Peter Alison,
Richmond, VA.
I come from an Austrian mother and an American father, so when people ask me about my ethnic background I tell them I’m half-Austrian. Throughout middle and high-school this elicited responses asking me if I hated Jewish people, or if I praised Hitler. It was annoying at first, but later it got offensive. Just because I was Austrian I was grouped with people, most of whom aren’t alive anymore, who did horrible things. Just as the French aren’t Napoleonic invaders, the Russians aren’t Soviets, the Americans aren’t slave drivers, and the Spanish aren’t conquistadors, we are not Nazis. Just as you are not your fore fathers, we are not ours.
