re: Your mind will wrap itself in knots if you ponder the term 'African American'

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It would be comical if it weren't so insane.

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It's just a flawed term to use for a fundamentally flawed trait (race), which relies on arbitrary and reductionistic categorization.

But your example is not insane, since we all know the meaning, even if it's terribly flawed. Just like I'm technically a Native American, but I know that is not what the mean when the ask what my race is.

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I know a white guy who was born and raised in South Africa and when he moved to the US as a teenager and then applied for colleges, he was told he couldn't put "African" or "African American" on his applications because he was the wrong color.

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Back in the day, a buddy of mine in undergrad engineering at LSU was a white South African who listed himself as African American. He still does it at every opportunity.

I think it's awesome.