Good clarification that I assumed was obvious. I've been using "American" to describe a heritage and long cultural background that has a giant basis in Europe.

Therefore, it is my view that just because someone is a citizen of this country does not mean they are "American."

This isn't an answer. I don't care what year it is, it is not relevant.

Would it be bad if there were no more Jewish people, that distinct people group?

Would it be bad if there were no more Americans, that distinct people group?

shiftyandquick said:

---

For you Christian nationalists, who say that America is only for Christians (which is dumb and evil)....did you know that there is a long-lived population of Indian Christians in India? That's why many have Christian names.

Now you know.

---

Good for them but don't really care about what happens in other countries as long as they keep it there.

This country was founded by and for white Christians. Doesn't mean non-white non-Christian people can't live here at all. But they should know the purpose of the country's existence is not for them.

Yes, it is why their flag has three colors. The Christians there are around 2% of the population.

Ok, you've convinced me. Christian Indians I'll happily welcome to America.

shiftyandquick said:

---

For you Christian nationalists, who say that America is only for Christians (which is dumb and evil)....did you know that there is a long-lived population of Indian Christians in India? That's why many have Christian names.

Now you know.

---

And how many international students does India allow into its better universities? Here's a spoiler; it's essentially 0.

Now you know!

My father was born into a family of legal immigrants in 1923 and grew up in the San Joaquin Valley of California in a rural community with a large percentage of....legal immigrants. There were residents from Sweden, Canada, Portugal, Spain, Italy and so forth. Some of them did not speak English, but they learned from their children who went to public school. There was no bull**** like bilingual education to slow down the assimilation. Everything went smooth until the Okies arrived later in the 1930s. Those immigrants had a problem fitting in with society. That is what my Dad told me and he is no longer her to explain it any further.

Zobel said:

---

This isn't an answer. I don't care what year it is, it is not relevant.

Would it be bad if there were no more Jewish people, that distinct people group?

Would it be bad if there were no more Americans, that distinct people group?

---

Yeah, only if you're looking at a map or anything with any relation to history. You posted that in 1965 American meant one thing...does it still have to mean that in 2026? Because it doesn't just because you want it to.

Quote:

---

Would it be bad if there were no more Jewish people, that distinct people group

---

It would probably mean something bad happened, so I'll say yes.

Quote:

---

Would it be bad if there were no more Americans, that distinct people group?

---

It would probably mean something bad happened close to home, so I'll say yes.

Would it be bad if we called a person of Indian descent with legal citizen parents, who are citizens themselves who have only really known life in the US, and have participated successfully in our society...Americans? Or does it dilute the term because they're Indian?

Quote:

---

does it still have to mean that in 2026?

---

Yes, because the people group "American" still exists. Laws dont change that. If someone passes a law that says "anyone who has Israeli citizenship is Jewish" does that make Arabs Jews? Of course it doesn't. They're not the same thing.

I think limited amounts of immigration are great, and for those people to come and benefit from the blessings of liberty that American founders and pioneers bestowed on their posterity.

That means we should not flood our cities with immigrants.
We should not upset the ethnic mix of our society.
The ethic pattern of immigration shouldn't change.
We shouldn't inundate America with immigrants from any one country including heavily populated countries of Africa or Asia

These were all promises from Ted Kennedy in 1965 about the Hart Cellar act.

It is bad that these promises were broken. It will continue to be bad if we continue down this bad path.

shiftyandquick said:

---

For you Christian nationalists, who say that America is only for Christians (which is dumb and evil)....did you know that there is a long-lived population of Indian Christians in India? That's why many have Christian names.

Now you know.

---

Jesus says that heaven is only for Christians. Is he dumb and evil too?

In India, Indian Christians face violence, intimidation, legal harassment, and social pressure. That's why there are so few. "Many have Christian names"?! LOL,no.

Now you know.

Gordo14 said:

---

Ellis Wyatt said:

---

That John Cornyn is a leftist who has pretended to be a Republican. He should have kept his mouth shut, now he's the race baiter.

I imagine Bo French is pointing out that our taxpayer funded institutions have been transformed deliberately and no longer exist to serve Texas taxpayers.

---

There are a lot of Indian Americans in Texas (many are citizens). They are taxpayers and contribute to America as much or likely more (due to Indian Americans having high salaries on average) than you do. I'd bet the majority in this photo are not immigrants, they've lived in America their whole life. Maybe that's why it's clearly about race.

---

I agree. Sometimes we forget the history of our state and that the hispanics have been here longer than the anglos. Some see brown skin and automatically assume illegal.

There were around 4000 Tejanos (Mexicans) in Texas in 1836 compared to 35,000-50,000 Anglos. This ratio was more or less maintained until the mid 70s. Texas was settled by Americans.

I think we just disagree on things.

Quote:

---

Yes, because the people group "American" still exists.

---

Yes, and I wouldn't flinch to call legal residents of Indian heritage Americans. You apparently reserve that definition for certain types of people. I think that's a disagreement.

Quote:

---

Laws dont change that. If someone passes a law that says "anyone who has Israeli citizenship is Jewish" does that make Arabs Jews? Of course it doesn't. They're not the same thing.

---

Yeah, but no one passed that law. No one passed a law that said Americans were only white, Christian or non-Indian either.

Quote:

---

I think limited amounts of immigration are great, and for those people to come and benefit from the blessings of liberty that American founders and pioneers bestowed on their posterity.

---

Agreed. I don't want to import people that hate the country or culture either. People seem to be assuming Indian people haven't or can't be assimilated. I'm asserting, though anecdotal, the Indian people I know are exactly who you'd want to to come to this country.

Quote:

---

That means we should not flood our cities with immigrants.

---

Agreed.

Quote:

---

We should not upset the ethnic mix of our society.

---

Birth patterns alone are going to lead to a result I don't think you'll approve of there.

Quote:

---

We shouldn't inundate America with immigrants from any one country including heavily populated countries of Africa or Asia

---

Agreed, I think immigration should be selective and not favor anyone. In my own relationships, the immigration of the Indian people and their descendants in my life were a home run in terms of a net positive for our country.

Canvasback said:

---

Gordo14 said:

---

Ellis Wyatt said:

---

That John Cornyn is a leftist who has pretended to be a Republican. He should have kept his mouth shut, now he's the race baiter.

I imagine Bo French is pointing out that our taxpayer funded institutions have been transformed deliberately and no longer exist to serve Texas taxpayers.

---

There are a lot of Indian Americans in Texas (many are citizens). They are taxpayers and contribute to America as much or likely more (due to Indian Americans having high salaries on average) than you do. I'd bet the majority in this photo are not immigrants, they've lived in America their whole life. Maybe that's why it's clearly about race.

---

I agree. Sometimes we forget the history of our state and that the hispanics have been here longer than the anglos. Some see brown skin and automatically assume illegal.

---

Nobody assumed illegal. We noticed "not American."

Vessel said:

---

Canvasback said:

---

Gordo14 said:

---

Ellis Wyatt said:

---

That John Cornyn is a leftist who has pretended to be a Republican. He should have kept his mouth shut, now he's the race baiter.

I imagine Bo French is pointing out that our taxpayer funded institutions have been transformed deliberately and no longer exist to serve Texas taxpayers.

---

There are a lot of Indian Americans in Texas (many are citizens). They are taxpayers and contribute to America as much or likely more (due to Indian Americans having high salaries on average) than you do. I'd bet the majority in this photo are not immigrants, they've lived in America their whole life. Maybe that's why it's clearly about race.

---

I agree. Sometimes we forget the history of our state and that the hispanics have been here longer than the anglos. Some see brown skin and automatically assume illegal.

---

Nobody assumed illegal. We noticed "not American."

---

What does an American look like?

Your opinion about Americans as an ethnic group has no bearing on that group, just like your opinions on the Japanese or Indian or Jewish ethnic groups are irrelevant. These people exist.

Americans, as an ethnicity, are white. Go re-read what Teddy Roosevelt said. That unique people group was already formed after centuries of living in the colonies at the time of the revolution and persisted. Taming the continent, fighting wars, shedding blood forged them into a unique people. This is not a crazy idea, this is completely a normal view that all Americans held about themselves from the founding of our country on.

Indians are not heritage Americans any more than they are Japanese.

It doesn't matter what law anyone passes. You can't make new ethnicities appear or disappear by legal action.

Canvasback said:

---

Vessel said:

---

Canvasback said:

---

Gordo14 said:

---

Ellis Wyatt said:

---

That John Cornyn is a leftist who has pretended to be a Republican. He should have kept his mouth shut, now he's the race baiter.

I imagine Bo French is pointing out that our taxpayer funded institutions have been transformed deliberately and no longer exist to serve Texas taxpayers.

---

There are a lot of Indian Americans in Texas (many are citizens). They are taxpayers and contribute to America as much or likely more (due to Indian Americans having high salaries on average) than you do. I'd bet the majority in this photo are not immigrants, they've lived in America their whole life. Maybe that's why it's clearly about race.

---

I agree. Sometimes we forget the history of our state and that the hispanics have been here longer than the anglos. Some see brown skin and automatically assume illegal.

---

Nobody assumed illegal. We noticed "not American."

---

What does an American look like?

---

Not an Indian.

shiftyandquick said:

---

For you Christian nationalists, who say that America is only for Christians (which is dumb and evil)....did you know that there is a long-lived population of Indian Christians in India? That's why many have Christian names.

Now you know.

---

"Christian nationalist" is just a term democrats throw around to smear white Christians who hold normative views about the world and American society. Views that 99% of America held just decades ago.

Sorry we don't want to import people who are going to be used as a cudgel against us.

The democrat party is openly hostile towards white Christians, which is dumb and evil. It's not a secret. Quit acting dense.

It's gotten so out of hand that speaking about normal Christian views is enough to get you assassinated (see Charlie Kirk).

Virtually unlimited immigration from countries like India gives you candidates in Texas like this. They can barely read English in any understandable manner.

🚨Texas Democrat nominee Sandeep Srivastava born in India with barely understandable English now running for state office.

Calls voters bigots while pushing this replacement-level insanity in Plano/Frisco.
pic.twitter.com/o9f6gmOSKj

— Don Keith (@RealDonKeith) May 28, 2026

This is a humiliation ritual. This person will never be an American. He can't even speak English yet democrats are pretending he should be able to govern us.

Rep Shri Thanedar who is from India and can barely speak English is introducing legislation to abolish ICE pic.twitter.com/9VHCkHm6qo

— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) March 13, 2026

Quote:

---

Your opinion about Americans as an ethnic group has no bearing on that group, just like your opinions on the Japanese or Indian or Jewish ethnic groups are irrelevant. These people exist.

---

And your opinion about who can be an American is equally irrelevant. Most people won't be confused by a 2nd or 3rd generation of Indian descent describing themselves as American because they aren't trying to exclude Americanism based on ethnicity.

White people do the same thing...that's why so many people (5+ generations on) still say they're Polish, Irish, English, or whatever else. The modern understanding of American doesn't delineate far enough to 'white/Christain guy', which is why people would tell you their heritage beyond American and have being doing so for an extended period of time...regardless of what definition Teddy Roosevelt assigned to it 100+ years ago.

This is not an American. We're tired of the insanity

We don't want Indian immigrants who can't speak English in our government.

We don't want Palestinian terrorist supporters in our government.

We don't want the daughter of a Somali warlord in our government.

It's all a farce. It's gotten out of hand and that's why you're seeing rightful and justified blowback.

Our country has become a bad SNL skit. We're tired of it.

This is a foreigner, sitting in YOUR house, writing, passing and preventing legislation that directly AFFECTS you, while wearing a pin that says, “F your immigration laws.”

It’s time to expel these vultures and pass new legislation BANNING any foreign born person from ever… pic.twitter.com/pk7SKecszl

— Based Bandita (@BasedBandita) February 25, 2026

Zobel said:

---

Quote:

---

You all do know that the minute they were born here, this was as much their home as yours, right?

---

This is not true, no matter how many times people want to make it so. The idea is absurd on its face, it is not a law of nature, we do not have to accept it as if it were.

As for who to blame, I have no personal malice toward immigrants. That's why framing this as "omg u r so racis" is a pointless waste of time. It doesn't matter. It's not about them personally or even collectively. It is about us and our home.

---

They are not and never will be like me, who can trace my ancestry back to Jamestown and every single major American conflict. My ancestors fought and died for this nation every single step of the way. I refuse and will never consider the people from foreign nations, even if they were born here, to be like me and I don't care if people consider this racist.

The following have similar claims to me that are not white:
ADOS blacks
Tejanos and Mexicans who settled here
Asians whose families lived on the Frontier
Native Americans

Absolutely no one else has the right to make claims about the people of this nation or who is considered to be an American. Basically, if your family was here when the Frontier ended then you have a claim, otherwise no you don't. American ethnogensis absolutely occurred on the Frontier. We are a distinct people. All of the above groups are also readily distinct from the people who live and come from those countries today as well.

Who can be an American citizen is a question of law, and a matter of fact.

Who can be an American by ethnicity is not a question of law, but is still a matter of fact.

Facts don't care about your feelings.

If you want to come up with a third inclusive category you could describe a person who is culturally American. They don't even have to be citizens or ethnically American, or even live in the US! But mixing all of these things up is the problem.

Lance Uppercut said:

---

Zobel said:

---

If I live in New Dehli my whole life, does that make me Indian? If I live in Tokyo, does that make me Japanese?

---

Is this really a novel idea?

Yes, you'd literally be Japanese if you were born there, grew up there, and spent your whole life there. Just like you literally wouldn't be an American, because you'd never been here before. You would just be Japanese of whatever descent you are...and you'd probably know and practice a lot of their cultural norms or you wouldn't have been born and brought up there.

Being white doesn't determine your nationality.

---

The Japanese would never consider you Japanese, you will forever be "gaijin" to them. It's honestly hilarious that you would think otherwise. Perhaps you should actually listen to the Japanese before opening your mouth.

Quote:

---

Who can be an American citizen is a question of law, and a matter of fact.

Who can be an American by ethnicity is not a question of law, but is still a matter of fact.

Facts don't care about your feelings.

---

Is the fact portion still that Teddy Roosevelt said so? Or did it become a fact because you want it to be one.

Someone being called American having your specific meaning is codified anywhere that I know of. Sounds a lot like your feelings to me.

Spergin said:

---

Lance Uppercut said:

---

Zobel said:

---

If I live in New Dehli my whole life, does that make me Indian? If I live in Tokyo, does that make me Japanese?

---

Is this really a novel idea?

Yes, you'd literally be Japanese if you were born there, grew up there, and spent your whole life there. Just like you literally wouldn't be an American, because you'd never been here before. You would just be Japanese of whatever descent you are...and you'd probably know and practice a lot of their cultural norms or you wouldn't have been born and brought up there.

Being white doesn't determine your nationality.

---

The Japanese would never consider you Japanese, you will forever be "gaijin" to them. It's honestly hilarious that you would think otherwise. Perhaps you should actually listen to the Japanese before opening your mouth.

---

Didn't say they would.

Some black people, Tejanos, Asians, Native Americans....but no Indians. Got it. What about Inuits and Hawaiians? Do they have to be able to do a certain amount of push ups, or is this another one of those "facts" I don't know about?

Lance Uppercut said:

---

Quote:

---

Your opinion about Americans as an ethnic group has no bearing on that group, just like your opinions on the Japanese or Indian or Jewish ethnic groups are irrelevant. These people exist.

---

And your opinion about who can be an American is equally irrelevant. Most people won't be confused by a 2nd or 3rd generation of Indian descent describing themselves as American because they aren't trying to exclude Americanism based on ethnicity.

---

I won't be confused by it. I understand why a 2nd or 3rd generation Indian in America would call themselves American. It doesn't make it true though.

Quote:

---

White people do the same thing...that's why so many people (5+ generations on) still say they're Polish, Irish, English, or whatever else. The modern understanding of American doesn't delineate far enough to 'white/Christain guy', which is why people would tell you their heritage beyond American and have being doing so for an extended period of time...regardless of what definition Teddy Roosevelt assigned to it 100+ years ago.

---

Because we all understand America to be a European country. So we all have a shared cultrual/European experience/lineage that goes back millennia, but we're from different parts of that region of the world. There are no parts of India that Americans are from.

Quote:

---

Because we all understand America to be a European country

---

That's not how I remember the Irish/Italians/Polish etc. being welcomed to the country. It's almost like things and definitions change over time.

It's an incredibly common thing. Here's a five second ai search.

* J. Hector St. John de Crvecoeur "that race now called Americans"; "a new race of men" (1782).
* Thomas Jefferson treated Americans as an Anglo-Saxon-descended people with a distinct New World genealogy and political inheritance.
* Ralph Waldo Emerson predicted that America's mixture of peoples would "construct a new race" (1845).
* Walt Whitman "America is the race of races" (1855); later wrote explicitly of the "average good American race."
* Frederick Jackson Turner described the frontier as producing "a new people, with new social and political types and ideals" and a distinctive American character.
* Henry Cabot Lodge treated the established American population as an ethnic body, contrasting immigrants from "races most alien to the body of the American people."
* Theodore Roosevelt exceptionally explicit: Americans had become "a people by ourselves"; the word American had acquired more than geographical meaning; he called the pioneers "distinctively and intensely American stock."
* Woodrow Wilson wrote of a distinct "American type of man" and later spoke of the "[American] race" being renewed by immigrant stocks.
* Madison Grant referred to the older population as the once-distinct "'American' people" and treated it as a historically formed national stock.
* Robert DeCourcy Ward wrote of the "traditional" native-born American type and the maintenance of a homogeneous American race.
* Albert Johnson treated the existing American population as a particular national/racial stock when shaping the 1924 national-origins immigration system.
* James A. Reed described the melting pot as having produced a "distinctive American type" and spoke explicitly of preserving America's "racial composition."
* Calvin Coolidge spoke in explicitly racial/ethnic terms about preserving an American population type and argued that "biological laws" limited the blending of divergent peoples.
* Lothrop Stoddard wrote that by the mid-19th century there existed "a real American nation inhabited by a well-defined 'American race.'"
* Harry H. Laughlin attempted a formal "definition of the American Race," describing the "racial stock of the American people" as a historically constituted population.

For Anglo Americans
* Stephen F. Austin "the Anglo-American race" (1836): "a war of barbarism and of despotic principles … against civilization and the Anglo-American race."
* Sam Houston spoke of the "Anglo-American race" in Texas; in 1848 described Mexico's objective as the annihilation of "the entire Anglo-American race" there.
* Jedediah Morse "Anglo-Americans" (1789): Americans descended principally from the English were, "for the sake of distinction, … called Anglo-Americans."
* Daniel Webster described Americans as the "Anglo-American" branch of the "English race" and envisioned the continent becoming Anglo-American.
* Herbert Baxter Adams employed the concept of an "Anglo-American race" in his historical account of American institutions and their Germanic/English origins.
* Theodore Roosevelt repeatedly conceived western expansion as the movement of the Anglo-American race, alongside his separate conception of an emergent American race.
* Josiah C. Nott described an "Anglo-American nation" as a distinct racial population within the contemporary ethnological taxonomy.
* Chester Newell described the settlement of Texas as "establishing the Anglo-American race" to the south and west (1838).
* Sam Houston's Texas contemporaries the phrase "Anglo-American race" was also ordinary enough in the Texas expansionist discourse of the 1830s40s to appear in private political correspondence about the westward movement of Americans.
* Late-19th-century American legal and civic writers the president of the American Bar Association in 1893 could refer without explanation to "our Anglo-American race," indicating that the formulation remained conventional elite vocabulary.

It doesn't look like those are exactly a majority of contemporary references. Just because someone 100+ years ago said Americans=white doesn't mean everyone understands it to be so now. Especially since so many of them aren't.

AI search a contemporary understanding of the term "American" now and post it for us.

Lance Uppercut said:

---

Quote:

---

Because we all understand America to be a European country

---

That's not how I remember the Irish/Italians/Polish etc. being welcomed to the country. It's almost like things and definitions change over time.

---

They may not have been welcomed at first but they still fit seamlessly in to America because they looked and acted like everybody else for the most part. This was made simple by the fact that they had a shared lineage and shared cultural experience which included the Enlightenment and every philosophical/technical advancement in just about the history of the world.

The Americans who had an issue with Polish/Irish/Italians based this on ethnic and religious grounds. Imagine how they'd feel about Indians lol.

Lance Uppercut said:

---

Quote:

---

Because we all understand America to be a European country

---

That's not how I remember the Irish/Italians/Polish etc. being welcomed to the country. It's almost like things and definitions change over time.

---

No one ever wanted immigrants from anywhere to show up on America's doorstep, but they were always allowed under every Immigration and Naturalization Act prior to Hart Celler provided they were "free white persons of good character"

The multiracial aspect of America is entirely modern and a direct rejection of founding principles.

Vessel said:

---

Lance Uppercut said:

---

Quote:

---

Because we all understand America to be a European country

---

That's not how I remember the Irish/Italians/Polish etc. being welcomed to the country. It's almost like things and definitions change over time.

---

They may not have been welcomed at first but they still fit seamlessly in to America because they looked and acted like everybody else for the most part. This was made simple by the fact that they had a shared lineage and shared cultural experience which included the Enlightenment and every philosophical/technical advancement in just about the history of the world.

The Americans who had an issue with Polish/Irish/Italians based this on ethnic and religious grounds. Imagine how they'd feel about Indians lol.

---

Stop acting like they were good fits for America. Every immigration wave has been destructive and any immigrant who wants to reduce the destruction of America would support a moratorium at the very least.

Irish machine politics. Italian organized crime. And every immigrant wave after those two decided to pick either ethnic political machines or organized crime when they got dumped on our shores.

Lance Uppercut said:

---

It doesn't look like those are exactly a majority of contemporary references. Just because someone 100+ years ago said Americans=white doesn't mean everyone understands it to be so now. Especially since so many of them aren't.

AI search a contemporary understanding of the term "American" now and post it for us.

---

And "contemporary" does not mean "more correct" or "better."

Just because we let a bunch of Indians in to America and they want to be called American doesn't mean they are.

gbaby23 said:

---

Lance Uppercut said:

---

Quote:

---

Because we all understand America to be a European country

---

That's not how I remember the Irish/Italians/Polish etc. being welcomed to the country. It's almost like things and definitions change over time.

---

No one ever wanted immigrants from anywhere to show up on America's doorstep, but they were always allowed under every Immigration and Naturalization Act prior to Hart Celler provided they were "free white persons of good character"

The multiracial aspect of America is entirely modern and a direct rejection of founding principles.

---

Quote:

---

Hart Celler

---

Yep, which was in 1965. Again, it's 2026.

Quote:

---

The multiracial aspect of America is entirely modern and a direct rejection of founding principles.

---

Well, it was multiracial in the fact that there were black slaves. Which is another indication that not all founding principles are good founding principles.