I thought that American politics couldn’t get any funnier, but of course I was wrong. And right now, the funniest politician is actually the sour, self-righteous Elizabeth Warren.
Long ridiculed by President Trump, and millions of other people, for claiming to be an American Indian, Warren has now triumphantly released a study of her DNA. According to the Stanford professor who analyzed the data, “the facts suggest that [she] absolutely [has] Native American ancestry in [her] pedigree.”
Warren could have as much as 1/64th Indian ancestry. So just make that cup 1/64th full.
“Pedigree”? Oh well. But the unwary reader may conclude, as Warren appears to have concluded, that her Native American “heritage” has now been authenticated. But that’s ridiculous — for two reasons.
One is that the purported percentage of her Indian ancestry is a whopping 1/1024th. That’s right — one part in a thousand.
“Would you like a cup of coffee?”
“Yes, please!”
“Fill it up?”
“Not quite. Just make it 1/1024th full.”
All right, I distorted the hard, scientific “data.” Warren could have as much as 1/64th Indian ancestry. So just make that cup 1/64th full.
Even the TV actors who burble about “discovering their Swedish heritage” by taking a DNA test and learning that they’re 40% Swedish aren’t as absurd as this US Senator.
The second ridiculosity is the whole notion of “heritage” based on genes. Culture has nothing to do with your body. But suppose it did. If you need to have your DNA analyzed to find out whether you’ve inherited some cultural characteristic, then you haven’t.
Even the TV actors who burble about “discovering their Swedish heritage” by taking a DNA test and learning that they’re 40% Swedish aren’t as absurd as this US Senator. But given her total lack of self-awareness (which is nothing unusual, given her occupation), I suppose it won’t take her long to appear on television to inform the other hundred million Americans who are at least 1/1000th Indian that now, because of the wonders of science, they too can discover who they really are — and prove it, by ending their long night of discrimination and electing one of their own (guess who?) as president.
We are all Indians now.
