Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Blergh.

I got my census form in the mail today. In the first column, they ask that you enter a phone number, so that they can call you if they "do not understand one of your responses." 

I'm strongly tempted, under "Race," to write "HUMAN" -- only because there's not enough room to write, "I categorically reject the concept of race as a genetically-derived, immutable, meaningful designation of human beings.  All humans belong to a single race.  Cultural and ethnic differences may be useful to learn about as we seek to understand one another. It is, however, utterly useless -- and, in fact, often wicked -- to attempt to construe meaningful data about the character of humans from the color of their skin, the texture of their hair, the shape of their eyes, or any other merely physical characteristic."

Do you think I'd get a phone call about that?

5 comments:

Pastor John said...

Yes. Yes you would. They definitely would not understand that response.

You could always send them a download of any one of a number of Thabiti Anyabwile's messages on the subject, including the one he preached at T4G 08.

http://sgm.edgeboss.net/download/sgm/events/t4g08/t4g08-session2.mp3

Unknown said...

Two words: Do. It.

The whole thing is a farce anyway, since the White House took over the Census Bureau and removed all oversight. Uncle Barry and a bunch of his Chicago political system cronies would never do anything shady like fudge numbers to get more seats in blue states would they?

Laura said...

Dad -- 100% of this thinking is because of Pastor T. He is awesome.

Dave -- har har. Are you obeying the commands of God to submit to and pray for and respect our government leaders? If 1st century Christians had to submit to Nero... ;)

Jack Brannen said...

I think they can use that data to find out about income gaps between racial groups, right? So that makes it less bad.

Laura said...

Well, except that there wasn't any info on income on the census -- just how many people live in your house and what "race" they are.