt them.    Who are you to call yourself black?   Are you ashamed of your Asian heritage?   I can guarantee you that they are not thinking of these questions now.

This is not a political blog, so I will not go into whether or not Elizabeth Warren is a good witch or a bad witch.  

What I will say it that the "Race" card is dangerously powerful in our culture.   It works for good and for evil.   It is played by everyone.   The only way to stop this is to take it completely out of the deck.

The Moment of Truth

I remember quite clearly the moment that my daughter learned about racism.

She was six years old and was quietly reading a book on the couch in the family room while I prepared dinner.    The book she was reading was from the Babysitter Club chapter book series.  The series focuses on a group of young adolescent girls who run their own babysitting business.  Even though my precocious reader was a little younger than the age that the books were targeted for, the books seemed gentle enough in content that I didn't feel the need to censor them before she read each individual book.

On this fateful day, she was completely engrossed in one of the books, her eyes quickly darting back and forth as she devoured every word on the page.    I tended to my pasta sauce.    At some point I heard sniffles and I went to check on her.   The book was on the floor, she was curled up under a blanket, and she was crying.   I was perplexed.

"What's wrong?"  I asked.

"There is a family in that book that doesn't want Claudia to babysit for them, they don't want her to babysit for them because she is (long pause with some sobs for effect) Japanese."

"Oh." is all I can say.

Then she looked at me with big, tear-filled eyes and asked the awful, awful question, "Will people hate ME because of the way I look?"

Oh, how I wished at that moment I could just say "No."

I knew she already knew the answer, she just wanted confirmation from me.    Lying was not an option.  This was not Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny.   This question begged an honest answer.  I knew I had to respect that.

I sat down on the couch and explained to my six year old child that there were some really stupid people in the world.  These people hated everybody, not just one person, but they were out there, and she might encounter them.  I must have said the word "stupid" about 100 times.   I hated having this conversation with my daughter.
I hated telling her that the world was less than perfect.
When our awful conversation was over, I picked up the book, and told her to finish it.   It was a book for children, so I knew it must have a happy ending, or at least a good moral lesson.  
She resisted, but being the avid reader that she was, she couldn't not finish it.
I went back to making dinner.   I heard a few more sniffles, but eventually they subsided.  By the time she finished the book her eyes were completely dry.

At dinner, I asked her to tell me how it all turned out.   She told me in her own six year old way that Claudia's friends all decided not to babysit for that family either.  So the "stupid" parents couldn't go out to their "stupid" dinner and had to spend their anniversary at home with their "stupid" kids.   She thought it was a great ending.   She also made it clear that it was the "stupidest" book she ever read and I couldn't argue with her.

Over the years, I have thought of that moment many times.   I have wished she had never picked up that book, I have wished I had read it first so I could have prepared her, and I have wished that I could have honestly told her that no one would ever hate her for the way that she looks.

But, in a strange way, I am also grateful for that day.   I am grateful that she was at home, with me, when she learned this harsh lesson.    Sadly, there was no way I could prevent her from coming face to face with racism at some point in her life, but at least I was there when the unsavory introduction was made.   I am also glad that I could tell her that it was the offenders who were "stupid" and not the other way around.

Now she is fifteen and reads books like "The Diary of Anne Frank" and "To Kill a Mockingbird" that deal with racism at a much deeper level, with endings that are not always happy.   Thankfully,  neither the untimely death of Miss Anne Frank nor the unjust death of Tom Robinson will ever have the impact on her that one simply written, elementary school chapter book did.  

Unfortunately, the lesson that the world can be a cruel and unkind place only needs to be learned once.
In my opinion, it's a pretty stupid lesson.

Where are you from?

Where are you from?

Think about it for a minute.   Do you have your answer?   It's a pretty simple question, isn't it?  You are probably thinking of the place you were born, or maybe the place you spent your childhood.
If you are white, and not an immigrant yourself, I am guessing, you are NOT thinking of where your ancestors came from, but where YOU came from.

People ask my husband where he is from all the time.    He knows that it is a loaded question but he usually gives them a straight up, honest reply, "Iowa".   Yes, he was born in Ames, Iowa.   That is not the answer most people are looking for, and they usually respond to his reply with a quizzical look.

The truly brazen will then ask that audacious follow up question, "Where are you really from?"
(I know, it is all beginning to sound familiar)

What they really want to know is what Asian country his parents, or grandparents came from.

Sometimes he indulges them, sometimes not.    When he is in a playful, snarky mood he might answer, "Well, okay, I spent most of my childhood in New York City."   Then, their look changes from quizzical to confused.   Are they brave enough to ask the second follow up question, "Where are you really, really from?"?  (maybe he should say "My mother's uterus!"?)

One of the great things about America is that it is a huge, huge melting pot.   Almost all of us, are the descendants of immigrants, and this is a great equalizer.   No one has more claim to this great country than anyone else.

Maybe it is because the Asian immigration is more recent, but it seems to me, they are less readily accepted as "real" Americans than other ethnic groups.   African-Americans have their share of issues but no one expects them to say "Ghana" when they are asked where they are from.   Of course, there is that whole awkward slave thing, so maybe no one wants to go down that road and "Connecticut" is easier to say than "Well, my ancestors lived in Ghana but then my great, great, great grandfather was stolen from his homeland and my family worked on a plantation in Mississippi for fifty years."  Awkward.  I live in a part of the country where there are not a lot of Hispanic-Americans but I imagine that they get their fair share of questions from people trying to find out if they are "legal", "How did your family come to this country?  By car?  By bus?   By a little rowboat with 50 people in it?"

I once met a young man on an airplane who was a true anomaly,  a real live example of a man without a country, a global citizen.    He had a French mother and a Portuguese father.   His parents were both diplomats and this young man had been born and raised in Japan.   His parents had decided since he was not ethnically Japanese that they would send him to an International, American school.   He attended that school from Kindergarten to 12th grade.    He spoke perfect American English.   He wore American blue jeans and American sneakers.    If you met him, and knew nothing of his background, it would be easy to mistake him for a kid from Iowa.   You would absolutely, unquestioningly believe him if he told you he was from Ames.   Oh!  The Irony!  In actuality, he had never stepped foot on American soil.   The plane ride we were on was his first time going to America, and he was on his way to spend four years at Columbia University.   He explained to me that no matter how long he lived in Japan, even if he lived there his whole entire life, he would never be accepted as Japanese.   His tall, six foot frame, light brown hair, and blue eyes immediately excluded him.   It didn't matter if he spoke fluent Japanese (which he did) or understood and respected their customs.  He wasn't one of them.   He couldn't even fit into their clothes.   He hadn't spent much time in France or Portugal, so he didn't identify strongly with either of those cultures either.   In fact, since his parents were of different nationalities, they all spoke English at home.   Since he went to an American school he grew up playing baseball, basketball, and football (real football, not soccer).   He celebrated Thanksgiving with American friends, and went to Fourth of July parties.   He was an All-American boy.   Except he wasn't.

This happened about 20 years ago and I still wonder what happened to him.  Does he still live in the states, or did he make a home somewhere else?   I imagine him living here, in some suburb, with a "typical" American family.   I think that every now and then he is at a cocktail party and someone asks him the innocuous "Where are you from?" question.    And, if he is anything like my husband, he gets that little crooked, somewhat devious smile on his face and answers, in all honesty, "Japan".

What comes to your mind when someone asks, "Where are you from?"?