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Why so many white Americans claim to be native? (lemmy.zip)

submitted 5 days ago by choihanna@lemmy.zip to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml

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For some reason when I'm talking to an American from the North East and the fact that I'm mixed comes up they always say they aren't white they're actually native because his grandpa once mentioned something about a Cherokee ancestor.

It's always Cherokee, no other tribe but that one. And it's always the whitest looking person ever, straight up 6ft tall blue eyed and blond guy.

I get it, I'm mostly white too, Spanish and Slavic. But even tho I'm not mostly native American I still look native enough that people think I'm Asian.

But when your ancestry has been so diluted over the generations... You're not native. It's not just that you don't look native, it's also that you don't even participate in the culture.

Dude you're just a farm boy from Philadelphia you're probably more Amish than Cherokee, if that supposed ancestor is even real at all and not just some random claim by some of your ancestors to have a "right over these lands".

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[–] CultLeader4Hire@lemmy.world 4 points 4 days ago

This is a huge part of it.

For my family it was the native kids that were forced into adoption with white families to force them to assimilate. We have photos of my dutch pilgrim family with daughters who are plainly native and in their photos as adults they often really lighten their skin on the face but don’t do the hands… it’s really bizarre to see