What box should Gov. Nikki Haley check when it comes to her race?
The South Carolina Democratic Party tried Thursday to make Haley out as a liar for checking "white" as her race on her 2001 Lexington County voter registration application.
But the application had no specific option for "Indian." Her options were "white, black/African-American, Asian, Hispanic, Native American or other."
The governor stayed silent on the matter, although her allies accused the Democrats of the lowest-grade politics: race-baiting.
As I recall from the movie, Gahdhi was considered "colored" in South Africa. As I recall from some social science course I took, East Indians are of the "caucasoid" group.
Then again, I'm not really interested in what color someone's skin is. Without trying to sound too melodramatic, I'm more interested in the color of someone's soul.
Technically, she is Asian (India is part of Asia ...). But most people mean Oriental when they say Asian in this context (actually, in most contexts). I've got some Israeli co-workers who technically are Asian as Israel is part of Asia, too :-) For most real-world purposes in America today, they are "white".
ReplyDeleteShe could have checked "other", I suppose.
The big problem with this (other than that the question probably has no business being asked ...) is that the groups are neither complete, nor mutually exclusive.
Hispanic isn't a "race" in the same sense that African-American is.
Asian isn't a "race", either.
But this is about scoring political points, not truth or accuracy, so ...
-Mark Roulo
Hey -- it's just another SC Democrat trying to make sure that the integrity of the white race is protected, just like the Democrat Party did during the days of slavery and segregation. No doubt he really wants to revive one of those old Democrat-passed laws that makes it illegal for someone not of pure European ancestry to try to pass themselves off as white, so as to prosecute Gov. Haley and send her to prison.
ReplyDeletePersonally, I believe that the only choices under "Race" on a government form should be "Human" and "Other".