fluid said:

morningsong said:

All I know where I live it's getting exhausting trying to figure out who belongs to who based on this, that or the other. I had a girlfriend at work who I swore was of arabic descent, she was puerto rican, another woman I swore was jamaican her family is from the states. You have all shades of african folks moving here in droves, nar one of them is african american but they black even if they yella, you have vietnamese, you better not call japanese or chinese and vis versa, you have filipinos, who range in skin tones from brown to yellow to pale, you've got mexicans that look asian, you got pure breed native americans that look latino but would be offended if you called them so, you got folks from central and south american that would die if you called them mexican. you've got your eastern indian folks moving here in droves who range in complexion like black folks do, the fact they mostly stick together helps distinquish them but their assimilating children, dear gawd, I can't tell on sight. And then all these folks mixing in together. I'm tired of trying to figure this stuff out. you tell me and we'll both know.

Most of that made sense. latinos that look asian don't unless it'cause indians are mixed with japanese and latinos are mixed with indian it makes sense. To mixup races is hard and easy to understand as offensive. to mistake nationalities however is just as or more offensive and far easier to do. Don't call chinese koean and cubans mexican. My friend called one mexican and he shouted "No I'm cuban!!" and pulled a knife on him. For back peope that might not make sense since blacks don't know their ancestoral nationality.Pakistanis and indians feud. Te british hate the french. Bexause of geography peole have more chance to hate nationality than race. For instance many think an asian would cringe at the though of their daughter dating a back man or even whie. But truth is the most hate woud come if a chid dated someone of anoher asian nationaity.

100 yrs or so ago there were chinese immigrants that settled in mexico for one reason or another and their genetic footprints shows up from time to time through individuals or whole families. people have been migrating for a long time, hence why bother with percentages and labeling.

paintedlady said:

morningsong said:

All I know where I live it's getting exhausting trying to figure out who belongs to who based on this, that or the other. I had a girlfriend at work who I swore was of arabic descent, she was puerto rican, another woman I swore was jamaican her family is from the states. You have all shades of african folks moving here in droves, nar one of them is african american but they black even if they yella, you have vietnamese, you better not call japanese or chinese and vis versa, you have filipinos, who range in skin tones from brown to yellow to pale, you've got mexicans that look asian, you got pure breed native americans that look latino but would be offended if you called them so, you got folks from central and south american that would die if you called them mexican. you've got your eastern indian folks moving here in droves who range in complexion like black folks do, the fact they mostly stick together helps distinquish them but their assimilating children, dear gawd, I can't tell on sight. And then all these folks mixing in together. I'm tired of trying to figure this stuff out. you tell me and we'll both know.

I stopped trying! You know my pain all to well

So now I just ask about folks cultural backgrounds, because I consider that the respectful thing to do. Especially if your dealing with an Indian store keep and you have a chicken in your shopping cart. I can't just expect them to handle the chicken ya know?

Its so nice though to learn about stuff you didn't know before, I hate offending people because they practice diferent customs.

Yep. I like to try to respect others cultures but it get very difficult just going by sight.