DNA, Identity, and the Scramble for Global Citizenship
There’s been a lot of talk recently about white people wanting to be black. From the likes of Australia’s Iggy Azalea to the infamous Rachel Dolezal, it is pretty clear that there are white people who seem to identify more closely with aspects of black culture. So here’s a pretty weird story.
After sifting through all the noise about white people talking and dressing black, I eventually stumbled upon a fairly well known millennial who has taken this craze to a whole new level and has basically broken the internet with her apparently factual claims of black ancestry. She is none other than YouTube’s very own Woah Vicky.
“Unlike Iggy and Rachel, she isn’t just claiming or acting black.”
This very outspoken young white American girl has been blazing a trail for all the white people who feel that they’re black. The only difference with Vicky however is that unlike Iggy and Rachel, she isn’t just claiming or acting black —she feels that she is black, and she has the proof too.
Ancestry Dot Com
When Woah Vicky starts talking (in the ridiculous way she speaks) about how black she is, she does it from a place of confidence… and that confidence of hers seems to be powered by Ancestry.com.
Ancestry.com has been raking in the money lately. From a company that started as a simple search engine where people could type in their names and find long lost relatives, it has since grown big enough to offer a more inclusive service to people whose families wouldn’t have been lucky enough to be included in European or American registries of records.
Whenever Woah Vicky speaks of her black heritage, she always makes it clear that she has the proof from Ancestry.com, who she sent saliva samples for DNA testing.
The result? Woah Vicky’s Ancestry.com's test certificate shows that 44% of her DNA stems from African origins. Now, I’m not going to knock Vicky for claiming a black identity based on the results she received, but this is where the discussion with my friends became really interesting.
Skepticism and Conspiracy Theories
As we watched Woah Vicky’s YouTube rants and laughed our heads off, the conversation soon turned from humorous banter to healthy skepticism about what ulterior motives might be lurking behind the recent popularity and widespread use of ancestry.com et al.
Some made jokes about how the western world may finally be ready to pay black people reparations for the ills of slavery, and how white people may be preparing themselves to make a claim if and when that does happen. Lol!
Others were more concerned about how these companies may be collating and storing DNA data in order to sell to the highest bidder. With all the ruckus around big data and privacy, this point actually made me stop and think for a moment. How do the owners of DNA servers plan to use such valuable information in the future? Who actually owns the information? The users of such platforms or the service providers themselves?
Some even joked about how this movement may be a modern reenactment of Herod’s search for Jesus, or the coming Messiah.
Conspiracy theories aside, I started thinking more seriously about the socioeconomic impact of this growing trend and the more I thought about it, the more I could see some of the possible ways it could effect change.
A Brave New World
As interesting as Woah Vicky and her theatrics are, she wasn’t the only person I watched on YouTube who had taken a genetic test. But I was so fascinated by her that I clicked and watched several related videos and discovered there were many people who had taken the test and were happy to share their results with the world. I also discovered that they weren’t all white.
I watched many black, and white, and mixed-race people proudly show off their charts and all the places in the world it said they originated from. I haven’t done the test myself (maybe I am a little skeptical) but I did imagine how I’d feel if I was one of the people I had been watching on YouTube.
The first thing that came to mind was that I’d probably want to visit all of the places that were named in my DNA Test chart. And if most people thought like me, that would mean ancestry.com and the like would have unwittingly (or wittingly) created a whole new class of tourists and tourism.
I mean, think for a second: if your DNA test results showed that you hailed from Mali, Belgium, Mexico, and Singapore, wouldn’t you want to visit these places at some point in your life? I know I would.
This much travel and tourism brings me to my next point which I’ll present as an open question: if people have tangible proof of heritage to the places and countries in their charts, does that mean they can have passports for every nation in their chart?
One of my friends said “no way… they’d never allow that.” When I asked why not, he said one could only obtain national identity cards or passports either through birth in that country or by being naturalised there.
I said, well, if my blood says I am from there, how much more naturalisation do I need? And what’s the point of having a DNA certificate if it can’t be used legally? I get his point however, but do you get mine?
“It is not about the Iggy Azaleas, the Rachel Dolezals or the Woah Vickys.”
This raises some serious questions about what it really means to be human, born here, on planet earth. Watching so many people discover the secrets held in their blood and seeing that everyone I watched had some connection to almost every continent on the planet, isn’t it about time we realised that we’re all just earthlings from the same human family?
I know there are those who will argue till the end of the world that we aren’t all the same and blah blah blah, but when we put all the dubious belief systems aside and look at the truth behind all things, surely you must be able to see the me in you as clearly as I can see you in me. If we carry on down this line of thought, isn’t it clear that racism will eventually become redundant?
In the end, I’m sure we will finally come to realise that it is not about the Iggy Azaleas, the Rachel Dolezals or the Woah Vickys. It’s not about big data companies or conspiracy theories either.
It’s about you, and me, and how we feel about ourselves in this world we all call home. It’s about identity and community. Ultimately, it is all about humanity and what it means to just be in this world of black, and white, and all the beautiful colours dancing within the spectrum.
