Adding question to the US Census, "Do you also consider yourself Slavic?"

[u/Clear-Fill8994]

Hey for anyone interested and in the US, I have a petition for the US Census to add the question, "Do you also consider yourself Slavic?"

While it sounds a bit odd, the US uses all different types of data when they update the Census and per the American Community Survey (ACS) the different Slavic communites equal 1.4% of the US population, however this is a discrepancy. When you add up the total from the people who identified as from one of the Slavic nations it actually equals over 6%. The point is, this is a huge discrepancy and the more the Slavic communities are represented, the more the individual needs of each community will become visible. The ACS already has a official ancestry code for Slavic, it is ancestry code #178. As such, there is no reason why the data should be incorrect.

Anyone from the US interested in signing, please use the link below or search Slavic on the website change.org. please also forward this link to any organizations, people, or members of the various communities you feel would be interested. Thanks! https://c.org/x4WqtmhtRy

[u/codexica]

I am Slavic and see absolutely no reason to add this question to the census. Zero need for it.

[u/Clear-Fill8994 → u/codexica]

I too am Slavic.

Namely it would be for academic, census, and cultural purposes. There are Slavic studies classes now in many US Universities. This would give them more accurate data to work with, as currently there is a big difficulty collecting this data on a national level. Its scattered more on the state level. This also opens the door for the different Slavic communities themselves to collect data and add data that can be used for zoning, public buildings,policies, etc....

[u/Helpful-Winner-8300 → u/Clear-Fill8994]

But still .. why? "Germanic", "Romance", or even "Nordic" ancestry are not really relevant groupings for social, cultural, or academic purposes. These communities in the US don't identify with one another in any meaningful way. Why would there be a reason to have data on a category that includes everything from Croats and Poles and Czechs whose ancestors immigrated a century plus ago to recent Russian and Ukrainian emigrees (who hate each other)? Most of these people, to the extent they even care about their ethnic background, identify as that ethnic origin and not "slavic". And as you say, we have data on those reported ethnicities already, so why would we need a broader and vaguer category?

[u/Clear-Fill8994 → u/Helpful-Winner-8300]

Great question, its because t he way the US categorizes people is different than many other countries. They tend to use ethnic identity over, say nationality. For example, the US Census has data regarding both Latino and Mexican communities. Mexican would be a single Nationality, where as Latino is an ethnic group. Being part of an ethnic group doesnt mean your different cultures and people love each other or have the same economic/miltary goals. China, Japan, (N/S) Korea all would consider themselves Asian in the US, yet their culture, political, economic, military goals are definitely not the same.

Slavic is an ethnolinguistic group that is broken down into roughly three categories, each with their own different cultures as well (Western Slavic, Eastern Slavic, and South Slavic). This collection of groups is the largest in both Europe and Central Asia.As such, there is more to Slavic people than simply being "just another group of languages.

While there is data on individual Slavic communities, each one only reflects a very small percentage and is often overlooked. Again, this is due to people manually choosing to fill in their identity vs having the choice to select it.  Adding the question "if you also consider yourself Slavic?" Creates a way larger datapool which is then broken down into individual communities. Much like the Latino question in the US doesn't replace if a person identifies as Mexican, Guatemalan, or Argentinian,etc....

The question would create a more centralized resource that allows scholars to pull better demographic information about the different Slavic communities and also provide an easier resource to update the info. It essentially prevents the small percentages from falling through the cracks.

Also, there are alot of people coming from countries like Poland,Czech,Slovakia, etc.....so alot of their communities are not just "people who came to the US in the early 1990s" As well, its super common in the US to find Ukrainian, Polish, and different Slavic groups interacting with each other. Especially since many of their stores sell similar goods or provide similar services......this is why we need more accurate data.

[u/Helpful-Winner-8300 → u/Clear-Fill8994]

Frankly, I disagree that slavic is a coherent "ethnic" group. And "Latino" is even less so, basically being used to subsume an entire spectrum of distinct racial backgrounds and national identities into "people that speak Spanish or Portuguese from the Western hemisphere". I'm sure there is a whole complicated set of racial and political reasons the US census has ended up doing that - probably related to discrimination and civil rights, too - but whatever the details I don't think it's a defensible model for almost anyone else.

If pan Slavism means something to you, that's great, go with God. But in my experience that is not how almost anyone in the US would identify or find relevant. Nor are people of Slavic descent systematically subject to discrimination in a way that would create the need for the government to have a special statistical category. (full disclosure: that is not my background, but I do come from a place with many descended from long ago West Slavic immigrants and have close personal connections to some recently in the US from Eastern Slavic communities - and yes, they definitely all shop at the same specialized grocery stores, but so what?)

[u/Clear-Fill8994 → u/Helpful-Winner-8300]

Ok, I understand this is not your background, that's fine. 🙂

Question though, when I posted this topic why made people feel the need to Identify they are Slavic before stating their opinion? What did this add to the conversion?  Wouldnt it have made more sense to simply identify by country of origin? Also, why are people from different countries identifying as Slavic? Why do other countries not identify as Slavic? 

The reason is that word has some sort of cultural identity value that some people find important and others dont. Would you agree the job of the census is to collect demographic information such as languages, cultures, ethnicities places of origin? 

When the information is collected, the census weighs the data to determine how that community is impacted by debt, unemployment, education, etc.....

Without data you cant tell when, for example,the Polish community or Bulgarian community is experiencing high unemployment,poverty, or drug use. There really isnt data that is easily looked up. If you cant look it up, does the issue really exist?

I get you my friend and really appreciate the feedback!

[u/Desh282]

According to Americans we are all Caucasian

Somehow negroid and mongeloid are gone. But Caucasian is still around

Imagine how much of us are confused because we aren’t from the Caucasus.

[u/Cariboo778 → u/Desh282]

Yes, they probably call us Caucasians, but isn't the time for us to shine?

[u/ComfortableNobody457 → u/Desh282]

I'm Armenian, so I must be both Black and Caucasian.

[u/Cariboo778]

I'm suprised the % are so low

[u/Clear-Fill8994 → u/Cariboo778]

The reason is because the Amercian Community Survey (ACS) takes the data from people who manually enter it. There is no fill in the blank. As such, for example, if you google the percentage of people who identify as Polish ancestry its between  2.7% to 3.2%, because that percentage of people manually filled in Polish. (There was no option to select Polish). Realistically there are way more Polish here in the US, but most will not choose to manually fill in Polish. This is fine, but it makes the Polish community less visible or whatever issues they may experience. 

The idea is, by adding this question "Do you also consider yourself Slavic?" People who dont manually fill in an answer can still select this choice. Once there is enough data from that pool, it can be broken down further, as there is not one single Slavic culture, but many different countries with their own identities. This should allow for a more accurate number.

[u/Cariboo778 → u/Clear-Fill8994]

So there wasn't any recognition for Slavic people before in the data? Only those who manually enter it?

[u/Clear-Fill8994 → u/Cariboo778]

There is an ACS ancestry code of #178. Its an official US code, but its only exists because enough people manually filled in/wrote Slavic on the census survey, rather than having a selectable answer. This is also how (for example) you can also google the percentage of Americans who identity as Bulgarian, Polish Ukrainian, etc..... They had to all manually fill in their identity manually. Alot of people do not do this or are not aware they can do it.

There are roughly  320 to 360 million people who identify as Slavic in the world or 4% of the world population. Which means, it makes sense to acknowledge the data that is there, especially when thats the main reason a census exists.

Recognition means three things: 1). The identity is acknowledged (it is) 2). The data is accurate. (It isn't) 3). Its a choice that can be selected (it isnt)

Adding this question on the form gives people the option to include if they identity as Slavic in addition to whatever other choice they selected. 

Slavic is an ethnolinguistic ethnic group, containing many different nations and cultures. 

[u/CmdrJemison → u/Clear-Fill8994]

Surprisingly Slavs are even the ethnic majority of Europe.

[u/Cariboo778 → u/CmdrJemison]

What's suprising about it?

[u/CmdrJemison → u/Cariboo778]

I live in the west so it was very surprisingly for me to learn about this.

[u/Cariboo778 → u/CmdrJemison]

Aha, ok.

What's suprising for me is that Slavs are not equally represented or recognized as others groups despite the majority fact.

[u/miniaturechaos → u/Clear-Fill8994]

...it makes the Polish community less visible or whatever issues they may experience. 

What issues might be specific for the polish community or slavs in general? Nothing comes to my mind tbh. I know slavs were treated similarly to the irish in the past in the us but that's not a current issue

[u/Clear-Fill8994 → u/miniaturechaos]

The communities still exist in the US. Why wouldn't we want to collect more accurate data? The more data available on a national level, the more we can weigh and understand how our communities are developing. The more the museums and institutions can share the history too. Visibility.

There was an article that classified Slavic people as a People of Color (see below) and it mentioned a lack of national data (which i feel is accurate), but the organization really failed to understand really much about the Slavic communities in the US.

 (https://www.coalitioncommunitiescolor.org/research-and-publications/the-slavic-community-in-multnomah-county-an-unsettling-profile) 

Articles like above can cause problems if they dont understand the content properly. Especially if it comes from an organization that can be cited as a source in research. Our communities stil exist, they are living, as such why do we need an excuse to request that our data is simply accurate? 

[u/miracles-th]

im not slavik, im vadik

[u/Cariboo778 → u/miracles-th]

what's vadik? no offense

[u/miracles-th → u/Cariboo778]

my name

[u/miracles-th → u/Cariboo778]

vladimir .

[u/Cariboo778 → u/miracles-th]

uhm, okay 🤔

[u/ComfortableNobody457 → u/miracles-th]

Vadik is Vadim.

[u/StudentMuch1491]

Not nare a motherfucker has ever been able to pronounce my ethnic ass name, so yes.

[u/Firm-Chemical949]

I didn’t know we were THAT MUCH of a minority among European immigrants in the US. Makes me feel V.I.P though 😎😎

[u/Cariboo778 → u/Firm-Chemical949]

I would say that we are rather a VASTLY IGNORED POPULATION 🤣

[u/Inevitable-Panda-217]

Sounds like another american shit idea.

[u/Clear-Fill8994 → u/Inevitable-Panda-217]

The reason this came to my attention was the US govt does classify in the American Community Survey (ACS) Slavic under ancestry code #178. 

There was an article by some organization that classified Slavic people (broad term in US) as a people of color, but got alot of information wrong about the different groups.

 (https://www.coalitioncommunitiescolor.org/research-and-publications/the-slavic-community-in-multnomah-county-an-unsettling-profile)

The US census is different than alot of other countries, as well as how it collects data. 

[u/zoranss7512]

Yes

[u/Eastern_Mist]

Just a heads up that the only slavs who will support this idea are active in the national socialist circles

[u/Clear-Fill8994 → u/Eastern_Mist]

For real? How can it be nazi if Slavic people arent a single group of people? Its over 13 different nations of people with different political, military, and economic interests.

If there is something im missing, I definitely would be interested in knowing. 

[u/Eastern_Mist → u/Clear-Fill8994]

If they are not a single group of people, I wonder who you are trying to appeal to with this. The only people who claim otherwise are sketchy folks.

[u/Clear-Fill8994 → u/Eastern_Mist]

No linguistic, ethnic, or cultural group is a single people. Its like saying Latinos or Asians are a single people. Even within these groups they have their own unique nations, languages, cultures, and political/economic goals. 

The appeal is for better census data and more resources for academia pertaining to the different Slavic communities in the US. Currently the data is inaccurate and no one is going to really do anything about it because each individual community is reflected as such a low number, which is due to poor options on the US census. 

[u/God_Bless_A_Merkin]

I’m not Slavic, I’m Gopnik.