For "What is Person 1's Race?", can I write in "American"?

[closeupready]

I hate being pigeonholed by my government.

[provis99]

1. you can write whatever you please.

write in Martian if you want. The only use the race label is made is for things like affirmative action program money, redistricting, small business support to minorities, and the like, which you obviously think aren't important.

[timeforpeace]

29. The shameful division of Americans into skin-colored interest groups only encourages racial discord.

[Warpy]

2. Yeah, I have trouble with that one, too

There needs to be a category for all of us who are mutts.

[muriel_volestrangler]

23. You have 'some other race' available, and you can mark more than one

That's what the online sample says you can do, anyway.

[malaise]

3. That is a nationality not a race

Try 'human'.

[Romulox]

10. So are Chinese, Filipino, Somoan, etc. nt

[angel823]

13. [phone]!

I hold on to the hope that before I die I will see a world where we are all, simply human.

Angel

[Pirate Smile]

4. Doesn't it let you enter multiple races if you want? American isn't a race.

I just did my form this morning and thought it let you put in more then one option.

I guess you just don't like it on principal though. ;) They do like to know how demographics are changing and I like to know too. It is interesting and scares the sh#$ out of the RW bigoted jerks.

[Romulox]

9. Neither is "Chinese", if we're getting technical here. nt

[closeupready]

12. I do not like it, no - perhaps that's me just being over-sensitive, but

I am opposed to affirmative action, and race-based quotas (to respond to the other poster above).

So I don't enjoy the idea that I am assisting the federal government in promoting that kind of thing.

Anyway, thanks. :)

[Bill McBlueState]

5. yep, lots do, especially in Appalachia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_ethnicity

[walldude]

6. I was thinking about writing in 100 Meter Hurdles.

But then I remembered that the government has no sense of humor.

[Romulox]

7. I almost wrote: "I don't understand your racial classifications".

I've never heard of humanity being divided into white, black, or 11 different types of Asian. :wtf:

[Bluerthanblue]

8. I put "human" usually-

but I do understand the reasons behind the question.

:hi:

[SoCalNative]

11. that's what all of the FReepers are writing

[closeupready]

14. Probably in English, too, knowing what kind of people they are.

n/t

[MineralMan]

15. I checked "Other" and wrote in "Human". I always do that.

[Brickbat]

16. You can self-identify however you want on the census form.

Or even refuse to answer that part.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

17. You can write anything you want.

Nobody's forcing you to be intellectually honest.

[rfranklin]

18. How would they categorize Obama?

That's a puzzle.

[closeupready]

20. We'd need to see his birth certificate to answer that.

And just where IS his birth certificate? :sarcasm: :rofl:

[Brickbat]

26. "They" would record how he identifies himself.

[etherealtruth]

34. The same way my children characterize themselves ....

... by "checking" multiple races

[xultar]

19. American is nationality. They didn't ask you that.

[FSogol]

21. No check box for "Flag-sucking half-wit"?

They could also add "hypocrite," "tea bagger," "crybaby," and "Merican" to make the Freepers happy.

[Winterblues]

22. Human...not American..You are confusing race with ethnicity.

:shrug:

[notadmblnd]

24. I wrote human

[dixiegrrrrl]

25. So this is the defintion I am used to:

Race means human and ethnicity is where your ancestors originate as part of the human race.

So, "race" = human.

However...
other than human "race" what other "race" is there?

[closeupready]

27. Well, the Census bureau seems to think that 'white' is a race.

I don't. I just really object to being thought of as 'white'. It's like it's a category that's being imposed on me.

[Warren DeMontague]

28. "Earthling"

Or, if you prefer, "Earth Creature"

[Gaedel]

31. Carbon-based life form n/t

[icnorth]

32. Earth creature?

I think he looks like Li'l Oxycontin when he discovers his session at LA Ink went horribly wrong. ;)

[SoCalDem]

30. 'Merkin is NOT a "race"

All the census does is to try and "paint a picture" of who's here in the US..

some people will be "funny" and skew it by writing in false info..but most will answer truthfully, so that people looking for us in 75-100 years might have a better chance to find us..

The people before us, had NO inkling of how computers would somehow make their little insignificant lives, important...long after they are gone..

we all hope we will somehow count..and be remembered, but once the people who are closely related to you or who have personal memories of you, are gone also, all you are, is data stored somewhere or letters carved on a headstone that's been long-forgotten..

[damntexdem]

33. You CAN write in what you want.

And thereby cheapen the informational value of the Census.

[Ignis]

35. Yes, because there are no human sub-species.

The concept of assigning every human being a "race" based on a handful of randomly-chosen morphological differences is outdated and unscientific.

"Race" is merely a social construct--a taxonomic kludge--that is slowly being phased out of the sciences because the plasticity of human phenotypes due to environmental factors has been acknowledged for almost 100 years.

It would be nice if the US caught up with France in banning the state from keeping data based on this 19th-century pseudo-scientific model.