Americans seem get really weird with the whole ancestry thing. There appears to be a desire to look into your family history and find something “exotic”, which basically seems to mean non-English - I imagine because that’s perceived as the ‘default’ ancestry, so-to-speak.
Honestly, who the fuck cares? What difference does it make? Nationalities aren’t Skyrim races. You don’t get special abilities. It makes no difference whether your ancestors were British/Irish/Spanish/French/whatever.
E: This is obviously not intended as a hateful statement, people. You have to understand that the rest of the world doesn’t care about this, so we’re confused when we look to the US and see them take it so seriously. We’re especially puzzled when Americans say “I’m Irish” because their great great great uncle bought a pint of Guiness in the 1870s. It’s an alien concept to the rest of the planet.
What’s with the negativity from you and the other comments?
I can tell you why Americans care. Because identity matters to people. The story of the melting pot is central to the American story as a nation of immigrants (even today) and central to individual identities. Thus, there is a lot of interest in backgrounds and geneology. If you ask the average American about their heritage you’re likely to get a surprising answer - so people talk about it more.
I get why it seems weird to many other cultures - if you ask the average French person (for example) their heritage they’ll say ‘French as far back as we can tell’.
The French person celebrates their identity through the lens of the French story, and the American does too, it’s just that the American story is the immigrant story.
I hope you do actually care. I hope in this era of rising nationalism and online hate enough of us value diversity of backgrounds and ancestries.
I’m not being hateful about it. I’m just puzzled as to why people think it makes any difference to their lives, or why they’d be disappointed in having the “wrong” ancestry.
I see a lot of Americans obsessed with it so much that it borders on being fetish-like, particularly when it comes to people claiming to be Irish or Italian, and it’s bizarre to me.
claiming to be Irish
I can speak to this phenomenon a bit. It’s part of what was drilled into us from our families. My father’s maternal grandparents were from Donegal, Ireland. Any time a single person from a Donegal family passed away in the entire city of Philadelphia, whether they were known to my family or not, my father, his brothers, and my grandmother were going to that wake to pay their respects. Once he became an adult, he became a member of the AoH, which is an Irish-American fraternal order. They’d keep some Irish customs alive (and being separated by the ocean, no doubt hallucinate some new ones). For people that are heavily invested in their families, it’s a way of feeling connected to your ancestors. I think leaving was rather traumatic for many people, so I think there is an element of mourning in the connection for some too.
I myself wouldn’t call myself Irish, but I know a great deal about Ireland and I share a deep appreciation for it despite being a Yankee. I get that it’s no doubt annoying when someone who knows nothing of the place they are claiming ownership of says they’re Irish or Italian to someone actually from Ireland or Italy, but at the end of the day I think it comes from a well intentioned place. If my family came to find we weren’t at all Irish by ancestry, I would definitely feel shocked as much of my upbringing was framed by that identity.
Calling people out as “fetish like” for identifying with…anything… is a bad look.
A person’s perception of themselves, their identity or self image isn’t for you to qualify as being good enough
Don’t try to compare an American claiming to de a different nationality just because they may have had an ancestor from XYZ to something like transphobia.
They are not the same. And rolling my eyes at the ‘plastic paddy’ crowd is not bigotry.
That is an absurd comparison to draw.
you have a fetish to shit on other people. why do you care so much?
No not hateful, you’re just giving off a weird vibe about it. But you’re half way there actually, transform that energy into curiosity.
The two you picked especially have a real fascinating history and I’d encourage you to check it out because both of those groups had a tough time in their early immigration days. They aren’t fetishising at all - those communities had to stick together because they weren’t exactly welcome, and that mentality became ingrained. Over time, it was less necessary for survival so it transitioned into more of a cultural tradition.
I’m aware of the history. It’s still weird. You need to understand that nowhere else does this. It’s strange.
I understand why you’d think that because we’re all inundated with American culture no matter where we are in the western world. But that’s just not true. There are plenty of interesting groups who celebrate cultural identities not based on the country they live in.
A web search uncovered German-Brazilians and Italian-Argentines for me, I’m sure there are many many more.
Europeans: haha you guys have no history!
Also Europeans: haha you’re curious where your family emigrated from! Losers!
…English is not the “default” ancestry for Americans. I think I know one dude from Michigan who has English heritage. Most folks I’d know have blood from Poland, Ireland, Italy and Germany. It varies regionally.
As far as white/Caucasian Americans, I’d bet money it’s Germanic ancestry.
I recall reading that at one point in the 19th century, 52% of American newspapers were printed in German. And, you still find towns with German names from coast to coast. Anaheim California, Hamburg Minnesota, Berlin New Hampshire.
If you’re near Eastern Indiana, check out Oldenburg.
Im actually in Ireland, but I grew up in western PA. There is a Deutschestown in north Pittsburgh, and a few breweries have faux bierhalles like Penn Brewery for example. Max’s Alleghenney Tavern in Pgh is a ‘German Restaurant’ as well, but they do “quirky german” things like serve beer in jars, which is not done in Germany at all…
anyway, genetically, Im half polish half irish, but there were shit tons of italians everywhere also. plenty of krauts in my schools though, now that im old enough to decipher their last names’ ethnic origins. some scandanavians also
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thank you for the actually
I’m aware. There’s an absolutely huge amount of Germanic-descended people, for example. That’s why I spoke of it being the ‘perceived’ default.
haha yeah ok I hear you, Ive just never perceived this or known that anyone else did, but maybe they do and I just didnt know
You speak for yourself. As an Englishman I get 5% water resistance and +2 charisma when dealing with non-Europeans.
You lose that buff two weeks after acclimitizing to another country, and the perceived extra charisma is actually people nervously smiling around you to mask their limited english (half the language is just obscure idioms)
The rest of the world has no ability to understand, because they’ve been in the same place for 700 generations.
Nationalities aren’t Skyrim races. You don’t get special abilities.
“It wasn’t until I learned that I was 90% British that it all made sense… my inhuman ability to queue for hours, my fastidiousness surrounding permits, and hatred for the French… I knew I was special, but I never imagined how special.”
I think having English heritage is not trendy for several reasons.
- It’s seen as the default (as you pointed out), and thus boring.
- It’s not seen as exotic/fashionable because of stereotypes about the English.
- The English have traditionally been considered America’s enemies because of what happened two hundred and fifty years ago.
- Stories being passed down (and possible exaggerated) from earlier generations about how the English oppressed their ancestors.
ETA: Man, you really riled up some people!
A large number of Americans generally seem to grow up with a main character complex thanks to all the individualist & jingoist propaganda people get bombarded with over there.
The search for something “exotic” as you put it is just an ego-driven search for the piece of evidence that they are, in fact, more special and unique than everyone else.
If you’re an American and you’re not a native American you’re family immigrated here. Why is it so weird to want to know where your family or ancestors come from, I’m lucky and can trace my family name back a couple hundred years. I’m still American I just got family history that’s fun to know about.
I think there’s a big difference between knowing your family’s history and drawing an identity from it.
It actually does make a very important difference. You might be eligible for citizenship in those countries.
True, although that would only go as far back as parents or grandparents. And a PDF from 23andMe saying you’re 8% French certainly wouldn’t be usable grounds to claiming citizenship.
Yep, my dad and I are currently working with a lawyer to get our documents in order for dual citizenship. Once one of us qualifies my son becomes eligible and we can more easily emigrate to an EU country.
You say that, but the luck stat is entirely dependent on it.
Weird how “a nation of immigrants” wants to know where they are from.
While true, a lot of older people in the UK get really, really racist when it comes to their bloodline. Some people view themselves as more British than others because of their lineage towards the Saxons, as opposed to people that have been here for 100+ years that may have originated from elsewhere. Many don’t consider anyone to be British if they emigrated from somewhere like Jamaica, India, or Ireland because, in their view, only the pure Anglo Saxons are the original Brits, even if 5-6 generations of their family grew up here, embedded themselves into society
I do agree that Americans are really weird when it comes to their ancestry, especially considering they come from a country that is very anti-immigration. IMO if you want to claim that you are 50% British or whatever, you shouldn’t be blocking British people from moving to your country (and vice versa).
I am a technology journalist – I like to think I am thoughtful about what data I share with corporations.
My brother in Christ, if you are a tech journalist then you, out of all people, should know not to give ANY data to corporations. That is a massive fuckup regarding your job.
I had in some ways the opposite 23&Me experience and goals. My parents told me growing up that I had some small native ancestry. This is actually a common myth many Americans have either been told or somehow deluded themselves into believing.
So I did the DNA testing (which I now regret from all the obvious enshittification and privacy reasons) to prove that my ancestry was boring and predictable. Which it was, no indigenous ancestry, just the expected European countries that my great grandparents came from.
They also do a lot of nice health screening things and I think that’s probably the much more valuable aspect of it. It really is very American that people are so much more concerned with what DNA says about one’s race or ethnicity than about their health and wellbeing.
I’m worried about insurance companies getting it and changing rates/services based on my DNA.
Per their terms and conditions
The Services are not intended to tell you anything about your current state of health, or to be used to make medical decisions, including whether or not you should take a medication, how much of a medication you should take, or determine any treatment.
https://www.23andme.com/legal/terms-of-service/
It also seems to be a data harvesting machine that probably has ties to Google
Oh, don’t worry. If you hadn’t given it to them, one or ten of your fucking rellies did anyway and had no clue of the implications either.
I want to upvote this, but … Why did you have to shorten “relatives”?
Maybe Australian?
I love how they just smash “-ies” onto any word. I started using “sunnies” for sunglasses after hanging out with a few aussies.
Maybe.
I’m only familiar with the term “BSc” from Red Dwarf, wherein it’s eventually revealed to mean “bronze swimming certificate”; however, from the context of the joke in the novel (and I think the show, don’t remember for sure), I assume it has some more impressive meaning in other uses.
Given the origins of that series, I was guessing British, but that doesn’t limit it much. My cultural ignorance is preventing me from forming a meaningful theory.
edit: I’m sorry, I thought this was a response to another comment I made, making my response 100% irrelevant. Please feel free to disregard.
edit 2: Though I guess the last line of my unedited comment still applies.
Bachelor of Science, however SSC doesn’t have a different meaning that I’m aware of.
Thank you for the information!
Also, I infer from your response that you also remember that part of Red Dwarf, which is awesome.
I like it
I refuse to do it because I’m a twin. We both agree that it’s shitty if one of us does it because then the other is forced into it basically, being identical.
Also our dad was a piece of cheating shit so we don’t ever want to know about that possibility.
I think of myself as someone who always wants to know, I want to know the truth, I don’t like not knowing things. Plus, it could help finding out about genetic conditions and things to be on the lookout for, which can definitely be valuable.
I’d still never do one of these tests because of the privacy concerns and because I don’t trust companies with something like this, especially since I have seen so many times where companies have a lax attitude or lax policies or both about security.
That would indicate your mom cheated as well? Not sure exactly what your dad cheating has to do with your DNA. Wouldn’t it be better to find out he wasn’t your dad if he was so shitty?
We do not want to find my father’s illegitimate children. He was our father, as our mother never cheated.
Fair.
I’m very sorry I didn’t think of this context. I wasn’t being daft intentionally, it just didn’t occur to me when I was trying to figure out the situation
I can understand now. Thank you for sharing and gently explaining the situation
(I’m also very, very sorry to have implied your mother had cheated in that scenario. I did not mean to cast shade on her character)
You are much more polite than the person who was much more condescending about my mother. It’s fine.
I know for facts my mother never cheated. Mother is at an age I have increasing access to medical records of previous…attempts at children. Which lines up entirely with things my father talked about, and how delighted they were when we were born. Also, my father, for his faults, absolutely could spot another cheater at 50 paces and knew my mother did not.
Also she was like. The only person at home, working in education with long hours and then taking care of us, so if she did cheat, like. Damn, she was really finding the time somehow taking care of terrible twins.
They don’t want to find other siblings
It’s this. We do not want to find his other children.
But what if they’re totally cool people who own a bar in Tahoe or something? You’d be missing out on the fun.
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But what if it’s Bill Gates and he’s been trying to find his lost sibling for inheritance purposes?
¿Porque no los dos?
What if deys rich foke?
How does that work? The lab puts you in contact with people they know share your DNA?
If you choose to opt in and participate in DNA Relatives, other customers that have also elected to participate in this feature will be able to view the following information about you:
Your DNA Relatives display name
How recently you logged into your account
Your relationship labels (masculine, feminine, neutral)
Your predicted relationship and percentage of DNA shared with your matches
Your location (optional)
Ancestor birth locations and family names (optional)
Your profile picture (optional)
Your birth year (optional)
A link to your Family Tree (optional)
Anything you have added to the “Introduce yourself!” Section (optional)
Much better than Tinder for solid matches in my experience.
Thank you; I’m sorry I missed that broader context. I try to think critically about what I read and sometimes I struggle with widening my scope of thinking
There’s something hilarious about the author’s disappointment to find out they’re British, and nothing else.
Can’t say I blame them though.
I read the headline and went, “…I mean, what were you expecting?”
I don’t really subscribe to the whole race thing. Its a culture thing.
And even more important is the food. Can you cook me a traditional xyz meal? Delicious. I love that you’re xyz.
That’s just another reason to be disappointed to find out that you’re British.
I’ve got to admit, I’ve wanted to do one of those tests just because my family is such a mix of “lol we don’t know.” Like, no really, what IS my maternal grandma? She does not look like the rest of her family and had a different family name from her siblings. And ok really, where DID my paternal great-grandmother who lied about her race so she could marry my great-grandfather back when “miscegenation” was illegal, come from? And WAS that great-grandpa biracial himself?
There’s a reason I call myself an ethnic Rorschach test, and I’d love to know why it is I am. But the rest of my family is against the idea of finding out because “it doesn’t matter” plus who knows how just data might be used one day.
the test isnt particularly meaningful. As I understand it they just test a handful of genes that they suspect were less varied in the past. As a result if you get tested through all the services that offer gene testing you will get different numbers for each one.
That’s the other big reason I’m hesitant - different tests can give totally different results, so who knows what’s “right”?
I haven’t found an article yet that can actually articulate the problem with 23 and me right now, and actually did research into it or even read the terms and service. The problem with 23 and me is that they are not maximizing the share holder value of the data they are sitting on. The CEO wants to keep the company in line with the principals they were founded on which is to protect the privacy and data of their customers, while using opt in studies to build data sets that can be studied or sold.
Investors want to enshittify the company, and have been organizing a campaign against to company to try to drive it into liquidation to buy the data, even though the company is profitable. I wouldn’t be surprised is they are funding these weekly omfg 23 and me bad articles.
That juicy data is going to get bought up by the health insurance industry. I would be surprised if they aren’t part of the push to force them to sell the data.
I still find it funny people think these tests mean anything. “you have these 7/9 genes in common with Jasper Brittania and are therefore 77% british”
Stories tend to disappear with the passing away of living memory. These tests are a hope to revive a story of where we came from. It doesn’t, obviously, but I can’t blame people for want.
they’ve mostly got your genetics anyways if your brother did it
Told you so.
On this topic, I did ancestrydna long before I got concerned with my data and privacy. I have since deleted my data and had them destroy my physical sample as well (which took them a long time). But I wonder if the damage is done and even though they say they deleted and destroyed the sample how can I know for sure? Etc
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