Saturday, March 20, 2010

Odd national origin options

I am filling out my US Census form, and I find several things odd. I have the short form, with only ten questions.

There is no question about my citizenship, or one that directly asks for my national origin, but there are about 25 national origins lists. None apply to me, and I have never even heard of some of them. I can say that I am Korean, but I cannot say that I am American or even French.

It separates race from being Hispanic, which makes sense, but what box do they expect non-white Mexicans to check? My guess is to check both "white" and "American Indian" to indicate mixed ancestry, but the latter asks for a tribe name, and Mexicans don't have that, as far as I know.

Only one answer is boldface, and that is the "No" for not being Hispanic. Is that for people who are emphatically not Hispanic?

What ever happened to the oriental race? There is no Caucasian race either anymore. It appears that the entire sub-continent of India has been kicked out of the white race.

The Census web site does not explain any of this. You cannot even file your census response online.

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