[quote=Yog]
If someone asks for my ethnicity then I tell them that I am an American and if that's not enough then I'll say I'm black if calling myself a Louisiana Creole is not enough.

I completely agree with you on the matter of the term people of color lumping everyone together. The problem is that Americans have a very simplistic view of race where everything is either black, white, Asian and Hispanic. One of the biggest flaws with the term people of color is how can a pale skinned Asian be considered a person of color if their skin tone is the same as caucasians? People of color to me is just another ignorant term to turn the race and ethnic problems of society into an us verses them argument which doesn't solve problems.[/quote]

Heard man, but it's tough too. People of Colour can be a term to highlight challenges unique to those who are viewed as non-white. The shit part is that this view isn't established by us, but by those who feel they can define white -- basically, people who feel they can identify as [I]white[/I]. There's this big separation there and fear too. When we're talking about issues unique to being a POC I get it, but when someone is just using it as a general description I start to wonder if they're just afraid to ask or have an extremely limited knowledge of colour tones (I mean seriously, I can't be the only one who recognizes the difference between mahogany and tope).

It does peeve me when people lump everyone who's coloured together as black though. Just like when they assume if you're dark, you're also African (what country, you never hear assumed). I am Puerto Rican and Native, not too dark, but enough to where people will identify me as black in conversation. I get it, sure, but when people start thinking that the suffering African Americans endure(d) here reflects my family history, they're blatantly wrong. We have very different histories. Racism is a common thread, sure, and so is slavery and genocide against people like us, absolutely, but the stories I passed down in my family about the fall of Borikén are not the stories of those from Vietnam, Kenya, or even those from Mexico. 

So no, I would never identify as American first. In professional and political encounters my race has been seen and noted. As long as that's a thing, it makes no sense for me to ignore that identity.