Just finished filling out the Census form on the website

[MineralMan]

While I have some issues with the race/origins questions, I answered them accurately. Why? Because the census is important as a way of identifying who lives where in this country and how they identify themselves.

Some might believe that the information is irrelevant and shouldn't be shared, but I disagree. I want it known that there are Hmong people living on my block, in my city, and in Minnesota. I want that information to be enumerated so we better understand who lives where. Here in St. Paul, MN, official notices and documents get translated into all of the languages used in our city, and that is dozens and dozens of languages. Without accurate census information, local governments and even the federal government have no idea what languages are needed.

So, the fact that my ancestral origins are Scottish and Irish might seem to be irrelevant, but so what? I don't care if the government knows that, really. My next door neighbor and his family are Laotian. That information is relevant, because they are not fluent in English yet. If the government needs to communicate with them, it is far easier to do so in the language they are most familiar with.

Similarly, my age is useful information. I'm 74 years old. So, I have different needs and realities than my much younger Laotian neighbor and his wife and young children. Government services must be created and delivered according to the needs that exist.

So, please just fill out your census form online and don't make a protest of some kind about it.

[Wounded Bear]

1. Did mine yesterday. Piece of cake...

Those of us of a certain age have been through this before. Several times.

[MineralMan]

3. Yes, we have. It's much simpler to do online, too.

The numbers go straight into the database, too. With paper forms, someone has to type it in or it has to be OCRed. More chance for errors.

The Internet is a good thing.

[pwb]

2. I am waiting for the paper questionnaire .

I like our Postal Service.

[Spider Jerusalem]

4. I find the ancestral origins question to be kind of weird, honestly

my ancestral origins: mostly English. Most of my ancestors arrived in America before 1700. I'm a tenth generation American on my paternal line and on my mother's direct paternal line. At what point can I just say "American"?

[MineralMan]

5. Well, like I said, it's mostly irrelevant.

At least it is for those who are of white, European ancestry. It is more relevant, however, for those with other ancestral backgrounds.

How will that information be used? Well, for boring European ancestry folks, someone will probably create a map showing how many people of some particular background live in various places. Purely an academic interest. However, for, say, my Laotian neighbor, knowledge of how many people with those origins live in St. Paul, MN could be of some importance.

In my case, I might find it interesting, though, to learn what percentage of the population of the United States has Scottish AND Irish ancestry. I might not, too, but I might.

Information is what it is. It is either useful or irrelevant, depending on who you ask. It does no harm, however, for that information to be collected.

[Spider Jerusalem]

8. I found that kind of an interesting thing, also, being in the UK for the 2011 UK Census.

They also had a race/ethnicity question with the options "White British", "White Irish" and "White Other". I thought about it for a few minutes, ticked the box for "White Other" and filled in "American".

[frazzled]

6. Ancestry can get complicated

As the grandchild of four immigrant grandparents, I'm often confused about it. The places from which my grandparents came are no longer the same countries today as they were back in the early 1900s. So, for example, my paternal grandparents "may" have come from Brest,• which is currently part of Belarus. But back then it was sometimes in Poland. And at other times it was considered part of Russia. We always said, "Russian/Polish," but what was it really? My maternal grandmother came from Budapest, Hungary (that is certain), but my grandfather, although considered Hungarian, was actually from a Hungarian-speaking part of Romania, in Transylvania. It's all a mess, and so little is firmly known. I'd like to put down just "Ashkenazic Jewish," and perhaps that's allowable. It seems the most accurate. As for "white," yes, I am fair skinned. But I don't feel that "white" really expresses it properly. I'll probably put down white, but I don't feel white like a person of Scots-English background.

* Note: As most will attest, when you had grandparents (or parents) who escaped their countries because of persecution, they never talked about where they came from or what it was like. Nothing, nada. It was all a deep, dark secret that they didn't want to talk about. All you got was the (wonderful) food, and sometimes not even a real language: my paternal grandparents spoke Yiddish amongst themselves (English elsewhere), a lingua franca of middle and eastern Europe with no particular country attachment.

[MineralMan]

9. It can, indeed, get complicated.

My wife's late father's parents were German Immigrants living in the Volga region of Russia. Invited there by Catherine, they were later targeted by the Communists after the Revolution and escaped to come to the United States. Her mother's grandparents came to South Dakota from Norway during the great migration out of that country.

My ancestry is simpler, really, although there are some redheads on the Irish side, so it's likely that there is some Nordic ancestor who may have shown up in Ireland on a Viking ship. Who can say.

However, it doesn't matter all that much, since the ancestry is European, generally.

In your case, of course, your Ashkenazi heritage could have some health-related value as information.

[frazzled]

10. My son did 23 and me nine or so years ago

Genetically, his "ancestry" came back at something like 99.6% Ashkenazic Jewish. So I guess that's an ancestry category. I think I may use that for a change.

We still haven't gotten a census letter in the mail.

[MineralMan]

11. Well, 99.6% is pretty clear, I think.

LOL!

Since there are a few genetics-related illnesses uniquely associated with that ancestry, it's important information to know and share with physicians.

I'm sure you already know that, though.

[frazzled]

15. On the other hand, thinking it about it

No one wants to identify themselves overtly as "Jew" on a government document. Not at least in this moment of white-nationalist ascendency, and not after remembering history. And most certainly not after watching the first episode of "The Plot Against America" on HBO last night. (Philip Roth novel with alternative history in which Charles Lindbergh actually did become president in 1940, and his "America First" ideology started to take over.)

I'll reconsider what I'm going to put down for national origin.

[MineralMan]

18. Yes, there is that, for sure.

[Retrograde]

20. Even just European ancestry can be complicated

I have a general idea of where three of my grandparents' families came from geographically, and a vague idea of where the other ones were. Even though they identified as the same ethnic group, depending on when you looked at the map they could have been from 7 or more different countries (yeah, that's more than the number of ancestors here: eastern European geopolitics can get complicated). My husband's ancestry is clearer: he says his ancestors run the gamut from Scots to Scots-Irish.

[Lars39]

7. It wouldn't let me skip it, so I just put U.S.

But it does seem like the questions keep getting more and more intrusive.

[MaryMagdaline]

12. I've been doing ancestry research

The census records from 1800’s, 1900’s Canada, US all ask ethnicity/country of origin, even of ones parents.

It’s cool to see Irish next door to German, next door to Polish ... gives a flavor for the old neighborhoods. I agree it’s a bit unsettling. Not sure how most Americans respond since we are very much mixed nowadays.

[Lars39]

14. Yeah, I'd be hard-pressed to name a country

of origin other than England and Ireland, yet I don’t consider myself either one.

[Maeve]

13. Did mine and my mother's yesterday

That 'origins' question was the hardest part--and that wasn't that hard!

[PA Democrat]

16. We haven't received the invitation or whatever it is they mailed out.

Should we have gotten it by now?

[MineralMan]

17. Ours came yesterday.

So, it will be there soon.

[Staph]

19. I've been doing genealogy on Ancestry.com recently.

It's fascinating to look at the old census forms for my ancestors. It made me decide to be as honest as possible on my forms, for the sake of those who come after me.


But I still haven't gotten my invitation to fill out this year's form!