🚀 go-pugleaf

This is getting to be a battle over semantics and becoming increasingly
pointless.

The assertion that attaching a hyphenated phrase to your identity is
somehow detrimental to society has no logical basis. Because America is a 
democracy (sort of), people have the right to call themselves whatever the
hell they please. Just the same way, Arf has the right to say that for
African Americans to do that is bad.

I personally disagree. Above and beyond the fact that anyone has the
right to say what they please, the one thing about African Americans as 
a group in this country is that they did not come to America by choice.
Other immigrant groups came over with some sense of history; as slaves 
they did not. In American society, as even Arf will agree (I think), in 
order to get things done, you have to first organize yourself around like-
minded individuals. In the case of racial-ethnic groups, this has been 
systematically done. There's a cycle in America: first you're a new 
immigrant, then maybe you dabble in crime, move up a little financially,  
next generation goes to college, generation after that is well-educated, 
then starts to think of itself as purely American; de-emphasizing ethnic
backgrounds. I make no judgements on whether this is "good" or not. But
if hyphenation is so upsetting, give it time and it'll disappear.


---I may disagree vehemently with what you have to say, but I will defend
---your right to say it...

                                paraphrase of Voltaire

--
bashar@apres.UUCP (Joel Grossman)
Applied Research (cryptography & security BBS)  1 708 639 8853