Hispanic Or Latino?

[EJLarson]

I read somewhere that Latino means you're from Latin America. Brazilians are also considered Latinon but not Hispanic. Hispanics are people from a Spanish speaking country. Hispanic nor Latino do not make up any of the four races. They're ethnicities. Those surveys that ask you to fill in your race should be about identifying your race and ethnicity, which can be two different things. There are Asians in Argentina and Jamaica, and Eastern Indians in Nigeria. I consider those surveys to be useless.

Doesn't this illustrate just how silly and pointless the whole "what ethnicity are you?" is? What needs to be addressed and eradicated is institutional racism; i.e., denial of opportunities to persons based on race/ethnicity/etc. When the playing field is as level as it can be made (perfection is the goal, but never achieved 100%), we've done all that we can, or should, do.

The other stuff like racial preferences to redress other generations' bad behavior is just a return to racism with a new face. So this won't be misunderstood: any present denial of rights or opportunity because of race should be immediately stamped out. But the idea that society can somehow make up for sins committed by other people in other times - by denying present opportunities to some different individuals - is just inventing new applications of the old sins.

 

[toongeorges]

... any of the four races...

What are the four races: Black, White, Asian, American Indian?

Are Chinese then in the same category as Asian Indians? Are Arabs then White, African or Asian?

It is difficult to make a clear distinction between races, especially with all the interbreeding

 

[Dada]

Black and white are both banned words. There's only "African American" and "Caucasian" Eventually, in case you're mixed, you might pass as African American Caucasian. But probably not if you're from the Caucasus mountains. The people there are generally a shade or two darker than what would pass as a Caucasian.

 

[Girino]

Maybe, on the same way that the question "What is your sex" is different from "What gender do you identify with", they should be asking "What is your ethnic background" and "What ethnic group do you identify with", since everybody seems to classify ethnicities differently.

 

[Noesdeayer]

The "Cosmic Race--La Raza Cosmica" a rarther interesting treatise on the mixture of races in Latin America was written by Jose Vasconcelos Calderon ,minister of Education in Mexico (1921-24).
The basic upshot is that in most countries in the region races are so mixed that it is almost senseless to discuss the matter.
As I stated previously the only real sense I can see is to create a trustworthy dara base in order to avoid discrimination.
As a personnel mgr for Marriott Corp.in the '70s I had to keep an update for The Equal Opportunity Law
I askrd Gisela a secretary a Latin American of Jewish descent what box I should check for her,Caucasian or Hispanic?
Gisela looked at me sternly and answered me forcefully," Poneme hispana,soy uruguaya !! ".

 

[syngirl]

Black and white are both banned words. There's only "African American" and "Caucasian" Eventually, in case you're mixed, you might pass as African American Caucasian. But probably not if you're from the Caucasus mountains. The people there are generally a shade or two darker than what would pass as a Caucasian.

Actually no. In Canada are we going to call blacks African AMERICAN? NO. Same with the UK my dear, where it makes even less sense. Very generally speaking, many just use the term black or Black Canadian or get more specific Afro-Caribbean, or African-Canadian, or even more specific Jamaican-Canadian, Granadian-Canadian etc. Also generally as a group you may hear West Indian when referring to POC of multiple backgrounds and origins in the Caribbean. The African-American thing is really only in the old US of A.

We also do not use the term indian especially now because that's just plain confusing when you live in a city with a 50% Indian from India population. So, aboriginals as a general group, then more specifically First Nations, Inuit or Metis, or band name. Indians are from India, but Indians are also Asians. Indians are definitely not aboriginals in Canada and haven't been referred to as such for at least 30 years (though there are still a few bureaus that haven't changed their names ie Fed Bureau of Indian Affairs, which is just plain confusing these days with the amount of Indian immigrants and business Canada does with India it sounds like it is a bureau dedicated to relations with that country, not the aboriginals of Canada!)

 

[EJLarson]

Actually no. In Canada are we going to call blacks African AMERICAN? NO. Same with the UK my dear, where it makes even less sense. Very generally speaking, many just use the term black or Black Canadian or get more specific Afro-Caribbean, or African-Canadian, or even more specific Jamaican-Canadian, Granadian-Canadian etc. Also generally as a group you may hear West Indian when referring to POC of multiple backgrounds and origins in the Caribbean. The African-American thing is really only in the old US of A.

We also do not use the term indian especially now because that's just plain confusing when you live in a city with a 50% Indian from India population. So, aboriginals as a general group, then more specifically First Nations, Inuit or Metis, or band name. Indians are from India, but Indians are also Asians. Indians are definitely not aboriginals in Canada and haven't been referred to as such for at least 30 years (though there are still a few bureaus that haven't changed their names ie Fed Bureau of Indian Affairs, which is just plain confusing these days with the amount of Indian immigrants and business Canada does with India it sounds like it is a bureau dedicated to relations with that country, not the aboriginals of Canada!)

There are many in the US who believe that Barack Obama and Colin Powell don't qualify for the African-American label because they're not descended from slavery. http://www.aaregistr...m-brief-history

What this thread shows with abundant clarity is that if there ever was a time when labeling people by ethnicity made sense, that time is long past. It may be occasionally amusing or entertaining to do so, but from the anthropological view, it's nonsense.

 

[nlaruccia]

Black and white are both banned words. There's only "African American" and "Caucasian" Eventually, in case you're mixed, you might pass as African American Caucasian. But probably not if you're from the Caucasus mountains. The people there are generally a shade or two darker than what would pass as a Caucasian.

I have a friend from Nigeria who calls herself Nigerian and she says her race is black. She doesn't say African American nor does she say African because there are many diverse races in Nigeria. It doesn't bother her to be called black so much as people's ignorance of Africa and treating it like it's one country when in reality it's a continent.

 

[ElQueso]

The biggest reason to label people in this day and age, at least in the US, is because the government gives things to people of certain ethnic backgrounds and people will justify what they get by what they perceive as what they do not have, which the government legitimizes with racial quotas. For decades the US government has become more and more a nanny state that has to make every little thing right for every group of person (well, except for wealthy people and much of the middle class) instead of that group doing for itself. Creating dependencies, which work to the government's favor (as a bureaucratic entity to continue its existence) , and usually to certain political parties that benefit by "helping" (after all, they are the ones who are "giving" these things to groups who "need" and thereby buying support, much like Cristina did).

I could write a big long story about a friend of mine, whose skin color happened to be dark (black and white don't really work, eh? I just painted my dining room "white", one of the hundreds of shades Sherwin-Williams calls white, and funny but my skin looks positively brown next to that, even though I'm considered "white") but I'll try to make it brief.

I ended up sitting in a cubicle next to this guy, who later ceased to be my friend because of this - all he did all day long was call up his friends outside of work and talk about all the things that the company was doing to discriminate against him. It drove me nuts. Not just because of what he was saying, but literally because it was non-stop, all day, every day and I could hardly concentrate on my own work. When someone in the field called up with a problem he had no choice but to deal with, he groaned and complained the whole time while he was working on it. I worked my ass off to get where I was at that point - but my ex-friend was held on to as a racial quota (it was confirmed to me later, when I moved up into management). In fact, his words were often "they ain't never gonna fire me, they can't! I'm black and they know if they fire me, they'll be totally screwed". Always talking about the slights he was given because of his skin color, how they were holding him back from promotions, etc. I sat next to him for 3 years before I got promoted to manager and got my own office, thank god.

He rarely actually did any work, never studied anything to keep up with technology, also talked to his friends about the "freak" he was going to get on that night with his girls, and so on. But never really worried about doing his job, because he didn't have to.

Some 4 years later, we both left the company for the same reason - our company was bought out and the new company laid off most of our company's personnel. The only difference was that I chose to leave (they offered me a job, but I had decided to strike out on my own) and they didn't give him a choice. He ended up selling mortgages in 2001 - and was later caught as one of the thousands of mortgage brokers who was falsifying information for people so they could get loans and he could get money.

I despise racial quotas. I don't despise the thought behind them, I understand it (those who are truly looking to do good, not those who are looking to take advantage of such), I just think that it does more harm than good, that it continues racism and labeling and the highlighting of differences that just don't mean anything in the long run. I despise racism and discrimination based on skin color or ethnic background. I discriminate, but based on other people's behaviors towards me, or based on the work they are able - or not - to do when I am dealing with employees or contractors.

You cannot legislate away racial prejudices and hate. It just doesn't work that way. How many decades have we had affirmative action policies and how much has it actually helped? According to Obama and many others, it has gotten worse. When you try to force other people to change, people find other ways to present their hate and idiocy and it paves the way for more who will take advantage of the "help" that the government gives.

It creates dependencies upon which government thrives but is really bad for humans themselves.