Hey Baby, What’s Your Heritage?

May 10, 2008 - 10:30 am By Sara - NYU

24281441.jpgYesterday some guy followed me up the stairs on a subway transfer (that it turned out he wasn’t taking, just creepily following me like a creepy creep creep) and after the requisite come-on line (which I won’t burn your retinas with), he instantly whips out the line I’ve grown so accustomed to hearing: “What’s your heritage?”

Here’s what I don’t understand (well, here’s one of many, many, many things I don’t understand):

Why does every guy in New York who approaches me want to know my ethnicity?

And I’m serious about this. Because, look. I live in New York City. There are more Jews (such as moi) here than like everywhere ever. I should not be so unidentifiable.

For me, there are two varieties of these guys. The guy cited above fits into the first category: guys who guess. And they always guess Italian, Puerto Rican, or Greek. Seriously. And I am pale like the squishy underbelly of a cabbage.

The other category of guys are guys who want to know if I’m Jewish. These guys are usually Muslim or Israeli and nothing in between. I don’t know why either group bothers–I’m too Jewish for the Muslims and not Jewish enough for the Israelis. So it goes.

And why, friends, why oh why for the love of all that is good and not annoying, why do they need to know my heritage in the first place? When did this become an acceptable thing to ask a stranger?

Please, let’s go back to the relative peace of the days of “hey beautiful” and “baby you so fine.”

And in the meantime, this little Belarussian Jew will be snuggling up to her Chinese-American boyfriend and whispering naughtily in his ear, “Hey baby, what’s your heritage?”

And then probably getting dumped.

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5 Comments on "Hey Baby, What’s Your Heritage?"

  1. Natasha says:
    Mon, 12th May 20082:28 pm 

    This happens to me all of the time too! I’m half East Indian and half Caucasian and sketchy guys for some reason always think they need to know my ethnicity. Except I live in the south, and more often than not, the question is eloquently put as, “What are you?” or even “What is you?” To the first, obviously human. The second doesn’t even get graced with an answer.

  2. Chachi25 says:
    Tue, 13th May 200810:53 am 

    Just for the sake of argument…….

    What if your lovely attractors have one of those funky religious laws that they cannot date/stalk anyone out of their race/religion for fear of death at the hand of one of their family members for dishonoring the family name?

    ….. ok i’m an idiot

  3. Becca says:
    Fri, 16th May 200810:26 pm 

    Funny thing is that I’d love to flaunt off my heritage (not to be conceited or anything, just proud). I’m the opposite in this case. I’m happy to say “Mexican, Filipino, Japanese” and used to get offended when they’d say “What? Asian, Chinese, all the same thing”, ignorance is something that irritates me but nothing I can really do. Other than “No, they are completely different countries, cultures etc.”

    Then again maybe sometimes guys are just asking because they want to fufill some gross porn fetishes that are now labeled with ethnicities now a days i.e. Asian, Latina :-\

  4. Patty says:
    Sun, 18th May 20087:54 pm 

    I understand that this can be a sensitive issue because of the implication that those inquiring as to your ethnic background may be sizing you up based on some racist agenda. However as someone who has been guilty of this sin in the past (asking about ethnic background, not racism) I can tell you that the majority of men asking you this are doing so because they are genuinely curious as to your racial make-up and don’t know better than to ask or they are simply trying to start a conversation. Inquiring as to a stranger’s ethnic background certainly isn’t polite, but I’m sure that is ranks very low on the offense scale when compared to many of the things that women hear from men.

  5. Danny says:
    Wed, 9th Sep 20093:57 pm 

    In summer of 2007 I was at this hostel in Praha, Czech Republic on vacation and met this really beautiful 17 year old blonde british girl while sitting in the lounge. It’s funny and purely coincidental but her name was also “Sara.”

    Anyway, we started talking and she seem really fascinated that I was from L.A. However, she ended up asking me what my heritage was because she couldn’t tell. I look like I’m half asian and half white (typically I get half Japanese and half white). But she did say “please don’t take this the wrong way but I’m curious what’s your heritage?”. I told her I was Vietnamese. To tell yout the truth I was a little turned off by her question though. I ended up not asking her for her phone # even though she would have given it to me for sure. I think it was mainly because of the how I thought her question was somewhat improper and immature. That’s my experience.

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