Among Friends

[151949]

I was frequently amazed when I was working because I worked at a large university medical center and we had doctors come from all over the world to do residencies. Many were so very prejudiced against Americans and were quite verbal about it. What did they think they were going to find when they came to the USA - Canadians ? Mexicans? This IS where the Americans are - in the USA. When they would say something about not liking the USA or Americans I was very likely to tell them it is a free country and you are free to leave it as soon as possible, because  we don't tolerate bigotry of any kind here. That usually shut them up.  

[goldensrbest]

I think each of us,should be proud of our ancestry,  to be ashamed is beyond my understanding.

[forrestwolf]

All of my scrubs for work are wolf prints..I wear moccasins year round, even for work..(Hate when people ask me why I wear them when it rains, and my response is..do deer get damaged in rain??? Do moose get damaged in rain??...you get the picture..) I have wolves all around my desk and on the wall....People ask me if I own one, and my response is that they are illegal in the state of GA...They are not indigenous to this area.....My jewelry is "rocks", to me, as they all have meaning, and bring such powers, if you really know the meaning of your "rocks"...."Rocks" are found in the east US, not turquoise, as so many think I should be wearing....which I do collect turquoise, but it was not originally Eastern Native American....I never, nor did my family, live in a Teepee...as that was western Native Americans....So many people ask me if I am atheist....NO.......I am not what you have been taught in old school....

I so regret that poeple do not look at ME....My Mind.....My offerings....Just what they have been taught in schools.....This is so true in so many cultures.....They are looked at upon what they learned in schools, and NOT what the person IS......So many are missing out on what I am as a PERSON......

Please always look at the person....Not their labels.........

This was just to see how many, besides myself, have been scorned for being your cultural background......

[151949]

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@SeaMaiden wrote:

My Father hid the fact from us (his children) that his Mother ( our GrandMother)was Jewish and from Hungrey.  I did not find that out until I was about 25.  He was ashamed I guess....we only heard about his Father's heritage ( our Grandfather) being Norwegian. He was proud of that I guess.   I am not ashamed at all about my GrandMothers heritage.  

When I was a little girl growing up in Western Pa. in the 50's a lot of people had a LOT of prejudice against the eastern european Jews who had settled here after they escaped from the Nazis. The steel industry & coal mines provided many jobs so a  lot of immigrants would settle in Pittsburgh. 

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i wasn't raised with prejudice in our home so I never understood it. 

[Bird mama]

@forrestwolf

I can't begin to tell you how rotten I think it is that you or anyone else has been made to feel ashamed of their people, of their heritage.  

All I can say is we got some ignorant people in this country.  It's sad when old thoughts a prejudices are passed from generation to generation.

[151949]

@forrestwolf  You state that you make a real point of pointing out that you are from native heritage but you say your insulted because people notice this about you. I don't get that.

[forrestwolf]

@Solar Is My Name

What becomes fascinating in the Native American culture, is that it extends into Canada, and Mexico, Central America, and South America, due to government and land disputes.....That is why so many want to call us indigenous....I go with HUMAN, as several have stated........

[Moonchilde]

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@Solar Is My Name wrote:

Got myself a birthday gift: THE ANCESTRY DNA ($99) TEST.

Fascinating; it is based on people around the world who report that they and all their grandparents are/were from a certain same area of the country.

YOUR different elements of DNA are tested 40 times against the many regions for which Ancestry DNA has data. The percentage reported to you is the average of those 40 times of running your saliva sample.

Seems as though most people have some surprises in the results. It is a fun and interesting thing to get done. Well worth the $.  My biggest surprise was what I WASN'T!

Family anecdotes sometimes inform you one way, but your DNA test tells you something else. For example: your relatives could have lived in Native American territories but were not Native Americans themselves.

-Solar1

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And you can definitely have some Native American ancestry and it doesn't show up in your test results. 

There is no "Native American" DNA test.  Not that many Native Americans have submitted samples to any DNA database and identified themselves on the paperwork as Native American, so there isn't a large enough database to test against - not to mention there might be significant DNA differences between geographic regions, small tribes and large, or finding "100%" Native Americans who have not intermarried or cohabited in hundreds of years. The Cherokee are trying to encourage more people to test and identify themselves as NA in order to build a better database, but the last I read they were still relying heavily on The Rolls, as other tribes do.

And then there is what testing you have done - maternal, fraternal or both, and how much ancestry is involved. It all figures into results. I'm something like 1/8 or 1/16 and that's just not going to show up, the odds being very small. I've done 3 separate DNA tests and it does not show up - yet I know it's true by former living family memory and relatives' corroborative research.

[Moonchilde]

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@151949 wrote:

I was frequently amazed when I was working because I worked at a large university medical center and we had doctors come from all over the world to do residencies. Many were so very prejudiced against Americans and were quite verbal about it. What did they think they were going to find when they came to the USA - Canadians ? Mexicans? This IS where the Americans are - in the USA. When they would say something about not liking the USA or Americans I was very likely to tell them it is a free country and you are free to leave it as soon as possible, because  we don't tolerate bigotry of any kind here. That usually shut them up.  

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Thereby reinforcing their (supposed) opinion. Way to go.

[SeaMaiden]

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@Moonchilde wrote:

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@SeaMaiden wrote:

My Father hid the fact from us (his children) that his Mother ( our GrandMother)was Jewish and from Hungrey.  I did not find that out until I was about 25.  He was ashamed I guess....we only heard about his Father's heritage ( our Grandfather) being Norwegian. He was proud of that I guess.   I am not ashamed at all about my GrandMothers heritage.  

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Assuming you know some world history, why would you assume your father was ashamed rather than afraid? Being Jewish in many parts of Europe from 1935 to 1945 was a death sentence. Aside from that there was widespread bigotry and exclusionary prejudice towards Jews in many countries, including the US, for millenia, right through the 1970s at least.

Perhaps he learned his caution from his mother. Perhaps he wanted to protect himself and his children from the ugly face of bigotry.

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@Moonchilde  Perhaps....I think it is hiding from the truth. That gets you nowhere really. Our last name was very Norwegian looking and sounding so I doubt anyone woukd suspect a Jewish bloodline.  I guess I will never know the reason.