[marcus_holmes]

It's massively irritating because it's the usual US blend of total ignorance and massive arrogance.

I used to do re-enactment in the UK, and after almost every show I'd have some idiot wander up and say "I'm a Saxon!" and blather shite at me about what that meant about their identity and culture.

If I asked if that meant they weren't American, then obviously they'd react in horror at the suggestion.

The idea that my culture, my history, can just be co-opted as part of someone else's cosplay identity, is tiresome at best. But then they walk up to me and expect me to recognise them as a fellow Saxon? No. Fuck off you annoying fucking wanker.

And I notice that none of them claim to be English or even British. Oh no, too much Braveheart and The Patriot for that.

[henrikschroder]

The weirdest part is that they stop tracing back the second they hit someone interesting, as if nothing interesting happened before that person. If their great-great-grandfather was Scottish, they then assume everyone before him was 100% super duper Scottish, and that that has conferred "cultural traits" through some weird-ass blood magic or something.

But Europeans are diverse mutts as well.

I'm Swedish. But my last name is 100% German, easily recognisable as a German name, super common. Because my paternal ancestor immigrated from Germany in the 1600's and brought the name with him. My mother's maiden name was Czech, also very easily recognisable as such, and my uncle and my cousins have that name as well.

But I would never in a million years call myself German. I am not German. I am not Czech. My cousins aren't Czech. All of our parents were born in Sweden. All of our grandparents were born in Sweden. The vast majority of our great-grandparents were born in Sweden. We are all 100% Swedish.

The idea that I would call myself German because of my last name is completely ridiculous, but that is exactly what these cosplaying Americans are doing, even though they don't speak German, and I do. My dad speaks fluent German. My maternal grandfather spoke fluent German. I have so much more claim to "German-ness", whatever that is, than these cosplayers, and I wouldn't dream of doing it.

And then they bleat about how their great-great-whtaever was German, and because of that they "feel so connected to the Alps".

[hyppopocriaas]

What's funny about those Europeans gatekeeping European ethnic identity from Americans, is that their tune will change immediately if we ask them if an African who has been there for 5 years is English or German.

See the response from marcus_holmes about "Irishness" in this thread. It's essentially the position of ethnic nationalist parties like Restore Britain. But in a different context he'd be ranting about civic nationalist parties like Reform UK or One Nation...

Basically, if an American is claiming to be whatever, you can use a purity standard close to the Nuremberg laws to exclude them. But an Indian or African who arrived 5 years ago is a true blood Aussie mate, because saying anything else would be doing a racism.

[brigandish]

> But Europeans are diverse mutts as well.

Speak for yourself, because

> If their great-great-grandfather was Scottish, they then assume everyone before him was 100% super duper Scottish

That is, indeed, the correct assumption to make. I would recommend having a look at the work done on population genetics at Oxford University’s People of the British Isles project[1]. Even their homepage should relieve you of some misconceptions:

> The People of the British Isles (PoBI) project was initiated by Sir Walter Bodmer in 2004, in an effort to create the first ever detailed genetic map of a country. The United Kingdom’s history bristles with immigrations, wars and invasions, so the PoBI researchers faced a tremendous task in investigating how past events impacted the genetic makeup of modern British people.

> Results included a map (image below) showing a remarkable concordance between genetic and geographical clustering of our samples across the United Kingdom.

[1] https://www.peopleofthebritishisles.org/

[marcus_holmes]

haha, great point about the language. An Irish friend of mine would speak Gaelic to any American he met who claimed to be Irish. Obviously none of them spoke the language, and he'd ask why not? Great question.

[453yuh46]

That is your right to not claim your German ancestry, as generally it is a viable solution to just not stand out and blend in with crowd, but frankly that is also your right to claim your ancestry and seek refuge in German speaking countries, if things go south in Sweden and Caliphate is established there or some Finns invade and makes your life impossible, so generally - this is not your gate to keep, as these can be considered as an open choices. And I would think that current age of open borders that we have now might end and claiming different identity might be the only viable option to migrate somewhere else.

[brigandish]

Ethnicity and nationality are not the same, though they have until very recently overlapped to an enormous extent. Someone might well be of anglo-saxon ethnicity and be American.

Being British myself, I find it fun to tease the yanks about all manner of things, but actual animus of the kind you’re displaying just looks like a massive chip on the shoulder.

[_DeadFred_]

Sorry when your ancestor's ran mine out we survived and chose to keep a bit of identity, some concept of self. You're right, we should have surrendered every right to it, every notion of those that came before us. Ungrateful us not to have submitted in a second way (the first was not submitting and, you know, surviving).

[marcus_holmes]

You became American.