For the first time in 27 years, the U.S. government is changing how it categorizes people by race and ethnicity, an effort that federal officials believe will more accurately count residents who identify as Hispanic and of Middle Eastern and North African heritage.
The revisions to the minimum categories on race and ethnicity, announced Thursday by the Office of Management and Budget, are the latest effort to label and define the people of the United States. This evolving process often reflects changes in social attitudes and immigration, as well as a wish for people in an increasingly diverse society to see themselves in the numbers produced by the federal government.
Europeans are culturally very put off with America’s approach of putting everyone in labelled boxes.
I wish I had a buck for every time I heard an atheist in Europe complain about having to identify with a specific church for tax purposes.
The one country I know does this is Germany. My experience is centered around Belgium/France, where the catholic church holds baptism records but does not share them with the government (and neither would the government even be allowed to ask in the first place AFAIK). As for ethnic categorization, I don’t know of a country which does that.
I see. So your government has literally no knowledge whatsoever about the Roma for example?
Another thing I love about Europeans the No True Scotsmen approach to things
“No European nation does that!”
“What about this one that does?”
“Well that is only one”
“Ok what about this other one that does it?”
“Well that doesn’t count because of X”
“Ok what about this third one?”
“Well that also doesn’t count cause of Y”
Why don’t you just say “Paris” or whatever your favorite city there is next time instead of the continent of Europe? It would be so much more accurate.
Oh and btw Finland also does religious surveys for taxes. Let me guess the Finns aren’t Europeans either?
I see. So your government has literally no knowledge whatsoever about the Roma for example?
There’s no registry of them no. We discriminate the old-fashioned way, such as by outlawing camping outside of certain areas which indirectly targets their way of life.
I also didn’t say that Germans aren’t European, but if all you can find on religious/ethnic state cataloguing in Europe is Germany and Finland doing some funky tax things, I think that only strengthens my point that we are VERY far from the US’s “please tell us your exact skin tone for, uh, statistics” approach. Europe is not a monolith but my goal was to show a different perspective, which I believe I have achieved and I don’t know why that offends you so much.
EDIT: I guess I could have been more clear in my first comment, but it’s pretty obvious to me that I don’t claim to speak for ALL of Europe since literally nobody can. I further clarified that my experience is that of someone raised in a Franco-Belgian culture but that I believe that it applies further in Europe, which I don’t think is as broad or incorrect of a claim as your make it to be.
