Mailvox: Identity and apocalypse

A reader writes about his recent observations concerning identity:

During a recent get-together to play games one of my friends who is a racial mix of white and Latino (racially and ethnically) expressed his angst about identifying with either group. He asked if we (all white) thought he could pass as a Mexican, while we thought he could it’s the Mexicans who matter and not us.

It’s a normal question to wonder about your origins, but this seemed out of place to me and an odd thing to ask. It got me thinking about some others on VP who are mixed races and asking “What about me?”. The difference here though is that we weren’t having a conversation about race and the was out of the blue. I think he spoke for millions of mixed race Americans who know that something big is coming even if they don’t know what is coming.

For everyone outside of the US let me make something very clear, the racial situation in America is a complete mess. Just a few years ago it was “I see no color” to… well… I don’t know. It’s everything from voluntary segregation is good, to bad, to picking your own race or denying your own race, to everything in-between. A good example is an article I read the other day about a company who had the races break out into groups by race to discuss racial tensions in the office. A very obviously black girl refused to go to the black group as she was raised around whites, and said she had nothing to do with black culture. She proudly walked right into the white group. The black woman running the groups didn’t know what to do, so let her do it, but didn’t agree with her decision.

So an apocalypse of some type is on the way. The nature of it is unknown, but people can sense it.

If you ever talk to someone who thinks the current situation is going to work simply ask them for the successful model from history the US should emulate. They cannot and will not provide one.

The irony, of course, is it that it is whites who deny the irrefutable reality of identity politics who are usually the fastest to play the card of whatever identity-complication they can claim, whether it is an adopted black nephew, a transmogrified child, or a Japanese friend.