Quote:
Originally Posted by RussianIvanov
What I am saying is that if a black man was born and raised in the U.S., he can not be African American because he is not African. His ancestors were. He did not experience it but if he moved to Africa he could then be African if he stayed there and pledged loyalty to that country.
Like me. I was born and raised as young in the former Soviet Union. We moved to New York when I was a young kid in the 90s. So I am Russian American because I experienced the reality of it. Why should someone who had Russian ancestors 100 years ago be Russian American when most of them have never even set foot in Russia? They are American until they move and stay in Russia and are loyal to Russia, and it is not just Americans with Russian ancestry... it could be an American of Irish ancestry, English, Italian.. because ancestry does not tie you to a country, you were just born to parents and you grew up and live in a place. You are not automatically Russian because your ancestors were. If that is the case then many born and raised Californians are really New Yorkers. Americans sit and call themselves "Italian, Irish, German, Polish, Russian, and Scottish" because Americans unadmittingly consider themselves cultural misfits.
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The OP here is probably long gone, but he is way off. While I do understand his basic premise - if you are born in America, or even come from a longstanding ethnic group in this country that is connected to America, you are simply American - it is not the way things are in this country. Americans of every ethnicity on the planet exist, and because of the inclusive and exclusionary nature of this society, it has been possible and even inevitable that many people with citizenship in and allegiance to this country identify with their culture, country or continent of origin.
America is no melting pot, and that can be a good or bad thing.
But neither is Russia. Does this OP or anyone else in this thread think that Russia is a country where everyone born within its vast territory are considered the same people, considered equally Russian? Russia has hundreds of ethnic groups within its borders. Are Great Russians/White Russians/Little Russians the same people as Ossetians, Tatars, Karakalpaks, Abkhaz, or Chechens? Why in Moscow is there so much ethnic violence toward people from Dagestan or Ingushetiya? Aren't these people all Russians? Are Buryats or Tuvans, Chukchi Eskimos from northern Siberia or Yakuts considered Russian even though they look more like Mongols or East Asians?
Funny thing is, I had a debate on another thread where another poster told me that these aforementioned people were not Russians, even though they speak Russian and their families have lived in Russia for generations.
What's right?
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