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[–] Thisismyvoatusername 0 points 2 points (+2|-0) ago  (edited ago)

Yes. My first thought on reading that was that if you come from a people who gave us Aristotle, Shakespeare and Beethoven, you also come from some alternate reality in which those three came from the same people.

That said, it is mostly a strange statement to come from someone descended from europeans who nonetheless does not see the distinctions between them. I once had a fascinating experience in Beijing. I paid a guy to take me on a tour of the Forbidden City. He was a good tour guide but every time he discussed historical events like the Boxer rebellion, he referred to Westerners as the French-English. To me those are two very different things. To him they were completely undifferentiated.

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[–] dontforgetaboutevil 0 points 1 point (+1|-0) ago 

Yeah that is a good point. Same for Scotch-Irish which was what the mostly English settlers in North America called the celtic people who moved in. A lot of those people were even welsh and the english who had fought these people for centuries and were very familiar with them still mixed them up.

For me, being white means knowing my history and once I studied that I couldn't help but conceive of a deep and lasting resentment against the english.