To bring a divided country together, start with a little spit (DNA test)

DNA test for a college to find out what your roots are. It's a novel approach to help people recognize that there is a lot of different nationalities that may have been in your ancestry. Seems like a good way to get people to see race from a different perspective. After the last 8 years of worsening "race relation" could programs like this help to bring people together?

Anita Foreman's students took DNA tests to learn there roots.

Anita Foeman’s students had just gotten the results from their genetic tests, and they couldn’t wait to talk.

One said her dad cheered when she told him she has Zulu roots. A girl with curly red hair said her family always gathers around a Nativity scene on Christmas Eve and sings carols over the baby Jesus, and this year, after learning that she’s 1 percent Jewish, she said: “We’re going to sing the dreidel song!”

www.washingtonpost.com... bc69

Foreman students are talking about race, immigration, terrorist attacks, building walls, riots, and the election. So the answer Foreman thought would be to take DNA tests to provoke people to recognize their own biases, and this would help pull them together. Foreman says that this really opens up the dialog and surprises people.

At a time when tensions over race and politics are so raw, the stakes, Foeman said, seem particularly high. Her students have been talking all fall about riots, building walls, terrorist attacks, immigration, the election. “You can feel it buzzing around the halls like electricity,” Foeman said.

Asking people to take DNA tests — an idea that has spread to a campuswide effort at this public university — grew out of consulting work Foeman does in race mediation. Instead of a confrontational approach, trying to provoke people into recognizing their own biases, she wanted something that would pull people together, or at least give them a neutral place from which to start to talk. And with racial divides so stark, she wanted to add some nuance and depth.

The news isn't all good. Some people are so connected to what they think is their racial ID is that they drop the class and some refuse to take it because they don't want to know if they are not pure. Seems like a new approach.

Foreman has seen people drop out of the project after getting their results, including three people who identified as African American who were upset to find out how much European ancestry they had. Some people refuse to take the test. One woman of Chinese descent told Foeman, “It’s okay for you — you already know you’re mixed up. I don’t want to find out I’m not pure.”

And some people resist some of the findings, like the student who insisted he just tans easily.

a reply to: seasonal

I worry that the information gathered from all the DNA tests will be used for sinister activities.

originally posted by: KEACHI
a reply to: seasonal

I worry that the information gathered from all the DNA tests will be used for sinister activities.

exactly why people are apprehensive about getting tested through those "Ancestry" or "23 and Me" companies

Oh this can't go off the rails at all......

The girl wants to start singing the Dreidel song, because she's 1 percent Jewish!? What about the other 99%?
People will start identifying themselves as [ blank ], just because they have a small amount of, let's say Native American, or like the girl, Jewish ancestry. I can honestly see some of the college snowflakes claiming they know what it's like to be oppressed, because they have 2% African American, Native American, etc, from 100 years ago, when in reality, they are from upper class, wealthy White people, that have never been near "oppressed".

a reply to: KEACHI

Like medical costs?

a reply to: DAVID64

Or start to use this as a way to get around affirmative action?

originally posted by: FamCore

originally posted by: KEACHI
a reply to: seasonal

I worry that the information gathered from all the DNA tests will be used for sinister activities.

exactly why people are apprehensive about getting tested through those "Ancestry" or "23 and Me" companies

Absolutely. I was offered a free DNA test through my insurance for preventative medical reasons. I refused. My aunt recently went over my family tree more completely than anyone, apparently the 'old aunts' didn't want anyone to know there was what they used to call 'black irish' in the family, which is members of the family that married people form Spain or Portugal. I am now wondering if I should get a test, as it would be great to know, but not through ancestry.com or my insurance.

Every since the Iraq War began, there seems to be a push to get people to put their DNA on record. Maybe I'm just overly conspiracy minded, but it seems suspicious to me.

OK, I am overly conspiracy minded. But still ...

originally posted by: VictorVonDoom
Every since the Iraq War began, there seems to be a push to get people to put their DNA on record. Maybe I'm just overly conspiracy minded, but it seems suspicious to me.

OK, I am overly conspiracy minded. But still ...

It is suspicious.

And on top of that, if I find I have that gene Angelina Jolie has I don't think my insurance would cover me like her. I think I would rather not know. She was probably in a posh private room to recover from both procedures for 2 weeks each. They would kick me out after each one after 3-4 days and I would lose income for weeks.

For a lot of things, I would rather not know.

originally posted by: seasonal
a reply to: DAVID64

Or start to use this as a way to get around affirmative action?

Hey, when everybody's special, no one is. It might also be a way to torpedo this whole special snowflake movement too.

When every white kid has a claim to minority status, it gets a lot less fun to try to lord it over them. They can play your game now.

I did the DNA thing. I am pretty much all Finn. Please hold the Finn jokes/

originally posted by: ketsuko

originally posted by: seasonal
a reply to: DAVID64

Or start to use this as a way to get around affirmative action?

Hey, when everybody's special, no one is. It might also be a way to torpedo this whole special snowflake movement too.

When every white kid has a claim to minority status, it gets a lot less fun to try to lord it over them. They can play your game now.

Which special snowflake movement? The one where Liberals protest against bad things or the one where conservatives whine and call them snowflakes?

a reply to: rickymouse

Like form Finland?

originally posted by: reldra

originally posted by: ketsuko

originally posted by: seasonal
a reply to: DAVID64

Or start to use this as a way to get around affirmative action?

Hey, when everybody's special, no one is. It might also be a way to torpedo this whole special snowflake movement too.

When every white kid has a claim to minority status, it gets a lot less fun to try to lord it over them. They can play your game now.

Which special snowflake movement? The one where Liberals protest against bad things or the one where conservatives call them snowflakes?

The one where if you aren't white, you are somehow terribly oppressed whether or not you are simply because you live in the country.

Please read up on CRT and intersectionalism. It gives a minority license to roll up on a homeless white and tell them they have privilege.

a reply to: VictorVonDoom

Why do you think they want DNA from everyone? What are they looking for?

originally posted by: ketsuko

originally posted by: reldra

originally posted by: ketsuko

originally posted by: seasonal
a reply to: DAVID64

Or start to use this as a way to get around affirmative action?

Hey, when everybody's special, no one is. It might also be a way to torpedo this whole special snowflake movement too.

When every white kid has a claim to minority status, it gets a lot less fun to try to lord it over them. They can play your game now.

Which special snowflake movement? The one where Liberals protest against bad things or the one where conservatives call them snowflakes?

The one where if you aren't white, you are somehow terribly oppressed whether or not you are simply because you live in the country.

Please read up on CRT and intersectionalism. It gives a minority license to roll up on a homeless white and tell them they have privilege.

CRT and intersectinalism sounds like a thing conservatives bash, so I will decline.

I have seen no instance where a minority can 'roll up on a homeless white' and I know a couple.

originally posted by: DAVID64
a reply to: VictorVonDoom

Why do you think they want DNA from everyone? What are they looking for?

Raise insurance rates? But Obamacare has a pre existing condition safeguard.

Some say Agenda 21, but I have read the entore thing, it is LONG and it isn't in there.

There is some nefarious reason I imagine, though.

originally posted by: DAVID64
a reply to: VictorVonDoom

Why do you think they want DNA from everyone? What are they looking for?

Raise insurance rates? But Obamacare has a pre existing condition safeguard.

Some say Agenda 21, but I have read the entire thing, it is LONG and it isn't in there.

There is some nefarious reason I imagine, though.

a reply to: seasonal

Lost my post on this quirky laptop.

Did the test. Found out my only full brother was a half sibling. I was the one without a father. I finally found my father. Seems he died when I was 9.

100% European here but autosomal dna only goes back 500-1000 years. Take y and especially mitochondrial (female) dna and you will find african roots. So at some level we all come from a similar ancient heritage...at least on the female side.

originally posted by: DAVID64
a reply to: VictorVonDoom

Why do you think they want DNA from everyone? What are they looking for?

I don't know. Maybe something related to whatever they were looking for when the US plundered the museums in Iraq? Remember the old Stargate TV series?