this post was submitted on 24 Nov 2023
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A friend of mine's grandparents immigrated to Germany in the 50s. We both grew up in the same village, both speak German natively, both went to the same school. Still he is considered Turkish and I am German.
How exactly is thousand years of history important for my personal life? I don't have memories of bashing in roman heads in Teutoburg, chasing Latvians out of newly conquered Teuton land or putting Jews into gas chambers. I learned about all of these in school, just as my friend. Why me may or may not having ancestors who may or may not have done that is now important to be considered part of the in-group is not something I will ever understand.
Because he is turkish.
Turks in germany are not germans, they vote for Erdogan in the elections and they keep their citizenship.
They have turkish names, they name their children turkish names, they follow a turkish religion, when they gather at home they eat turkish food and they often speak with each other in turkish.
They're turks.
I know Germany is stereotypically that country with strict rules for everything, but you will be happy to learn that it does not actually police its citizens about what they can eat and how they can communicate.
I do enjoy Turkish food a lot as well, though Korean food is probably still my favorite. :)
You don't seem to like Turkish people at all.
Turks in Turkey or visitors, tourist and students from Turkey, they're great.
Turks who want to live in Europe, but not become europeans, who want to change our countries into Turkey? No, they should go back to Turkey.
So you believe that Turkish people shouldn't live in Germany at all, and there's no path to assimilation.
The friend sounds assimilated, but you already seem to know who they voted for and exactly their character, and you don't tolerate it at all. They aren't German and should leave, even though they were born and raised in Germany.
It's very easy to assimilate yourself. Marry a german, have german children, give them german names and baptize them.
If you marry another turk, give turk names and follow a turk religion and continue to live as a turk, then you're a turk, living in germany.
Thank you for enlightening me about this stuff. I am actually not baptized, and I follow neither the middle eastern religion that dominated Germany the last 1000 years nor one of the Teutonic ones that existed before. Oh no. And I have the most popular name for German boys in the 90s, but I just googled it and it turns out it's origin is hebrew...Oh no. And I have to admit I do not like Sauerkraut much..Oh no, my whole identity is disappearing.
No, honestly, do you know how many people in my life have given a fuck about me being religious? It's 0.
And the same way, it's not going to matter if a turkish-looking person does all the things you want. They are still going to be judged and stereotyped by how they look, nothing else.
I mean, you yourself already knew everything about my friend from his culinary habits to political views, all without asking him a single question. It's like magic, right?
My kids will probably face the same problems if they don't primarily inherit my features because my SO isn't white. Then, even the “1000 years of history” that I will give them with my magical blood will matter for many people.
Let me tell you something, I don't go around seeing some brown person and think "foreigner", I think "fellow human in Denmark".
If they give me just any small inclination that they identify as danish, then I will view them as danish.
If on the other hand they speak a ghetto-arabic language with each other and they dress in ways that no or few danes do and if they behave in a threathening manner and if by their behaviour they make it very clear they are in opposition to what I consider Denmark, then I'll take them on it and consider them as foreign.
Ah, my apologies then, with you being able to judge so quickly that Rustykilo's and my friend aren't German I had wrongfully assumed you were basing that on something else. Of course, I should have known that you were able to meet them before and judge their clothing style as not sufficient, especially since we Germans are internationally famous for being well-dressed. :P
I do have to point out, though, that while I don't know much about Denmark, there is actually no mandatory dress code in Germany. Quite the opposite actually, if anything there are laws preventing a government from enforcing such. So judging their Germaness on their clothes would be if anything very Ungerman.
But that's good if people aren't judged by their ethnicity in Denmark, you guys are probably a lot more liberal than us then. Because if you ask any 'non-white' German here about their experiences, many will tell you that's not what happens here, no matter when they or their ancestors immigrated here or how 'well-behaved' they are.
So you agree Elon Musk is the world's most successful African-American?
Sure? Relevant why?
The dude is obviously disliked by many people for various of reasons and even then I have never seen anyone say: "Well, he isn't real American, he isn't one of us, he is just a migrant and his kids also will never be American because they don't have our hundreds years of history through our magical blood". Because Americans don't really do that.
Maybe you are referencing someone who said that, and I missed it, but the issue with picking a celebrity is that you will find just about everything being said about them.
Still, for an average white dude like you and me, it would be no problem to migrate to the US and be considered American after we get citizenship and our kids who are born there would definitely have no problem being considered American.
That's kind of what the whole thread is about.