I don’t want to dox myself, but I’ve been at my job for 5+ years. I guess either my boss or I fat fingered something while I was on boarding, cuz just now I was going over some paperwork and… As far as my job is concerned I’m Native American. I am very much white. Nobody ever brought it up.

I couldn’t find an easy way to change it and I’d rather not talk to HR if it’s not a big deal. So, forget about it? Call HR?

  • kadjiis@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    As a European, please help me understand. Why would you get fired? What implications does ethnicity have on your job? Why would anyone want to falsely claim to be Native American?

    • DrMango@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      I am not an expert here, but essentially certain groups that the US gov was an asshole to in the past are eligible for some additional benefits as an ongoing way of saying “sorry we did a lil genocide on your people.”

      Misrepresenting yourself as one of these groups in order to obtain additional benefits is likely a punishable offense.

      • SJ_Zero@lemmy.fbxl.net
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        1 year ago

        The idea of government WASPs using the massive understatement of “lil genocide” is definitely funny.

    • DrMango@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      I am not an expert jere, but essentially certain groups that the US gov was an asshole to in the past are eligible for some additional benefits as an ongoing way of saying “sorry we did a lil genocide on your people.”

      Misrepresenting yourself as one of these groups in order to obtain additional benefits is likely a punishable offense.

    • chowder@lemmy.one
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      1 year ago

      I can answer your last question. 1776-1970(ish) it was way better to be a mixed person of Native American decent rather than African American. So if you were ethnically ambiguous (a large portion of mixed people) enough you could claim you were mixed with something other than African American.

    • Sigma
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      1 year ago

      to answer your first question: at-will employment enables rich people in america to fire you over your race, religion, or sexuality as long as they pretend the reason is “no reason”. if they interpret this mistake as him lying on his application, it could result in losing his job.

      to answer the second question: white people in america have a weird fetish of simultaneously being the best people on earth but also mixed with something exotic. people without a culture are quicker to steal someone elses, and thats how we get so many people claiming false ancestry. most americans dont just claim to be native american, they claim to be multiple tribes and related to “native american royalty” despite such a thing never even existing. the reason for doing it ranges from making yourself feel important to gaslighting people who point out racism by saying “i cant be racist im part indian!” or something equally moronic. lately lots of friends and family have been doing DNA tests and i find it hilarious the ones who swore they are native american have 0% native american dna.