This is the very reason we should teach our true history in schools, all schools. When I say, (Our)I mean Italian Americans, African-Americans, Native Americans, Asian Americans, Mexican Americans, Caribbean Americans, Irish Americans. All American people should know their true history ☝🏽 When we know who we truly are, we can do better.
Beautifully said. I think a lot of people today dont realize that just a few decades ago, it was THEIR families who were the targets of hate, so we need to do our best to protect those who are in the hot seat today. Really no one has been exempt, but the hierarchies shift.
I never heard about the lynching of Italians in New Orleans or elsewhere. That is awful but thanks for teaching me what really happened. Do Southern Italians consider themselves white now? I heard it depends which part of the country you are from.
@@Catlily5 There is still racism against southern Italians in Northern Italy today. It’s about 50/50 when it comes to southern Italians identifying as white or brown. However, nearly all northern Italians call southern Italians brown, no matter how light their skin is. My skin is literally a few shades darker than milk. I’m considered brown in Italy, because I’m from Campania. (My parents are actually, literally the color brown though.) I’m considered white in America though. It was very confusing as a child. 😅
Wow really?! What the heck would they call me? I am so pale right now since it’s still not summer but I’m definitely darker than milk 😩 thank you for sharing this
Wrong. Prior to 1965 Blk immigration to America was to the right of the decimal point on a percentage basis. The immigration act of 1965 followed the Civil Rights Act of 1964. That's what opened up the door for non European peoples to immigrate here. Because America's immigration policy had been European Centered from After the Civil War to the Twentieth Century on up until 1960 when Euro Migration to America began to decline. Foundational Black Americans are the only ethic group / black group who didn't immigrate to America Voluntarily. And all of these tragic racial incidents that took place in America Were not caused by Blk Americans. And in many instances these newly arrived Euro migrants were hostile towards Blk Americans. And at the same time Blks were being " emancipated" with nothing, through an act of Congress ( Land Grants ) millions of acres of free land was given to newly European Immigrants, they even set up Land Grant Colleges to teach them how to farm the land for free... This should also be taught in American History. As well
My father grew up in NYC in the 1930s & 40's. He remembers looking for work as a teenager and seeing signs in shop windows that said: "Help Wanted. No Italians." The Irish were the cops and politicians and the power and hated the Italians. My grandfather sold fruit and vegetables from a pushcart. The cops would, turn his cart over, smash his scale and arrest him (a US Word War I veteran), on some fake charge. He would have to go to court and the judge would fine him 25 cents. Ironic because when the Irish got here, they were treated like garbage themselves.
They hated The Italians , because they both became Gangs in N.Y . They, were beating and killing Italians ,etc. So , the 'Black Hand 'was formed . The resulting rounds ended the Irish dominance. They still had a part during prohibation alot. That's until the St. Valentines day Capone party.
@@pele11201 Its an American tradition. Come to this country poor and uneducated . Endure horrible discrimination and violence that the government and police encourage. Then after hundreds of years of hard work, finally make it and gain some acceptance. Then you can discriminate and hate too.
My dad a black man raised in 1950s Chicago I just want to say his best friend until they died both 3yrs ago was an Italian. His parents were killed in a car accident and my grandma raised a baby along with her own, he became my uncle and I loved him like dad#2. I am now in my 60's writing a book for my grandbabies titled what color is love dedicated to their special attachment
@@CarvellaNY Please Make Sure you Make All Necessary Provisions for your project before you allow someone to read your manuscript. And don't mention your topic or title without a copyright. Good Luck ❤
As an Italian whose family migrated to Brazil, here the history was completely different. Italians were always well received and our contributions to the Brazilian culture and society are deeply and proudly recognised by everyone.
Because Brazil’s population was not majority Anglo-Saxon/North European…as simple as that. Brazil, along with Argentina, was also the destination of Germans and Italians fleeing Europe after WWII after what they did over there.
The fact that history, like this has been kept from us, is the reason why the children and grandchildren of immigrants today will have hateful views towards other immigrants. If we were taught exactly where we came from, and how much are histories overlap, we all would’ve gotten along a little better, and ultimately lead to a better world. Thanks for sharing this.
No, this was well known for hundreds of years both in the US and Europe. Hint! Multi culturalism does not exist in other parts of the world,nor is it wanted today. See Soviet Union, Africa (no Pan African unity), Jugoslavia and its failures. Once Chinese Communist fall out of power, China too will splinter and divide across 4 to5 different new ethnic based nations.
As a black man, when I saw this title, I was a bit thrown off. I had NO idea about this side of Italian history. I grew up in an area in Miami with a lot of Italians and this was never mentioned. Glad I learned something new today
It's because along with many "others" they are systemically racistly omitted from being taught about fairly and equally in the schools. The books have always been geopolitically manipulated . Furthermore Christopher Columbus does not actually represent 99.9% of all Italian Americans.
I'm a White American who grew up in a 100% Black neighborhood in Massachusetts in the 1950's and 1960's. I can't tell you how Blessed I feel for growing up where I did. It made me open minded to ALL People, not just on the basis of color but on every other social dimension as well. I've never understood how anyone who calls themselves a Christian can discount the humanity of another person based on superficial appearances.
What a blessing… I’m a black 50 sumthin woman that grew up in the 70’s 80’s in a military family but in a civilian (all white) neighborhood.. and I can honestly say, I had the BEST childhood and wouldn’t trade it for anything… This is proof that prejudice/racism is taught !!! I never once felt like I was treated differently… Our neighbors were our “FAMILY”… When anyone needed help .. each family showed up.. when one family had a crisis the entire neighborhood had a crisis… We HAVE to get back to this way of living… ❤❤❤
@@troycleek7394nah I’m black from Boston . Believe it or not we had a lot of black history . Specifically some of the first blacks to come to the states (slaves) were brought to mass.
My mother-in-law is Italian and we did a deep dive into her ancestry a few years back. I'm glad we did. Found a cousin who had a ton of pictures and the record of everyone who came over on the boat. I recall my mom saying she was called slurs when she was going to high school and I couldn't wrap that around my mind. This video is very eye-opening, yet heart breaking. We're in Kentucky and much of this history is not shared.
My Sicilian grandparents came to America when they were 13 years old. They entered into this country at New Orleans. And picked sugar cane for a living. They moved to the Mississippi delta because there were a lot of Sicilians living there. They operated a grocery store and later on a restaurant. My grandparents taught me a lot about life. I wish I would have written down all of their history.
Picked? Holy moly, if only. Your ancestors cut cane. This means so much more than picked. You should watch some videos on it. That work caused revolts.
Im Sicilian American..this makes me sad but im so proud of my heritage. I wish more Americans knew this history ,and celebrated all heritage and groups. Thank you for this! ❤
Italians were always considered white. the discrimination that Italians faced was not because they weren't considered white. There have always been ethnic hostilities among white people(Just look at the history of Europe), but that doesn't mean they didn't consider each other white.
@@jamesMcCarthy-uq3bn I understand your comment but growing up in the 70's I was considered a"black Italian" because I'm Sicilian. We may be considered white in America now but Sicilians were treated much different throughout history
I am african... I studied in Italy, universita di Bologna, between 1998-2003... Sicilian people are just wonderful! I knew the information you delivered here by then. Unfortunately, the majority of Italians do not know how badly they were treated in the USA and not only there... Thank you! I love what you are doing, and I do not struggle with myself when I listen to you!
Thank you for bringing this to light. My Grandpa was discriminated against in the early 1900's when he arrived in New York. We've come along way fighting stereotypes, but there's still much more ground to cover. When we realize we're ALL God's kids, then we'll make real progress. Thanks again, Prego Seniora
I don't mean this in a condescending way, there is nothing "unfortunate" about it. My grandmother is from Palermo Sicily and my grandfather from Naples. I liked the video, so nothing on that, but who cares if all Italians or Sicilians know what happened? It ain't like that now, what are we supposed to do? Piss and moan about stuff from the past? It was different times and all of those people are dead. Moving on, now if we could just get everyone else on board with that logic and agree we are now all Americans, we can move tf on to the important issues...
I had no idea of this History. I do remember my Grandparents saying that Italians or any immigrants that came to America were ashamed to speak their native tongue as they were horribly discriminated against. Although many, many immigrants didn't let those crazy people dictate who they truly were. Thank you so much for all you do to bring light to Identity and ancestors.
Same thing happened to my Italian family in Canada. We were prevented from speaking and practising our culture, many of my older cousins totally lost their heritage and identity. They know very little Italian. We were made to feel ashamed of ourselves. I remember that I was too, as a little girl growing up in the 80s in Toronto. There is still a lot of racism towards Italians in Canada, mainly from the BIPOC community and new immigrants.
My dad was Sicilian and I grew up in the Boston area . I was born in 1941 and experienced some really bad race prejudice as a child, even though my parents forbade me to tell any of my school mates what my ancestry was. I grew up with severe emotional trauma, eventually leaving the white community and feeling more safe with black people. I totally believe that we are all one people, and am at peace with my identity as a human being. Thanks for sharing, I really enjoyed your video. Love, Nina
My Dad is also Sicilian! Our last name was a town in Sicily that is now called Henna. I had no idea there was even a difference until I was called a slur but didn’t know what it meant. When I learned more I was horrified. I’m so sorry you had to go through that, I have no idea what it’s like to be discriminated against and I’m sure it was hard.
Oh please cmon ! The moors invaded Sicily and what not , and planted their seed, no different from the Spanish in north, central , and South America , and no different from the US slave owner porking their African slaves.
Morocco is a more white supremacist country than today's Germany, wish I was joking, and it always was one. Mediterraneans are self haters too, just because they hate anything making them remotely related to the south, even if the south are the innocent ones and the actual good ones
My family are Scandinavians. In the 1960s, my late older brother met, fell in love with, and married a lovely Italian girl. She was just the nicest person ever. My Dad was fine with it but my mom treated her like DIRT, called her all the pejoratives, and just embarrassed the rest of us. I still get sick to my stomach thinking about it.
@@Nico_420 No it isn’t. So again how? The main things Italians/Irish in NYC are know for is being on the police/fire departments. And those departments have horrible reputations and are extremely corrupt.
@@channel-gt1cb l'impero romano è durato più di 1000 anni, voi luridi americani e inglesi nemmeno tra 100000 anni creerete un impero come quello romano
@@channel-gt1cb The Americans and the English were and are not better than your friend Adolf. They only used a different strategy to invade, steal and kill.
I swear history is so prevalent for every race. Leave nothing out, teach factual truths; no matter how difficult it may be. I’m black but my family consists of people from most races, cultures, and religions. We all love another and are stronger as a unit.
She preaches racial bias against Whites and the United States who freed her ancestors from "Confederate" slavery. Their Black ancestors are the ones that sold Blacks into Slavery. If it aso wasn't for the slave trade these miserable, hateful Blacks wouldn't be alive and be in the 'FREE" UNITED STATES. This preaches and establishes the "INFERIORITY" and hate that is in the majority of Blacks in the United States.
To note the truth: there is ONE race, the human race. Many have been bigoted, but none are racist because there aren't multiple races, just one. The false teaching about there being "races" is actually used to perpetuate the bigotry and problems of the past. They simply changed the wording of their old teaching, the one that claimed some were "sub-human" to teaching the word "race/races/racist/racism," and we need to understand that "race" is used as a synonym for "species," and that different species can't interbreed and remain reproductive (examples are horse and donkey make mule, but mules can't reproduce, just as lion and tiger can make a "liger" but "ligers" can't reproduce) but all humans can. What we have are many lineages, ethnicities, and cultures, but only one race. When we use the word "races" or "racist/racism," we are continuing to teach ourselves and those that hear us that there are multiple races when there are not. The "race" teaching is used against us to divide us, to perpetuate the same divisions of thought.
Factual truths? This video lacks context and is mostly pseudo-historical nonsense. Italians didn't need to "become white" because they already were -by US law. That "Italians" (mostly Sicilians) faced some discrimination does not mean that any significant number of people thought they weren't "white".
@@cacatr4495 to deny there are races is to deny the atrocities committed by Caucasian men who created racism and classism bc they felt "racially superior" and that they inherited the Earth
I'm an Italian from Sicily, I was completely unaware about the New Orleans massacre and the segregation that Sicilians suffered in Louisiana. Thank you for letting me know.
It wasn't like that. My Catananna was from Agrigento and immigrated through New Orleans. The reason for the lynchings were because Chief Henessey was murdered after he got between two warring Sicilian clans who ran the docs. So, the townspeople naturally blamed the Sicilians who had all been arrested in suspicion of the murder. I'm related to the guy they wanted to lynch, who was most likely responsible, but he managed to hide under a mattress and avoid being killed. Sicilians thrived in New Orleans and for the most part, people there liked them.
It was for a great reason lol. I grew up in a mafia area. I once read a study the US did on the Italian mafia that covered the US and Italy. The findings were that Southern Italians were extremely selfish narcissists who were only interested in their selves or immediate family. They would think it nothing to murder and create chaos in public as long as it was not in their area. Meanwhile, Northern Italians, who are like Germans/Celtic people, hate Southern Italians too and want nothing to do with them. A trait Southern Italians have with other troublesome groups is to deny everything. Thankfully, things seemed to have smoothed out a lot in the US.
Stop it. First the Irish were " slaves" now the supposed mistreatment of Italians. Yes , anglos discriminated against foreigners, immigrants, however none of them were brutalized for 400 years like Blacks were in the US. The Irish, Italians and others could assimilated by changing their names and speaking English. The Black people could not change their skin color. The Irish, Italians and others thrived after awhile, while Blacks didnt get their freedoms until the 1960s.
@@davegorko7647Bruh, what does the german heritage of northern Italy matter? Southern people got viking blood in their veins for all that matters. Also, northern people doesn't hate southern italians, wtf are you talking about; just a small part of the northern italians is so fucking dumb to blame south for all the italians problems, just as some of the southern people blaming north for all their problems. The fact that mafia exists doesn't automatically make all southern italians criminals you donkey
As an Italian, I do appreciate this video. It shows how Italians were considered just a couple of generations ago and it is quite sad that nowadays Italians do not know anything about these things...
74 people were massacred at the Calumet Italian Hall of the deaths 3 were Italian Americans while they were on a Copper mine strike. In Calumet, Michigan, there was a significant population of Italian immigrants who worked in the copper mines. It’s a tragedy and I believe another story to support your perspective. Great video.
Hannibal a African Ruler conquered Rome, hence the dark skin, eyes, curly hair of Sicilians, southern Italian's were not considered white because of their African heritage.
@@MarcelleSims lol, you’re wrong. Hannibal, and most Carthaginians, was racially Phoenician, so he was Levantine. Definitely not black or North African.
As a Greek American I appreciate your well researched podcast. My grandfather was most likely a victim of the Omaha burning of Greeks out of the city. We only know something terrible happened there that resulted in him moving to Chicago and starting over. He did everything after that to appear as “Anglo Saxon” and blend in as possible. As a result we lost our heritage and even connections to our extended family.
I am so sorry to hear that. I had a chance to hear a Greek language and clearly up close just a couple weeks ago (I live in very homogenous country) and I fell in love with the sound of it. Such a beautiful language. It sounds like a mix of romance language and turkic language spiced with an elegance. Wish I had more time to learn it.
This explains why the Italians and Greeks currently in America are the most racist creeps one can find. To fit in with the anglos, they act like the worst racist bholes.
A white person is any of the original peoples of Europe, Middle East, and North Africa, so that includes italians. Ameriva is even named after an italian, "Amerigo". There's two kinds of white people: those who get pink & red in the sun and those who get gold & bronze, every white community/country has both kinds, some just have more of one kind than the other.......
Well done! About 10 years ago, I wrote a book on my own family’s Sicilian heritage. I did not want it to be simply a genealogy of names and dates, but a personal story told within fact-based historical context. I very carefully researched and included a lot of the information you presented in this video about the Italian immigrant experiences with racial, employment, financial, and societal discrimination. Many family members, who had assumed that we had always been “white” were surprised at what they learned. I firmly believe that when we know what our ancestors went through, we better appreciate what we have now.
Have you published your book yet? I would love to have a copy as I am Italian My family been here since 1902. Three brothers one wife one cousin Nicola, Micheli,Veto Glaviano they were from the mainland I just don't quite remember the name of the town. But as many Italians will tell you they were deported or left from the island of Sicily and so when they ask them where they come from when they arrived here they told them they came from Sicily or sometimes the Italians could not understand English and they would just simply put down their origin was Sicily . I guess in the rush of things so many coming over 4 million I think she mentioned I guess it's easy for some misinformation. Someone like yourself I'm sure we're clear these things up so that we can all be proud of our Italian heritage. Our last name was Glaviano
This comes with mixed emotions as on the one hand I feel sorry that Italian Americans were treated with bigotry in the early times of our country. However, knowing the full history we know how Italian Americans en masse look down on African Americans, treat them with the same bigotry once they became "white", ex. Italian parents and the community not allowing interracial dating or marriage with black persons. It seems everyone couldn't wait to throw off their culture and background to become like the oppressors. And Italians are not the only group with this strange, very anti Christ or anti judeo Christian act. The Irish, Mexican, native American, Asian , other Latino groups and Jewish community all looked down on the negro with the same hate and discrimination as the Anglo Americans.
@@thatguybill34 Crossed my mind today for some odd reason while driving. Just thinking how Zionists even today feel this to be true. Not necessarily secular Jews but the Zionists that mistreat Palestinians. For this reason, I believe that is why they cannot have their own homeland. It's sad.
Wow! So glad you turned up on my UA-cam feed. I'm an Italian -Irish American who's always identified as Italian because I was practically raised by my Italian grandparents and relatives in a small north eastern Connecticut town. Not only have I never heard of what happened in New Orleans, I never knew that ANY Italians had ever been lynched. My first experience with racism, although I didn't recognize it as such, was being asked by a third grade classmate if my grandfather belonged to the Mafia. This would have occurred around 1953-54. Having no idea what the Mafia was I told that boy that my grandfather worked in a factory. My grandfather was born in Rome and was given away by his mother 3 days after his birth. He was brought to the "commune" with the name Latici pinned to him. The name does not exist in Italy, although it is the second half of the Tuscan name, Montelatici. All of my grandmother's relatives came from the Province of Ferrera with the exception of two aunts, one Bolognese, the other Piemontese. I don't recall ever hearing anyone speak degradingly of Southern Italians or Sicilians. Flash forward to 1966 when met the love of my life in college, a Neapolitan/Sicilian boy. When I spoke of him at a family dinner gathering, I was shocked to hear my grandfather say, "If he's Napolitano/Siciliano you better check his pockets for knives before you let him in the house." I was so shocked I didn't ask my grandfather to explain himself. I ignored it. I went through three breakups and reunions with that boy before breaking up for good for reasons having nothing to do with his being Southern Italian. I have lived in Italy now for 21 years. I first lived on the Bolognese pianura. At yhe place where I lived there were gardener, a married couple. She was Ferrarese, he was Tuscan. My bedroom was directly over their cantina and I heard their daily conversations. They referred to the husband of a woman who lived above me as a "mulingnan" a eird in dialect meaning eggplant, slang for a Sicilian or Southern Italian that referred to their alleged dark skin. The husband in question was Sicilian. The year was 2003. So the racism that led to the lynching of Italians in the United States was very much alive here in Emilia Romagna and Tuscany. BTW, the gardeners were horrid people. I won't go into details. In my time in here I've been fortunate enough to travel around the country for work. My two favorite places so far are Puglia and Sicily, especially Sicily, for its beauty, culture and most of all, people. I wanted to move to Sicily after my first visit. Oddly, I never once saw a dark skinned person. I DID see in Sicily stunning faces that looked as if they'd jumped off of ancient Greek urns. When I say stunning, I mean literally breathtaking to yhe point that more than once I was unable to prevent myself from telling a few young women how beautiful they were. I don't know where all the dark skinned people were hiding. Same in Puglia. Not one. I have Calabrian and Sicilian friends here. No one is dark. I HAVE seen old photos of Southern Italians with what I suppose might be referred to as dark, but I would call it a shade of olive, a color so stunning I would trade my pale skin for it in an instant. Interestingly, when I look back at myself at age 19 I realize that a paler shade of that olive hue was in my blood. I had a job working in Sturbridge Village, a recreation of an 18th Century village. I was obliged to wear a costume, and the costume I was given was a light purple. When I put it on I saw that my skin took on a pale shade of olive green. Purple being the complementary color of green brought that color to the surface of my white skin. I was fascinated, though it took me years to understand yhe the meaning of it. As I've aged my skin has become increasingly devoid of any melanin. I don't even tan darkly as I did when young. From the moment I understood what it meant to be Italian I was proud of what that meant. I still am. Only after watching this video (I've subscribed) did something incredibly disturbing occur to me. Having grown up in New England I had several WASP boyfriends
Wow. There are a lot of Black families in New Orleans who carry Italian names. My parents and many people from old New Orleans who considered them as “Dagos.” I never knew where that term came from. Thanks for giving light in this dark history. It’s so sad that people are treated so badly because of skin color
I heard Dago was originally a knock on Spaniards, keying off the name Diego. In Saint Paul Minnesota, some old-Italian-family-run restaurants embrace the term. A common item on the menu in these places is a "Hot Dago Sandwich".
Only white people created different laws to discriminate against people on the basis of their skin color. They're the ones who fostered hate against dark skin people, Jews, Italians, Greeks, and Chinese people. Whites are the architecture of racism.
Dago may have been derived from term "Diego", which means "Spaniard" ...The Romans laid the foundations for modern Spanish culture and identity, and Spain was the birthplace of important Roman emperors such as Trajan, Hadrian or Theodosius ...So Italians were Romans first, then Spaniards, then Americans, much like Hassidic Jews. However, WOP actually stands for "WithOut Papers" W/O P and would apply to many immigrants, not just Italians, but somehow it stuck to Italians.
@@philipethier9136 Dagonites . Southern Italy was fundamentally invaded by Greek-Jews whom had invaded Eastern Mediterranean coastal line and had a substantial Northern African genetics .
@@dylannaenzo9737 Dago or Dagonites or Fish people is whom Jews and Roman Catholic Church venerates .Southern Italy like Eastern Mediterranean coastal line was invaded by Greek-Jewish SeaPeople whom had a substantial amount Northern African genetics hence when a so called “Greek” speak English will often have the same accent as a Spanish person just as Greek-Jewish SeaPeople would and do share common cultural and genetic traits that are different continental and pastoral,societies.
This puts me in mind of a story my Dad told me. He was born on Staten Island in 1918 (his parents immigrated from St. Martin, the Dutch West Indies in 1911). Many people from St. Martin settled in Staten Island around that time. A little later, Italian immigrants also arrived, and friendships and alliances were formed between the two ethnic groups, including going to church, going to public school, and even eating at each other's houses. My father, who was black, claimed many of his best friends during his childhood were Italian. In 1942 when they were drafted into the service for WWII, a group of these friends took the ferry to Manhattan to be inducted. Once there, they were split up by race ("whites over here, colored over there!") The war took over their lives from that point. When it was over, my Dad never re-established contact with his old friends. If he saw one on the street, he might nod a quick hello, but that was it. I always found that sad.
Black citizens in the US were treated badly after the CW and returning vets were treated abominably. The modern movement for blacks to get equal rights began as a consequence of the hurt and anger felt by these returning vets
Really sad. (Even sadder is that without talking to each other, they would never even know if the other might have wanted to rekindle that friendship-but both too embarrassed/nervous to say anything)….I get it, but so sad
@@tesmith47ill do you one better and say black folks have been fighting injustice since slavery for hundreds of years whether trying to escape slave masters or trying to live free when "allowed"
I didn't know a lot of people from St. Martin settled in Staten Island, NY. Very interesting. NYC was settled by the Dutch as well. Cornelius Vanderbilt is buried on Staten Island in the Moravian Cemetary he was born on S.I. as well. I have family members from Staten Island and Brooklyn. My grandparents lived in Brooklyn, some of their children later moved to S.I., NY some moved to Long Island and some to NJ.
I found this very interesting. My husband is half-Italian. His mother’s parents were born in Italy. When I had asked him which part of Italy he had always said it was central or northern. When I did a tree on Ancestry I found they were from Campania which had been part of “The Kingdom of the Two Sicilies” in the 1800’s. I never knew there was discrimination based on which part of Italy a person came from. I knew my husband’s paternal grandfather wasn’t happy when his son married an Italian around 1960 in Pennsylvania. The discrimination I think tapered away as more Italians became “Americanized” and other groups became more demonized. René Giraud’s scapegoat theory is interesting to look at as part of why groups tend to create “us versus them” narratives and dehumanize each other.
It's funny how petty humanity is. One leader's insecurities can cause a whole movement. Turning on eachother because of skin tone, lifestyle, traditions, language, stuff that doesn't matter when all is said and done. We all go into the ground at some point. So we should just be respectful while we still have the time. Fighting over dumb stuff that doesn't matter.
Columbus Day was launched as a marketing tool for the 1893 Columbian Exposition and continued as a peace-offering for the infamous 1890 lynching over that assassination of that New Orleans public official automatically blamed on the Black Hand, the forerunner of the Mafia.
Its a product of the Royals or actually Robber Barons who destroyed tribal culture to create a caste or class system controlled by the royal oligarchy. It was the original crime that created the mess of social disorganization we have today. All hate and racism result from the self hate imposed by patriarchal class society with sick people as the elites. Those who need others to look down upon to feel adequate are sick weaklings. This will destroy us all if we do not re embrace strong cultural or matriarchal communities.
To this day, Northern Italians refer to Southern Italians by the slur "terroni" (plural for terrone"). The country is still divided North v South politically and economically.
Just found you. what a wonderfully done piece. I had read about the inching but there was no “story” behind it. I look forward to seeing more of your videos. 🇮🇹🇨🇦
My great great grandfather immigrated from Sicily to the U.S. through Louisiana. Growing up I heard stories about my grandfather and his family being called dago niggers and being treated poorly. They left and ended up in Colorado. I had no idea how bad they actually had it. Thank you for the info.
SIMPLE : TO THIS VERY DAY, ITALIANS REMAIN DIVIDED. FIRST THING A FELLOW ITALIAN ASKS YOU : CHE PARTE ? ( WHAT PART OF ITALY YOU FROM ) THIS IS WHY ITALIANS CANT ELECT EACHOTHER... THEY'RE BOUGHT OUT WITH SOME DRIVER OR LABORER JOB AT WHATEVER MUNICIPALITY. LIKE BIDEN, NOT ONE ITALIAN ON HIS STAFF, CABINET.
Holy shit man Dago Niggers?! Forgive me as a black man I had no idea that Sicilians and Italians suffered the same shit that my ancestors and so many others went through weather they were from Africa Europe or indigenous . But hey your here due to his strength one way or another. I knew they went through some hatred but it’s definitely not taught in school like that.
Excellent content! As a 58-year-old Sicilian American growing up in NYC in the 1970's, I can tell you that we did not identify as "white". White people to us were white Anglo Saxons Protestants. My parents made sure that my siblings and I understood our roots and the treatment our grandparents received as dark-skinned non-English speaking immigrants in an effort to teach us to never judge a book by its cover. My wife who is a Peruvian immigrant and I have taught our children and grandchildren to do the same. As many have mentioned here, this is why the history of all Americans from all backgrounds should be taught in school. We really have so much more in common than in differences.
I am patrilineally Sicilian, even though the rest of my ancestry is clearly from the more northern reaches of Europe. I look about as Northern European as you can get, and I find this "otherness" Americans once thought of Italians extremely bizarre yet also predictable: Southern Italians were encouraged to leave Italy en masse because of the contempt Northern Italians had for them, and despite some of the animosity put towards them like this video suggests, life for those Southern Italians and their descendants is far, far better than had they remained in Italy.
@@Wasserkaktus I Own The Complete "Divine Comedy" by Dante Alghlieri. And I find it fascinating that Italians were classied as Black and White Race prior to the 13th century. 😮
I’m sure you know Fabrizio the Doorman. I met him in 2007 when I moved to nyc and loved his style. He was the first Italian who taught me that he wasn’t “white”
I’m a 4th generation Italian American born in Pennsylvania, but now lives in South Carolina. I knew there was hatred towards Italian immigrants at several points, but I had no idea some of us were lynched. It’s odd to think that I would be considered inferior to others in another time to people who didn’t know me and didn’t know better. Thank you for bringing this to my attention.
Imagine being black! How do you view black people now that you know your immigrant ancestors were considered less than black folks. Now that your 4 generations removed from the racial hate and now comfortable in the whiteness they didn’t enjoy, how does that make you feel? I’m just curious! Thanks!
@@ROMESKIable bro it's wild. I'm shook. I'm half German-half Italian, but even Germans immigrants during the World Wars era were being harassed and beaten. Mobs would go out and kill Dachshunds and German Shepherds. And I'm Catholic lol. In the end, it's just another reason why we're all the same.
Italians have always been White Thing is the back in the late 1700s White's even hated other whites like the Polish or the Italians or the Irish etc. But it wasn't for their skin colors but rather mostly just for their Catholic beliefs
@@KingMattTheGod ahhahahahah cosa stai dicendo? la pelle diventa scura a causa del sole, ignorante. è normale che gli italiani del sud sono più scuri, in Sicilia c'è molto caldo non è come il nord
This was an amazing video. As a biracial Black woman from the South I literally empathize with the experiences you shared on the struggles of Italian-American immigrants. I pray that in my lifetime America will stop caring about having a racial and ethnic hierarchy. I think it’s important that we all have compassion for each other as humans because we all have more in common than many people think.
America needs to have a conversation to get rid of racial hierarchies. A party is literally white washing history while erasing black history. It's really happening
I hope so too but sometimes I loose faith when I see South Americans come here and call themselves white. Then I realize people are still trying to play the hierarchy game.
In 1999 I served with Italian troops under NATO command (SFOR V ). From day 1, I was shown nothing but the utmost respect, and in a short period of time I became their brother. Despite the fact that most of them spoke English, they appreciated my interest in learning Italian. I've always known of the oppression of Italian immigrants, but never heard of the scale of abuse they had endured. Among all of the Europeans I had the pleasure of meeting, it is the Italians that are perhaps my favorites . ( don't tell my French and Norwegian brothers and sisters! ) Thank you for bringing this ugly truth to light.
It's because Italians (by not being a defined ethnic group, rather a multitude of ethnicities all lumped in together) have always been taught to blend in with the rest of the population. Ever asked yourself why Italians seem to find themselves "at ease" wherever they go? Here's your answer.
@@Thenewbronzeagecollapse tra le regioni italiane ve n'è una che nel 1390 era una Nazione! La Sardegna! Lo studio del loro DNA dimostra che non sono veri italiani ma sono un etnia a parte! La più antica del Mediterraneo! Poi la geopolitica ha fatto il resto!! purtroppo..
It is interesting that even in 1972 when I went to university in Southern California I was able to receive an Equal Opportunity Grant because as an Italian I was considered a Latin. However in 1973 I was told I was no longer considered Latin but my ethnicity was listed as White. I was a Sicilian and Calabrese (listed as South Italian). 80 years before that my Grandfather coming to Ellis Island was listed as “black”. The irony of race has never been lost to me. In fact even today in Latin Countries Southern Italians are still considered as latins. Southern Italians make up 95% of all the Italians in the United States. It is said that Italians took close to 100 years to assimulate in the United States. When I was At college there were mothers who would let me date their daughters because I was Italian . When I became a chef in the mid 1980s running a successful restaurant and catering business I had been hired by a large pharmaceutical company to cater a large party at their house . The president of this company and his wife were both Italian. They were very pleasant people. But the wife seeing my name was Italian wanted to know what part of Italy my family was from. I told her that I was Calabrian and Sicilian. She laughed and told me “Oh you are not Italian”. I had never heard that before . As a fiercely proud Italian American I was really thrown for a loop. This post is important and our history and how we were treated is important.
Italian is not a race. Its a bit like "American". Is American a race? No. What I believe happened in US was, because the majority of Italians that migrated to US are from a specific region of Italy (mainly from the south) they look alike and are "easier" to identify and stereotype. But Italians from other regions may appear different from those Italians that went to US, they have, on average, a different phenotype. Making an analogy, if many Americans from Vermont would immigrate to Italy, Italians would be convinced Americans are all white. But that's not true, we know. Also, in the sense that Americans give to the word, you are not "Latin", or better, you are not "Latin-American", because you are not from a Latin-American country, nor your ancestry is from there. That's clear. Latin is the origin of the Italian language, as well as all the Romance Languages. French people are latins... from a language point of view and... maybe, generally speaking... culturally. Also, don't be offended, but you are not Italian also, because you are not born in Italy, nor you live there or are a citizen of Italy. You are an US American with Italian ancestry, an Italian-American.
Thank you for spreading the word about the Italian lynchings. My grandparents were also immigrants from Palermo via New Orleans to pick sugar cane in the late 1800s. I would love to understand more about this history and look forward to seeing more from you.
I'm sorry sir but no one picks sugar cane they cut it That's what my grandparents did too and donaldsonville Louisiana when they first came here in 1902
I’m so sick of hearing about race and shit that happened 100 years ago which nobody cares about now Somewhere, somebody fooled people into thinking that there is power in victimhood That’s a lie. There’s power in Jesus and the Bible never mentions his race for a reason. Because it’s inconsequential and it’s a distraction just like endless lineage DNA studies. Stop obsessing over melanin Content , and pigmentation. It’s not your identity.
@lee_9837 But don't also forget that North Africans are not the same things as Sub-Saharan Africans. You colonizers should leave North Africans alone too😠
I am familiar with the history of how Italians became white, as with others like Irish. I had a very interesting conversation with an Italian physician who was so bothered by racial injustice towards Black people who shared his story of growing up in Detroit. Italians lived in the same area as Black people and were subjugated to inequities and prejudices. Hearing these stories reminds me of the importance of sharing and understanding our history. It also doesn't escape me the role of skin color and colorism plays into the construction of race. I now focus on the construct of whiteness as a standard that is used as a measuring tool towards acceptance. What if we turned our attention to the meaning of what it means to be white in the United States (and maybe European). I bet we would get closer to the root of why being white is such a powerful construct that even people have fought in court to be considered white. And when we peel back the layers of the white construct you'll find the caste hierarchical structures that reinforce power and control over even if those considered white.
Italians were never black. Try checking DNA why are some blacks, so intent to change truth history to fit black. As. White, I have no need to change truth history to fit white. Because history proves it's self not color.
Fascinating but sad history. As a Caribbean American teen I was aware of the prejudice faced by Italians when they came to America due research done for a term paper in high school. However, I don't remember reading about the lynchings. Thank you for bringing this to everyone's attention. It's time we all embrace, learn from , and appreciate each other as individuals and celebrate our diverse cultural backgrounds.
I never heard the term “Caribbean American” before. Is that a Haitian, a Dominican, a Jamaican or a Puerto Rican? Most of those do not want to be compared with each other.
Same for my Sicilian family.. my grandfather’s nickname was “Blacky” because of his dark complexion. I just found your channel and look forward to listening to all of your content as I’ve spent over a decade studying the 1800s. Really terrific work!
did you know that the Romans had strong trade ties with Southern India, the Romans and Greeks also had trade settlements in Southern India, they amassed most of their wealth from their trade with south India. they used to take ships laden with gold in exchange for black pepper. The dravidians are the original mediterranean and sumerian people who were in the west and east . In the West they were mixed with the Akkadians and Amorites and also the Indo aryan Lydians(neo Hittites) who also went into the Mediterranean and are known as the Minoans and Etruscans, they were dark and fair and had striaght to wavy hair quote” The word 'Dravidian' comes from the Tamil words Tbirai Ahvidar, meaning 'sea people'. A popular Tamil saying was 'cross the oceans and acquire gold' Quote” The Mediterranean Peoples (Dravidians) (Extracts from ‘The Original Indians â€" An Enquiry’ by Dr. A. Desai) How the Mediterranean people came to be called Dravidians makes interesting story. The Pre-Hellenistic Lycians of Asia Minor, who where probably the Mediterranean stock called themselves Trimmili. Another tribe of this branch in the island of Crete was known by the name Dr(a)mil or Dr(a)miz. In ancient Sanskrit writings we find the terms Dramili and Dravidi, and then Dravida which referred to the southern portion of India. South India was known to the ancient Greek and Roman geographers as Damirica or Limurike. Periplus Maris Erithroei (Periplus of the Eritrean Sea) in the second or third century AD described the maritime route followed by Greek ships sailing to the South Indian ports: “Then follow Naoura and Tundis, the first marts of Limurike and after these Mouziris and Nelkunda, the seats of government.†Dramila, Dravida and Damirica indicated the territory. Then it was applied to the people living in the territory and the language they spoke, in the local parlance Tamil and Tamil Nadu or Tamilakam. ----------------------- The Mediterraneans or Dravidians were associated with the ancient Sumerian civilizations of Mesopotamia and of Elam (southern Iran). Authors have pointed out ethnic, linguistic and cultural affinities between the Sumerians (Mesopotamians) and the Dravidians of South India, and concluded that both probably belonged to the same ethnic stock. HR Hall writes: “The ethnic type of the Sumerians, so strongly marked in their statues and relofs was as different from those of the races which surrounded them as was their language from those of the Semites, Aryans and others; they were decidedly Indian in type. The face-type of the average Indian today is no doubt much the same as that of the Dravidian race ancestors thousands of years ago...And it is to this Dravidian ethnic type of India that the ancient Sumerian bears most resemblance, so far as we can judge from his monuments. He was very like a Southern Hindu of the Deccan (who still speaks Dravidian languages). And it is by no means improbable that the Sumerians were an Indian tribe which passed, certainly by land, perhaps also by sea, through Persia to the valley of the Two Rivers.†Hall is of the opinion that Dravidian people must have migrated to Mesopotamia from India, whereas others think Dravidians came from Mediterranean regions, which was their earlier home. KP Padmanabha Menon writes about their close relationship: “Orientalists, many of them, are prepared to concede that the Sumerians, the Mediterranean race, are branches of the early Dravidians.†Quote"Dravidians In Crete they were known by the name which the Greeks wrote as Termilai, in Asia Minor as 'Trimmili' or Trimalai (Sastri p60), and in India as Dramiza, Dravida, Dramila and finally Tamil. Their deity was "Mother-Earth" who gave them grain, vegetables and food. The 'Mother Goddess' cult belonged exclusively to Crete where it was known as Durgha (compare Trqqas mentioned in Lycian inscriptions in Asia Minor) as Uma or Parvati. (Sastri p61) They probably brought along with them to India this Mediterranean or Aegean Saivaism, Mother Goddess with her consort Siva.Dr K Loganathan Inanna is the ancient Sumerian goddess of love quote ⭐"Inanna[a] is an ancient Mesopotamian goddess associated with love, beauty, sex, desire, fertility, war, justice, and political power. She was originally worshipped in Sumer and was later worshipped by the Akkadians, Babylonians, and Assyrians under the name Ishtar⭐.[b] She was known as the "Queen of Heaven" and was the patron goddess of the Eanna temple at the city of Uruk, which was her main cult center. She was associated with the planet Venus and her most prominent symbols included the lion and the eight-pointed star. Her husband was the god Dumuzid (later known as Tammuz) and her sukkal, or personal attendant, was the goddess Ninshubur (who later became the male deity Papsukkal). quote Astarte is one of a number of names associated with the chief goddess or female divinity of those peoples.[1] She is recorded in Akkadian as As-dar-tu (D), the masculine form of Ishtar.[2] The name appears in Ugaritic as ʻAthtart or ʻAṭtart (), in Phoenician as Ashtart or Aštart (), in Hebrew as Ashtoret (עשתרת).[2] The Hebrews also referred to the Ashtarot or "Astartes" in the plural. The Etruscan Pyrgi Tablets record the name Uni-Astre quote"Astarte (Greek: Ἀστάρτη, Astártē) is the Hellenized form of the Middle Eastern goddess Astoreth (Northwest Semitic), a form of ⭐Ishtar (East Semitic), worshipped from the Bronze Age through classical antiquity. The name is particularly associated with her worship in the ancient Levant among the Canaanites and Phoenicians. She was also celebrated in Egypt following the importation of Levantine cults there. The name Astarte is sometimes also applied to her cults in Mesopotamian cultures like Assyria and Babylonia. Quote"The Hyksos practiced horse burials, and their chief deity, their native storm god,⭐ Baal Quote" The Canaanites and, whose language is very similar to the Hebrews worship (el) a ⭐bull god Quote" Shapash is the Phoenician sun Goddess, called the "Torch of the Gods", or "Pale Shapash". Tanit is also called Tinnit, Tannou, or Tangou. The name appears to have originated in Carthage (modern-day Tunisia), though it does not appear in local theophorous names.[4] She was equivalent to the moon-goddess ⭐Astarte Quote `(Hittites This empire reached its height during the mid-14th century BC under Suppiluliuma I, when it encompassed an area that included most of Asia Minor as well as parts of the ((((Northern Levant and Upper Mesopotamia)))). After c. 1180 BC, the empire came to an end during the Bronze Age collapse, splintering into several independent "Neo-Hittite" city-states, some of which survived until the 8th century BC. Quote Lydia arose as a Neo-Hittite kingdom following the collapse of the Hittite Empire in the twelfth century BC. According to Greek sources, the original name of the Lydian kingdom was Maionia. Quote”The Hittites adopted many of the gods of the Sumerians and Old Babylonians Quote "The people of Akkad worshipped, as what is generally described as, the Sumerian religion, the mythology, rites, and cosmology of the Sumerian civilization, however there were differences between this religion and the one worshipped by the Akadians. These myths were passed down by oral tradition until the early Sumerian cuneiform was invented, and it wasn’t until the early dynastic period that religious writings became hymns and incantations. The Akkadians worshipped the Sumerian triad of An, Enlil, and Enki, however they changed the names to Anu, Bel, and Ea. Anu and Ea were created between the union of Apsu and Tiamat, and along with them the rest of creation came." Dravidians belief of India Thai Pongal (Tamil: தைப்பொங்கல், /ˈθaɪˈpoʊŋʌl/) is a harvest festival dedicated to the ⭐Sun God. It is a four-day festival which according to the Tamil calendar is usually celebrated from January 14 to January 17 Quote "Ancient Tamils worshipped the ⭐crescent moon on the third day (Kuruntokai verse 170). Tamil epic Silappadikaram has a prayer for sun and moon.( tamil is a Dravidian dialect)
You do realize that Sicily was under Arab occupation from the year 827AD to 1091AD? A minority of Sicilians are descendants of those occupiers. It was the Normans who actually liberated the island over a period of thirty years. The Greek speaking residents of the island welcomed them. This is a reason of why there are also blond haired blue eyed Sicilians, even though there are some blond haired Greeks.
I’m from SC, now living in NC, and I had always wondered why there wasn’t as strong of an Italian-American presence in the south as there is in the north, and only now do I have a plain and simple, clear to understand answer. And it really hurts, but it needed to be known and it needs to be shared. I really appreciate the way you presented the facts, here!
I find it rather paradoxical to define Italians in this way, considering that Italy has been the cradle of culture, art, literature, and science in Europe for centuries. Our cultural heritage has profoundly influenced many fields of European knowledge and life, from the figurative arts, with the great masters of the Renaissance, to philosophy, music, and scientific discoveries.
I’m born and raised in New Orleans. The top of my family tree is a Sicilian man and a mulatto women. By the world I’m considered black. I’ve been trying to find more about the Sicilian part of my family. My grandfather has been shedding light on a lot of it. I found your videos looking for more about him. If you want anymore info on the family dynamics with Sicilians and Black people my family has lived it first hand I’m sure they could help
Yeah maybe he was clever choosing a woman and not a dry white cornbread 😂 oh do I hurt the feelings of some wasp 😂😂😂 ??? - I have blue eyes and I am white but not one day I denied my Neapolitan heritage! Hunting someone because of a skin colour makes me sick even after breakfast.
Africans and Sicilians lived virtually next door to eachother before coming here AND THEY INTER- married and traded with each other for Centuries before migrating here. Older PURE- blooded Sicilians who were not prejudiced are generally aware that their ancestry has African Ancestry as well. Check the DNA to see what the per cent age is.
My grandmother spoke of being harassed on her way to Polish school. Most immigrants were and are vulnerable to attack and being taken advantage of. Thank you for this well done video.
I've learned that the Italian, Irish and Polish were discriminated against because when they immigrated over to the US, the greatest plurality of them were Catholic, and members of Protestant denominations felt threatened since the US was founded on grounds of religious freedom from the Catholic Church.
@@terencelee7761I was JUST about to say that! How can you expect us to feel bad for them when they turned around and did the EXACT same thing to black people? I don’t, and that’s that!🤷🏽♀️
As a person outside of America, it's always been so interesting to me just how much Americans see the world as black and white. I'm Polynesian and when I lived in America it was like, no one knew what to make of me. In New Zealand we call ourselves brown, but even then that's such a broad category. We tend to just say what we identify with when we discuss our race. White people will say Irish, or German etc. Asians will say Chinese or Korean etc. Polynesians will say Maori or Samoan etc. It's sad to me how much Americans have erased from their heritage. People are definitely much more proud of their roots in other countries.
You are right. The Wasps had a narrowed sight, but now comes the contrary like M.Luther said:" Mankind is like a drunken peasant trying to ride, he is falling first on the right sire and then on the left
@@ragnapodewski4694calling the natives of your host nation an insect is a narrowed sight. You should appreciate Anglo Saxons/ native Americans instead of resenting us, we built the cities and states that you moved into out of wilderness.
It is great to see so many Italian Americans proud of their Italian roots, particularly after all the prejudice we endured in the USA. Unfortunately, many of us lost our connection with Italy and our Italian culture in order to fit in and “ Americanize.” Several years ago, I applied to the local Italian consulate and was recognized an Italian citizen “de jure sanguinis “ ( by blood) . I now have an Italian passport, Italian birth certificate, and I vote in all the Italian elections. I studied and speak fluent Italian, and visit Italy every year. Yes, I am American by birth, but I am also a proud Italian. Viva l’Italia ! 🇮🇹
Good for you! My papa (grandfather) made the conscious decision not to speak Italian because he wanted to fit in with the rest of America (his mother was fluent in Sicilian). This video helps me understand maybe why that was, but I had never understood it. So much of the culture was lost in that decision as now all of my American relatives from Sicily are deceased and my papa died before I was born. Since then, I've been learning it all on my own and have been using Duolingo to learn the language. I've been wanting to look into getting Italian citizenship but I don't think I could afford to travel there anytime soon, haha!
@@cappyvas congratulations to you for for wanting to learn about your family’s culture and background. Sicily is one of the most beautiful and historic places Italy with its ancient roots in Greek culture and language. While you may not be able to go to Italy now, you still should checkout the possibility of Italian citizenship, there are all kinds of information online. Continue with your Italian language studies as well. “In bocca al lupo!” ( Good luck!) Viva la Sicilia! Ciao.
I really appreciate the time and care that you took with putting this video together. You really hit the nail on the head with the racist structure that is set up and used on different ethnic groups over time. My dad's side is Italian (from Anzi) and my great grampa came over from southern Italy in the early 1900s. He worked on the railroads as a line walker--a very dangerous job and lived in the slums in Cleveland. He had to give some of his earnings back to the company for the "privilege" of having a job there. My grampa worked in the rail yards for a bit and was called slurs daily. Even after he was successful he was still stereotyped by some. He also had to let the mafia know that he wasn't their guy. Maybe it is because of their experience and learning how the system uses the same tactics towards different groups in time, but I don't understand how any Italian American can be callous to the current plight of African Americans, Latinos, and other marginalized groups.
We should all have self ~ esteem. Insecurity may undermine this, even make a person doubt themself, not particularly like themself, or others. This is one reason that people lash out, criticize others, as a matter of personal rote, routine, "put down others," including slurs, as you mention, and more aggressive behavior, when this is unnecessary, and perhaps illogical. These are also behaviors learned by observing other people. If, when a person has self ~ doubt, this may be assuaged, if briefly, by thinking, "Well, I'm imperfect, but at least I'm better than, superior to, this other person." {Thoughts such as this usually don't provide personal improvement, are very temporary, "fixes."} A source of overly aggressive behavior, conflict, misunderstanding. We many times, intrinsically want to associate with others who appear to be, "like myself, us," visually, audably, mannerisms, habits, & so on. Can we understand, appreciate, even like others who are not, "like myself, us," at least part of the time? Be positive? We can try to do this! Not just indulge in knee ~ jerk criticism!
I'm 3rd generation Italian American from a small town in Ohio. So much of what this video discusses runs in my family history and raises deep emotions. My great grandparents were Southern and Northern Italian and only spoke their native language while living in a combined Black & Italian neighborhood. The next generation only spoke English in public unless asked to translate. About half of them married German or Irish Americans. There were Catholic schools and Churches, one for Black Catholics and another for 'everyone else'. There were Blacks who were 50% Italian in the Black Church and surrounding towns. Italians and white Italian mixes began moving to other neighborhoods and trailer parks. A few Black Catholic women bravely came to the other 'white' Church with their daughters. No one every saw or mentioned who the girls' fathers were. I went to school and Sunday classes with those mixed girls and though we were all part Italian, I was definitely considered 'white' and they weren't. Both my grandmother and mom married 'out' to white men who were then completely enfolded into the community. My grandmother remembered working with Black women as a housekeeper or server but quit her job when she was allowed to use a public bathroom but her Black coworkers were not. My grandfather supported her choice. She went to work in war time factories then. Part of my early childhood, I was raised in the original Black Italian neighborhood and my parents and my generation always kept our friends from there. White Italians, relatives and friends, did not support this and it caused problems during school sometimes. My town actually had a Black mayor so was fairly progressive but the only legally married mixed race couple I knew of kept it secret and would meet in the next county. During college, when I began exploring my Native American and African heritage from my Dad's southern Carolina, Tennessee, and Georgian family trees, I felt a lot of resistance from the family and community. I attended Pow Wows with Native friends for years who introduced me as fullblood Italian bc 'fullblood' was important in that community. When I tried to correct them it was just passed over. When I attended so many African studies classes I could have gotten a second minor degree, I never dared say I was anything but white. I had a few Black folks tell me I wasn't dark enough to be Italian, who they considered Black. When I tried to explain the differences between Northern and Southern Italy it didn't seem believable to them. When I questioned the celebration of Columbus day, I was called a race traitor by Italian cousins. I really stepped back then. No Pow Wows, no going to Church, no more race studies classes. I understand how connected we all really are historically and biologically. I understand why people "pass" racially in the US and it's interesting to see the popularity of so many aspects of African American culture swamp popular culture now. Mixed couples on TV everywhere. Times have changed, haters can't stop it or legislate it out of existence. I was very angry initially how racist many white Italian Americans are towards Blacks and immigrants considering our own struggle in this country. Anger isn't my food anymore though. Compassion and a sense of relation is. Thank you for posting this video. We need to hear our real story, not the whitewashed one.
Crazy considering how racist modern italians in italy can be. Just goes to show that ppl everywhere are the same. When there is a perceived threat, or ignorance stemming from having no idea about newcomers, this is naturally what ensues: barbaric hatred. It is really sad. America has been one of the worst toward anyone not "American" even though these white Europeans were the true invaders!
Damn all this colorism and Racism really did a number on ppl this was a Sad story why does it have to be like this? Why does being of whiter skin make ppl feel they can look down on other ppl this world is in need of a Serious wake up call !!!!
This was a very good podcast. I'm black and I didn't know about the mistreatment of Italians until I started digging up African American history about 12 years ago It actually came up in a lot of the historical documents I was reading and watching. I actually live in a town where it's heavily populated with Italians. And I had this Italian security officer at my job. He had just found out the history of Italians himself. And we talked about it and I remember telling him that so many Italians were mistreated because they were considered black but another thing and it's in some areas may make it worse than being black, Is that white supremacist people thought Italians were sneaking in black genes. And in some cases that would actually make it worse than being black. I just thought that was an interesting cuz I don't think another non-black group experienced that kind of racism way back then. But a lot of people don't know the history of Italians I'm inclined to believe most of Italians that I live around don't know.
I dont think most do. We all really need to dig into history on our own and not trust that the powers that be will tell it straight. I did a video on the italian internment camps in Montana during WW2 also: ua-cam.com/video/2W3CjKQx0f4/v-deo.html
@@nytn oh wow I got to look that up! White supremacist groups had large contempt for Italians thinking some of them could pass for white and sneak in black genes by mixing in with "pure whites" (whatever that means) . Did they ever get reparations I wonder?
@@nytn oh wow, do you think the reason for not giving them reparations was bc they can be classified as white? Some people will argue that being classified as white is a form of reparations?
I grew up in a largely italian community and have been called a dago my whole life in both good and bad ways. I was under the impression that I was not italian because I had no known italian lineage, but my mother never knew who her father was. I never claimed to be italian and would refute being identified as one by explaining my father is part greek and lebanese and that’s why i have mediterranean features. I definitely thought being italian would’ve been awesome and would’ve made me fit in more with community but i didn’t think it was my heritage to claim. After both me and my mom did dna tests, I did ancestry and she did 23 and me to cover more grounds on relatives, we found her father. He was an Italian man with roots in caserta, campagna and palermo, sicily. My maternal grandmother had an affair with her best friends husband. She kept my moms biological father a secret out of shame. All those years I sat back wishing I could join the community. I even took italian in high school for four years because I loved the language and culture. I really appreciate videos like these that help me learn more about our heritage and ancestors’ stories! thank you!
Wow I would love to be Italian to, Italians are cool. I came up to age in the era of Lady Gaga, Colby O'Donis, Jersey Shore. I most likely might have some Dago Blood in me from British American slavery, and I recently found out that besides the British, France & Spain owned the Deep South where my family is originally from before it was given up to the United States in 1796. They came up from Old Mexico, the Southwest, the Gulf Coast, French Canada, the Caribbean, the Mediterranean, Macaronesia and settled the swamps where my ancestors lay, ❤ 🇮🇹🇪🇦🇫🇷🇹🇷🇦🇲 🙂
Mediterranean/southern europeam = white but unfortunately americans are mostly of northern european descent (german and english) that's why we were looked like "lesser white"
My mother was an Italian war bride who married my dad and moved to the US in 1945. We were taught to be very proud of our Italian heritage, which is of course very easy to do. My mother did not run into anti-Italian sentiment, but we were in Washington D.C., a liberal, diverse, and fairly educated city. My mother spoke impeccable English, but never lost her accent. She didn't really like English vowels.
When President and Mrs. DeGaulle visited the U.S., a reporter asked the Mrs. what she wanted most following the war. She smiled and said just two words. As the female reporters giggled, the President leaned over and whispered: “Darling, I believe it is pronounced ‘appiness’.”
Italian can mean sicilian and blonde with blue eyes... so when you say Italian, what do you mean? North, South, Central or the two isles of Sicily and Sardinia?
My mother's family is from Ancona, which was a Greek settlement before it was Roman. From my DNA testing, we are about half northern, half southern Italian, with some Greek thrown in. One of my great-grandparents was Socrate Montano! We are all brown-eyed and brown-haired.
I remember my grandma telling me a story when she was a kid, (she didn’t live down south though, she lived in Newark NJ) she was playing one day with another little girl who had blond hair and blue eyes, they where getting along and having fun together playing, the little blond haired girl invited my grandmom over to her house, when they got there the little girl told my grandma that she couldn’t come in because her mom said that my grandma was “dark”. I never forgot that story and neither did she.
I experienced this as a child from an Italian family. My mother said this might be due to me having a physical disability and that some people believe this happens because of a curse or wrong doing. Fortunately my family did not hold this belief and it was only one family which treated me this way.
That is sad to hear this happened. You do realize that Sicily was under Arab occupation from the year 827AD to 1091AD? A minority of Sicilians are descendants of those occupiers. It was the Normans who actually liberated the island over a period of thirty years. The Greek speaking residents of the island welcomed them. This is a reason of why there are also blond haired blue eyed Sicilians, even though there are some blond haired Greeks.
Years ago I met a woman from Sicily. I was shocked. She was very dark, much, much, darker than me with auburn hair. I and my family are considered African American despite our American Indian heritage. To be honest I had never seen anyone like her or since. I was absolutely floored at her appearance and probably stared. As I got to know her (as much as you can at work), I found out about her heritage. Plus, I had opportunity to study this and the way Italians, Chinese, and Mexicans, were treated in America along with African Americans or Negroes. However, southern Italians were elevated to “White” whereas African American despite being here for four hundred years with mixed ancestry are still considered Black. America is a racist country. Maybe not person to person but it is certainly baked into the system. The same can be said of our current immigration of people from India. They too are very dark people but are considered “White.” And those that made it to this designation of White quickly forgot and lacked compassion for those considered permanently Black even if Black skin is much lighter. Interesting and destructive to say the least. It would be beneficial if we were all Just Americans and judged by the content of our characters. But maybe that would be just too difficult.
Anyone considered different could have been lynched 100 years ago in some parts of the country. Those White folks didn't play. Don't get it twisted you say Mexican but what you should say is Latino. I agree overall though.
My mother was Southern Italian and, like me, had brown skin. I have never been fully comfortable with being considered white. I think some of that comes from knowing how my people were treated, some of it comes from the fact that overall, I’ve been treated better by non-whites than whites, and some of it because my skin is more like someone from Mexico, the Middle East, or North Africa.
@@AndrewUnruh They meant only the Southern Italians . Northern and Central Italians were considered White because they looked like Germans . Northern Italians were tall , white , Blonde hair and Well built . On the other hand , Southern Italians were physically small , brown skinned .
I have Italian ancestry on my father's side, and you've answered so many questions that I've always wondered about my great great grandparents that immigrated here in 1904. I appreciate the research you have done.
You have South Italian ancestry at most and this video shows what happened to some of them non to all Italians. North and Central Italian didn't undergo anything of the kind, first because very few and second because they were feature and cultural wise different from South Italians.
Mine too. I doubt that we're cousins though as I know all of them from the offshoot of that side and it's extremely small, unless you are a 2nd or third cousin, that's possible.
I'm black and from New Orleans, grew up in a neighborhood with Italians and Sicilians, and I've definitely seen all forms of discrimination. People draw imaginary boundaries to insulate their insecurities. I didn't know anyone thought we were different until (at school) I overheard some adults talking about my friend and his family. Irish Catholic nuns discussing my friend's Sicilian family. You can just guess how that convo went.
I always say that outwardly bigoted people harbor the most insecurities, and merely project it onto numerous scapegoats. The way you put it, though; insulating their insecurities, cuts very deep indeed.
A video like this and it's affirming comment section is the dark side to the internet and free speech. There's nothing much that's pragmatically true about it. I grew up in San Francisco, and me and every member of my family were physically and violently attacked by blacks for no reason. I don't think they really gave a rat's ass that we were Italian..... in relation to being Irish, Slovenian, Armenian, Croatian, German, etc! We never experienced any discrimination from anyone.... except BLACKS. It wasn't even discrimination; it was violent racist assaults. Sure Irish people could come around in 2023 and say they were slaves.... or Slavs, Jews, etc. But pragmatically it's no longer relevant in anyone's mind. Basically a video like this attracts the rats now slithering through the comment section. Tell us all about it sbupt9413... we just need YOU to protect us from the Irish! What fkg universe do you live in? It kind've sounds like you and your friend were a couple of simpletons who latched onto each other for mutual support!
@lawrencedaniels9231 did they liberated us italians? From who? from ourselves? No more fairy tales please: America defeated us, invaded and occupied. On the other hand, it was Italy that declared war on the USA, and we lost. I don't want to be polemical, I'm just saying it because that's how it happened: we lost WWII.
“Liberated Italy” ? From who/what? Italy declared war on the US during WW2 cause they were National Socialists. Benito Mussolini was the Italian Hitler.
An excellent video. Thank you for making and posting it. So many of the comments that have been posted are very insightful. I am of 100% Italian heritage, fourth or fifth generation, and even growing up in the 1970s and 1980s, in a town in NJ where about a quarter of the residents were at least partly Italian, I was subjected to some nasty comments. And yet what I experienced was nothing compared to my older relatives. Though both sides were from the same sub-region of rural Campagna, my mom's family was generally "dark" and my dad's "fair." In the 1930s, my maternal grandmother was sent to work in a tobacco factory at the age of 17, and was literally spat upon by people she walked by to work...especially by the Irish maids to the wealthy WASP families who lived in the good part of town. As for my mom, who tanned quickly darkly, as a young teen in the 1950s was regularly harassed and kicked off of public beaches. On the other hand, many members of my dad's family visually "passed" as German, Irish or WASP. My paternal grandfather had red hair, and gota good job during the Depression only because he lied about his last name. My aunt on that side was even paler, and a classic looking ginger, and because people would never imagine in 100 years that she was of southern Italian heritage, perfect strangers would sometimes share really nasty comments about "wops" and "guineas," expecting her to commiserate! In light of all this, it truly pains me when Italian Americans behave like the people who hated their ancestors!
I worked and studied in Louisiana. I even published a book about the French derived languages of Louisiana. When I first arrived there, I was surprised by the number of people of Sicilian descent. I just wanted to ad that Cajuns had also been victims of discriminations (and those people traditionally speak a langue derived from my own and come from my land). The were called "coonass", and were also considered "on the same level as negroes". On the other hand, Louisiana had a fair amount a free people of color too.
Opelousas, Louisiana had one of the largest free mulatto populations in America prior to the end of the Civil War, in 1865. Many of which were plantation owners and owned enslaved Africans. New Orleans is always the center of stories like that or historical events but as much can be said as in the town of Opelousas.
This video was very informative. As an Italian, born and bred, I wasn't aware that Italians were subjected to attack from the KKK, and were the second most targeted background after african-american. On the disparaging of Southern Italians, I can confirm that the social stigma of being from Southern Italy still persists today, albeit generation after generation, and it is waning. In other regions of Italy, people from the South were considered slackers, good for nothing and prone to committing petty crimes. On top of that, coming from a particular Italian region would see you treated differently and had additional racially-motivated stigmas applied to you: people from Naples were thieves and conmen, people from Sicily were automatically identified as being affiliated with organised crime, and so on. I grew up in a rural and pretty bigoted community in central Italy, and the whole environment I was growing up in reinforced these false stereotypes. When I moved to the South for work and spent time in Naples and several places in Calabria, I saw most of them were entirely untrue, and some, unfortunately, were true. From an ethnic point of view, people from the South of Italy have a higher appearance of appearance details from past arab and Greek ancestry. All of Southern Italy was colonised throughout history by whoever was the leading naval power in the Mediterranean Sea, bringing a genetic background different from Northern Italy.
What an eye-opening video! As a first generation Mexican who grew up in the Midwest, I clearly remember how my father had this undercurrent of love for the Italians in our neighborhood in Chicago. He would even root for the Italian team in the World Cup!
Then WHY do some Italians practice the SAME bigotry against Black people?? There are SO many immigrant groups that practice this same bigotry once they’ve transitioned into the so called American dream??
Italy and italians no matter the pregiudices, mafia, no white, pizza and spaghettis ect, ect, ect, has been one of most important and influencia people in human history in all sense , art, science, culture , Rome , florrence, Milan ect, ect, no matter what people who knows history said or not, At the end of this day and the ones to come , the country that it self (USA) named AMERICA , was discover for the New world by a italian Cristoforo columbus) the name tha they use for calling they self AMERICA , is Am italian fermale name, the first european man that arrive to colonize de capital of world (NY) was an italian ( VERRAzZANO) and the every one of them , keep goin eaten italian pizza, spaghetti, buy ing a Ferrari and drive ir with Dolce Habana or Bulgari suite, a gelato,lasagna ect, ect, ect, seaten confortable see ing a Robert deniro or al pacino in taxi driver or the Deer hunter movies or maybe hearing “in my way “ for Frank Sinatra and franki Valli , thats mean maybe for sure , a lot of parta that they proclame of their greatness of AMERICAN to the world , is a bebts the they have with ITALIANS greatness.❤️🇮🇹🇮🇹🇮🇹❤️
Italians are such wonderful people and have contributed so much to this country...their cuisine, their art, their music, their architecture, their natural beauty! I think this hatred stems from pure jealously!
Stereotypes. Italians are normal humans like everyone else. I say that as an Italian. Romanticizing Italy was what exacerbated the problem in the 1950's. Let's put it an end.
They are very racists, not all but many. Especially those from the North. My mum worked with a black woman who was invited to Italy by her Italian work colleague, the girls grandma was horrified that her granddaughter allowed a black person sleep in her bed. She told her to throw away the bed sheet. Sounds extreme but a it’s a true story.
@@Roseau112Italians are horrible and so racists. I follow a black American travel page. They were treated so awful. Changing my plans. I’m ok with seeing Big Ben a Fifth time.
My family told us these stories. I was fortunate to be brought up close to the older generations and geographically close to where we started out in America. It wasn’t easy for us Italians to become part of the American story. But we never gave up or stopped contributing and that’s why we are so proud.
My grandparents came to the US through Ellis Island as children. They traveled West to California along with many other members of their families. After getting married, they bought 23 acres of apricots and supported their children from the harvest. We were not taught Italian because they wanted to learn English. I am returning to my roots. Italy had always been and will forever be in my heart.
EVERY single Time!!! As an African American,I feel that we should come together and change this status quo. Instead of acclimating to "society" because it's easier..
@@natturner465 yes he does… black Americans need to come together as a lineage and get ourselves together… we are the ones who made it possible for other to come here then crap on us like they had these rights before we made it possible with the sacrifices our ancestors made
Come together? Get out of here with that nonsense! Italians we're only attacked because they were believed to be Black or possess some amount of Black blood .
Oh please, many Caribbean immigrants did just as much as AAs did for black people in America but you don’t know your own history so continue to believe that MLK did everything. The Africans did nothing for black people but Caribbean folks like Marcus Garvey, Hazel Scott, Malcolm X’s mother, Stokely Carmichael, CLR James etc. in fact it was certain high ranking self hating blacks and mixed race persons in the NAACP who helped destroy Marcus Garvey’s movement, but you don’t know that either because ADOS also love revisionist history…. Do some homework and come back and prove me wrong. I’ll be waiting. Let it also be known that many of the first slaves from the original colonies in America were also from the Caribbean, mainly Barbados.
I never knew this, my family came to America before 1900 and they talked of discrimination, but I had no idea how bad it had been. I think this is partly because as Italians ascended the ladder of social acceptance, especially those I knew, they became more than willing to pass along prejudice to other groups. I always felt that there was no justification for that…. Wrong is wrong
Remember too that the original English settlers were Protestants while many groups afterwards wer Catholic. The prejudice against Catholics (Irish and Italians) and their allegiance to the Pope was held right into the election of JFK.
@@Patriot1789 I'm an Irish/Italian mix and yes both were discriminated against so don't be hating on today's immigrants they are no different than our grand parents and great grand parents.
Yea, and the largest mass lynching in American history was against Italian-Americans in New Orleans. Because the chief of police David Hennessy was cracking down on the New Orleans mob and he had evidence that would exonerate one crime family and incriminate another. He was assassinated in October of 1890 and 18 men were initially arrested. 7 were cleared as innocent but the 11 remaining were dragged out of their jail-cell(due to a ruling that the 11 remaining would likely be released) by an angry mob and lynched. I think it’s really important that Irish, Italian, Polish, Ashkenazi Jewish, and broadly Slavic Americans learn that only 100-150 years ago it was their ancestors being treated horribly and that they would not of been considered “white”. Which obviously sounds insane because they’re also European but thats a glaring fallacy of the system that whiteness can be granted or taken away depending on convenience. Maybe gain an understanding for more modern immigrants for Latin America or Asia.
You understand that each group in America was treated in the same manner. I grew up in an Italian neighborhood in Brooklyn in the early 70s. An older Italian man told me about Italian history in America. They were lynched, beaten on a regular, and even deported in masses. There were hardships like all other groups. This is why I do not understand DeSantis wanting to remove Black history from books and schools since he would not want anyone denying him his history. Everyone's history in America is American history. Everyone's history should be taught to the generations. Learning the history of each group is not about making anyone feel bad about themselves. It is about understanding. Great video. Thanks for sharing.
This video is amazing! Being Italian and European, I have never imagined such a situation in the US! In Italy, we tend to think that we have been discriminated in the US only (and solely) because of exporting mafia. Which is hated by all of us, we hate mafia. So we tend to say that we have been discriminated because of a small group of dishonest people! I learned a lot! Thank you!
In Italy they tell us nothing about this story. I remember that in primary school I was told that Italians who migrated to the US and other countries got to be appreciated by locals because they were funny and friendly. The reality is completely the opposite and very harsh. Only later on I find out about Marchinelle and other episodes in which such story came out to be nothing more than a fairytale.
@@hellboy0189 I'm Portuguese, and I have learned that too many people have inferiority complexes and want to be a part of the "White" club. White meaning Anglo-Saxon-Northern-European. Israelis and Zionist Jews are another sad example.
@@hellboy0189 Also the columbus day was born due to this type of discrimination, since they led to the death of Sacco and Vanzetti, which caused tensions with Italy and therefore the Mayor of New York established the columbus day to celebrate the Italian who discovered the 'America, which led to a smoother tone between the two countries.
A white person is any of the original peoples of Europe, Middle East, and North Africa, so that includes italians. Ameriva is even named after an italian, "Amerigo". There's two kinds of white people: those who get pink & red in the sun and those who get gold & bronze, every white community/country has both kinds, some just have more of one kind than the other....
I had not heard of Italians being lynched in the South, before, and I grew up in East Tennessee. So your video is very interesting! My dad, whose family was from Northern Italy, SW of Turin, had a childhood experience he only related to me once. A classmate asked my dad to go home with him after school and help him with math (my dad was really smart and ultimately earned a Ph.D. In Chemical Engineering). My dad was happy to do that. They were working on math peacefully until the kid’s dad got home, cursed my dad as an expletive Italian, and threw him out of the house. In Clinton, Indiana, the town was “racially “ divided between whites and Italians- and, I guess, God help any black people who lived there. Clinton ultimately became famous for it’s annual Italian Festival.
Thank you so much for sharing this. I have a few other videos on the Italian experience here in the US, and it's part of a bigger story I am hoping to tell. Their prison camps in the US during WW2: ua-cam.com/video/2W3CjKQx0f4/v-deo.html AND school segregation issues in the South: ua-cam.com/video/xbz1D0v5dYg/v-deo.html
Italians are western Europeans we are white, but the Irish always hated us! Lol... not exactly sure why, but they can kiss are ass! Jealous, I'm sure of that! And they had a lot to do with all the hate! We come from the Roman empire and they come from the land of nothing and no significance at all but endolence of Drinking 🎉 sorry not all but alot!
As a half italian I never suffered some of the stories mentioned here but my dad and uncles did back in post WWII in the 1950's when they migrated to Australia. They used to tell stories of some of the fights they used to get into because some strangers wouldn't accept they spoke a different language or, probably the real crux of the issue, risked taking their jobs away. I actually lived in Italy for over a decade and there is also there a certain level of discrimination between northerners towards southerners but overall they all feel proud of being italian and would laugh away at suggestions of being inferior by anglo/germanic people experienced by migrants. The biggest racist in history, Adolf Hitler, actually admired italians and their history, feeling contempt towards them only at the end of WWII because of Italy's weakness as a military force which was mainly due to the fact italians weren't united or mentally and militarily prepared to fight in wars after 70 years from unification with some territories finally re-uniting only after WWI, 20 years earlier. Substantially, I found italians in Italy quite arrogant and so proud of their nation's history that trying to diminsh their heritage and race would get ridiculed and laughed at. A race of people, a population that produced so many historic figures in human history such as Michelangelo, Dante, Da Vinci, Galileo or historic moments such as the Renaissance, Roman Empire, the Republic of Venice and so many other famous personalities, too many to mention, don't need anyone's approval for what or who they are.
@@panamasrose My dad was from Northern Italy, less than an hour drive from Venice and that's where I lived for over a decade. I never heard that saying. Actually, they felt less italian and more regional "Veneti". But deep down below, from the North to South, they all feel proud italians, except probably in the top Northern Sud Tirol region where the majority of the population is of Germanic heritage and feel italian because they live within italian borders but obviously don't feel ethnically and racially italian.
EXACLTY they don’t need anyone’s approval for who they are and, were a super power, at the forefront of technology, architecture, art and military might which is why Rome was so great. But empires rise and fall and to see what was happening that the video creator mentioned is just crazy. Situations change and racial categories is an ideology. From super power to kkk seeing them as nobody and want to kick them out the country shows human behave at play. Even the Chinese growing as a nation financially in less than a 100 years. A rate no empire has ever achieved but in her video they showed a news paper of some one carrying a Chinese person by the long pony tail. Thinking people are dumb, inferior just baffles me
Fun fact: during the unification of Italy a lot of Sicilian farmers rebelled against their owner, thinking the unification was a sort of social revolution when it wasn't, so Garibaldi executed most of them. When the unification was over, there was no longer a lot of people in Sicily to take care of the lands so Garibaldi moved some of the Piedmontese workforce on the island. So, this means that a lot of people that today we perceive as Sicilian are actually of Piedmontese origins.
The correct pronunciation for "dago," is "day-go." My Sicilian great, great grandfather came from Palermo here to New Orleans in about 1869 from what I can tell. He married a lady from Berlin Germany, my great, great grandmother. He was a baker according to our family genealogy. I also have Irish ancestors that came here during the potato famine in the early 19th century, and they were treated pretty terribly too. I really like your videos now that I've found them, please keep the interesting material coming.
Yes sadly if you say this to your average black person of the woke victimhood type they try to erase the history and suffering of our ancestors as “not as bad” as theirs. SMH
@@Nissardpertugiu It's the singular consonant following the vowel that dictates the Ay vs Ah. The way she is pronouncing it is as if it were spelled "daggo"
I Love your videos. My father who is Puerto Rican often times hung out with Italians in NYC. In no way did he identify as white. However, he felt more accepted by Italians in NYC than any other group. They embraced him and he was made to feel part of the group. My father always said my Great Grandfather was Sicilian. My Mom was always thought to be Italian. But the racism amongst and between migrants and immigrants is so deep. I grew up and hung out with all types of people. Thats what i love about NYC. We are so diverse. It is a beautiful melting pot of culture.
Hmmm 🤔 so you’re saying blacks didn’t accept a rican? I’m from New York &!I highly doubt that. Maybe it was the other way around. You father probably didn’t want anything to do with us. So your father was dishonest with you..
Americans should be grateful to Italians. An Italian (Cristoforo Colombo ) faced a difficult journey to discover their unknown land. Another Italian (Amerigo Vespucci) was kind enough to baptize them with his name.
Thanks for sharing Unfortunately with their new acceptance into the Larger white community, Italians and the Irish , both with similar American origin stories, turned their backs on those black communities they were once relegated to. Often being the most violent in opposition to integration into northern communities. Places like Cicero, Illinois , Bensonhurst, and Howard Beach serve as sad reminders of how this “assimilation” pitted great communities against one another. I agree that this history be taught to ensure the divisions that separate us give way to the ties that bind.
My father was Irish my mother was Sicilian both first generation Americans. They were married in 1956 my mother had said if it had been 20 years earlier it never would have happened because it would have been considered interracial at the time I thought she didn’t know what she was talking about. As I get older I hear more stories that make my family stories make sense.
Yes! I have a good friend from college who's mother and father's situation was similar, except her mother was from Palermo and very dark and her father was Cajun. Both my friend and her mother used to always be mistaken for Black Creoles but they were Italian and Cajun!
@@lthomas3623 yes I have heard that as well. Unfortunately both my parents have passed so I am working off of memories of stories I was told. I kind of get the impression that people of that time focused on every difference of everyone in order to justify their bad behavior keeping everyone in order by fear.
@@lthomas3623 Both Irish and Italians were always legally considered "white". Just check old census records for starters. Why after a few generations could populations like the Irish blend in and become part of the mainstream American population? Could it be due to the fact that they had white skin? Also where exactly were the Irish considered an ethnic minority? An ethnic minority just means a population within a larger population that has a different culture and tradition like the Russians in Estonia for example.
I learned about this some 20 years ago, regarding the Italians and lynching in the Jim Crow south. I'd totally forgotten about it until you brought it up. I also remember the late dancer, Josephine Baker's husband talked about his Italian family, whom were from southern Italy, talked about them being discriminated against in Italy because they were darker. It'd came up, because Josephine had talked about her frustration with the racism back in the States. I don't know if you brought it up yet. Because I haven't gotten towards the middle of the video yet. But most of the Europeans during the Ellis Island years, whom were from Greece Italy, eastern Europe or any European whom came here during that time, whom were dsrk skin. Had their racial identity question by the whites from here. This issue lead to creating a new law on whom were white and whom weren't classified. After the law was passes. Pretty all of the Europeans stop saying that they were German, Italian etc. They'd started saying and stating that they were white. Last. A lot of the Italians and Sicilian people have Arab roots as well as Black African.
@@josephinemoten345 yes its true..Some Sicilian will fight tooth an nail that they have no other ethnicity in them but you cant refute how dark they get and majority have dark hair..i come from a multi diverse background..so i get it
Thanks for tour contribution. As an italian teacher in Italy,it's important to learn the immigrant's stories and how they were treated by the "locals". Grazie mille e buon lavoro!
This is the same with the Mexican race. I’m 60 years old and my birth certificate identified me as white. My Beloved Father who was a World War Two Veteran and whose Father also was a World War One Veteran would tell me stories of how not just the blacks were racially discriminated and abused but so were Mexican’s and Italian’s. I, at so young an age couldn’t understand why people of other ethnicities that fought for America could be treated differently because of the color of skin or ethnicity. Thank you for sharing.🙏🏽🌹✌🏻😎❣️
Because they were used for the benefit of a false foundation. I encourage you to dig deeper to actually understand who your ancestors were and are. You just might realize what was forcefully taken and I could only hope you reclaim it one day.
Yes, many Mexicans were lynched also but no one talks about it. I dunno if it’s because Mexicans often identify as White so now they don’t want to talk about it or what.
@@MaryLou913 FyI Mexicans are being lynched daily in Mexico . Mexican police just found 45 garbage bags filled with the body parts of an entire call center.
Mexicans are not a separate race, we’re an ethnicity composed mainly of Native American and European blood. My belief is that when we are forced to categorize ourselves most of us do not check off the “Native American” box because typically that applies to Native American tribes of the US, which we are not. So, that really only leaves us with the “white” box to check off since nothing else really applies. Sometimes we get the option to elaborate a little further and have an additional option to select Hispanic/Latino which I presume most people do. I wish they would just add a box we could check to say “human “
Thank you for bringing this topic to light. I was raised in New Jersey were Italians are everywhere. I now live in West Texas and I only know one Italian family living here and they too came from New Jersey. Now after hearing your documentary do I understand why few Italians live down here in the South. Funny how a lot of West Texans are of Mexican descent have similar last names as Italians. Thank you again, please bring more, it is a blessing to know the truth of history so we do not repeat it.
Mexicans in Texas have Italian last names? Maybe Cavazos, Trevino, Sada? Yeah you find them in Monterey and surrounding areas. The state of Nuevo Leon (South of Texas) was founded by Italians and Jewish. Another common last name in that area and in Texas is last name Cantu.
Wow! I'm an Italian-American born and raised in Florida. English is my language . I'm light olive skinned, dark curly hair, dark brown eyes, experienced mild discrimination growing up but didn't understand what it was until I became an adult. Worked in the Florida school system for 28 years and experienced extreme prejudice by mostly white Anglo women. I have never been treated as an American. Always a minority. Funny thing I'm Sicilian and I went to Italy and was discriminated as an American which I found a little shocking. My grandparents on both sides of my family of course were from Sicily. If only I understood what was happening to me back then.😢
Traveling in Northern Italy, I noticed prejudice against southern Italians (similar to prejudice here, against Mexicans). I knew a woman of Northern Italian ancestry, who shared this prejudice even though she was born in California (she had never been to Italy). My Italian ancestor migrated from Northern Italy.
I am from northern italy(piedmont) and i can say that the prejudice is not very present anymore in younger generations. The fact is that northerns and southerns were VERY different from each other back in the day; and maybe to a lesser degree, we still are. Which translates in xenophobia in the less open minded older generations. While its factually true that southern Italy drains a lot of economic resources from the more developed north(as it happens, and should happen, in every country) theres a certain unwritten southern italian philosophy that everybody, expecially in the western world, can find very appealing. Family, friends, good food and being happy with less is what everybody needs in their life.
Similar to Mexicans?? I have never seen any Mexican specific prejudice, what are you talking about! I have seen racism when people speak Spanish, but Spanish is NOT unique to Mexicans or Mexico, and not everyone who speaks spanish is Mexican! So that was just such a dumb comment! Not every Latino is Mexican man, read a book! If Mexicans face racism, then that means that Cubans and Pureto Ricans face lynchings right now becuase Mexicans have always had betters rights them in the entire history of this country. Im guessing you did not know that or will claim it is a lie becuase you live in red neck town where books dont exist!
When I was in college I had a girlfriend who shared an apartment with a blonde-haired blue-eyed woman from Northern Italy. When one of the women in the upstairs apartment, an Italian-American, found out that an Italian was living downstairs she came down to introduce herself. When the Italian woman asked the upstairs neighbor where her family was from her demeanor instantly changed when she said that her family was from Sicily. This was 35 years ago. I hope the current generation isn’t as bigoted.
It's the same thing in France. I lived in the south for a long time and there s definitely between the more Nordic northern France and the south. There's both ethnic and linguistic descrimination. In France they know where you're from based on your accent.
We have too many Mexicans in this country though. They don’t learn English and they don’t assimilate 😫. I SHOULDNT have to learn Spanish because you liberals are letting the ethnics take over and not assimilate. Mexicans should be speaking exclusively English and baking casseroles by this point. But we’ve failed to assimilate them AT ALL.
I was born in a private Italian hospital in NJ. Found out later my father had a very close relationship with scicilians because his octoroon father from Louisiana had a deep relationship with them as well.( my dad also worked in thw hospital as a dishwasher and they paid for him to get a nursing degree).fast forward my mother in law is scicilian and my father and her hit it off right away. My son definitely shows all of it in his features.
They meant only the Southern Italians . Northern and Central Italians were considered White because they looked like Germans . Northern Italians were tall , white , Blonde hair and Well built . On the other hand , Southern Italians were physically small , brown skinned .
My grandparents came from Napoli to NYC in 1905. Im half Italian and Puerto Rican. I knew about how Italians weren’t considered white until the 20th century but had no idea about the violent history in New Orleans. You hear so much about Italian immigrants settling in areas like NYC, NJ, and Boston.
Same, my family went right to NYC and stayed in NY. I had no idea some Sicilians made it down South. I think some of my dad's family came from Napoli as well! I remember seeing that on a manifest.
It was hard for jews too. Being beat up a lot. New york was better but not great but they had each other and made successful kids. In the midwest it was horrible. Henry ford and father coughlin.
Thank you for shedding light on this event. You barely touched on HOW Italians became White in America, except for briefly talking about Columbus Day. Add more of your complex heritage, I'd love to hear about it. BTW The slur is pronounced "Day-go". I've been the butt of it and you don't forget.
Excellent presentation, I’m Italian/Irish, and we heard stories of “Irish need not apply” from my grandparents on mom’s side. My Italian family hails from Tuscany and Abruzzi. Viva Italia!!
This was very interesting. My grandmother and grandfather on my mother’s side were Sicilian immigrants. My grandmother said she experienced a lot of prejudice when she came as a young child because she couldn’t speak English. My great grandfather had trouble finding work because he was Italian. When my grandmother married a fellow Italian, they lived in an area that was mostly Italian and Jewish. I know my family would sometimes refer to themselves as Dagos (pronounced day go) or wops, but it was a huge insult to hear it come from someone else. I never knew about the lynchings or the connections to Columbus Day. I’m proud to be an Italian American.
I think your channel is very fascinating. I am glad you were able to find these instances of Italian discrimination in the United States and publish them on UA-cam. Far too often, many either don't want to admit or just don't know these acts took place.
I am an Assyrian American (indigenous people of Iraq) and the same experience was shared by my earlier ancestors, similar to Italian Americans. In fact, many cities such as Brooklyn, NY: Philadelphia, Chicago and so on: Italians, Assyrians, Greeks etc. lived together in rough neighborhoods. Assyrians especially, with their daker complexion, were considered non-white, while enduring racial slurs by white Anglo-Saxons. Luckily, because of skills in farming, agriculture and Merchant trading, Assyrians prospered by starting businesses that were passed on from generation to generation. Some of my relatives also faced discrimination due to their darker look. It is quite interesting, as you had pointed out, how a century earlier, it would be a completely different story.
I heard this on a hip hop station years ago. The host was Italian American. Northern Italians who are close to Swiss boarder hate this controversy. My father worked construction in NY from late 60s to early 80’s and he told me that Italians came in various shades but all spoke Italian with different accents and colloquialism.
Great video. I'm gonna show it to my wife. She acquired Italian citizenship a few years ago thanks to her grandad who spent 8 years collecting paperwork etc. She is Brazilian from Sao Paulo a city that has an enormous community of Italian descendants. Not surprisingly, Brazilian-Italians pride themselves of their heritage and many arrogantly proclaim themselves as belonging to an European tradition/race probably ignoring the fact that their ancestors had to ran away from war famine and poverty. Thanks for the upload.
Thanks for sharing this. As a Canadian, I learned about lynching in the context of African-Americans, but not in relation to Italians. I had definitely heard about anti-Italian discrimination. I married into an Italian family and I was appalled to hear the stories of police officers mis-treating Italian-Canadians in the 1960's and 1970's. By contrast, I have spent a lot of time in my in-laws native village in southern Italy. I have never felt anything other than acceptance there. Yes, I speak Italian, but with a French accent.
Italians are far from being open minded people, immigrants have a hard time over here and will never be accepted as Italians even after spending generations in Italy…and we are not exactly a country that doesn’t know what racism is…your experience is very limited unfortunately
This is the very reason we should teach our true history in schools, all schools. When I say, (Our)I mean Italian Americans, African-Americans, Native Americans, Asian Americans, Mexican Americans, Caribbean Americans, Irish Americans. All American people should know their true history ☝🏽 When we know who we truly are, we can do better.
Beautifully said. I think a lot of people today dont realize that just a few decades ago, it was THEIR families who were the targets of hate, so we need to do our best to protect those who are in the hot seat today. Really no one has been exempt, but the hierarchies shift.
I never heard about the lynching of Italians in New Orleans or elsewhere. That is awful but thanks for teaching me what really happened.
Do Southern Italians consider themselves white now? I heard it depends which part of the country you are from.
@@Catlily5 There is still racism against southern Italians in Northern Italy today. It’s about 50/50 when it comes to southern Italians identifying as white or brown. However, nearly all northern Italians call southern Italians brown, no matter how light their skin is. My skin is literally a few shades darker than milk. I’m considered brown in Italy, because I’m from Campania. (My parents are actually, literally the color brown though.) I’m considered white in America though. It was very confusing as a child. 😅
Wow really?! What the heck would they call me? I am so pale right now since it’s still not summer but I’m definitely darker than milk 😩 thank you for sharing this
Wrong. Prior to 1965 Blk immigration to America was to the right of the decimal point on a percentage basis. The immigration act of 1965 followed the Civil Rights Act of 1964. That's what opened up the door for non European peoples to immigrate here. Because America's immigration policy had been European Centered from After the Civil War to the Twentieth Century on up until 1960 when Euro Migration to America began to decline.
Foundational Black Americans are the only ethic group / black group who didn't immigrate to America Voluntarily.
And all of these tragic racial incidents that took place in America
Were not caused by Blk Americans.
And in many instances these newly arrived Euro migrants were hostile towards Blk Americans.
And at the same time Blks were being " emancipated" with nothing, through an act of Congress ( Land Grants ) millions of acres of free land was given to newly European Immigrants, they even set up Land Grant Colleges to teach them how to farm the land for free...
This should also be taught in American History.
As well
My father grew up in NYC in the 1930s & 40's. He remembers looking for work as a teenager and seeing signs in shop windows that said: "Help Wanted. No Italians." The Irish were the cops and politicians and the power and hated the Italians. My grandfather sold fruit and vegetables from a pushcart. The cops would, turn his cart over, smash his scale and arrest him (a US Word War I veteran), on some fake charge. He would have to go to court and the judge would fine him 25 cents. Ironic because when the Irish got here, they were treated like garbage themselves.
Not so ironic that the victimized often become victimizers. Happens all the time.
They hated The Italians , because they both became Gangs in N.Y . They, were beating and killing Italians ,etc. So , the 'Black Hand 'was formed . The resulting rounds ended the Irish dominance. They still had a part during prohibation alot. That's until the St. Valentines day Capone party.
Exactly
This isn’t really shocking. It’s human nature unfortunately. Just like when abused children grow up to be abusers as adults. A sick cycle.
@@pele11201 Its an American tradition. Come to this country poor and uneducated . Endure horrible discrimination and violence that the government and police encourage. Then after hundreds of years of hard work, finally make it and gain some acceptance. Then you can discriminate and hate too.
My dad a black man raised in 1950s Chicago I just want to say his best friend until they died both 3yrs ago was an Italian. His parents were killed in a car accident and my grandma raised a baby along with her own, he became my uncle and I loved him like dad#2. I am now in my 60's writing a book for my grandbabies titled what color is love dedicated to their special attachment
You thinking about publishing? Or is it just a personal project?
That's beautiful!
@@kylewood5607 Excellent question! Would be interested in reading it.
@@CarvellaNY Please Make Sure you Make All Necessary Provisions for your project before you allow someone to read your manuscript. And don't mention your topic or title without a copyright. Good Luck ❤
#cosign🫰🏿🫰🏿🫰🏿
As an Italian whose family migrated to Brazil, here the history was completely different. Italians were always well received and our contributions to the Brazilian culture and society are deeply and proudly recognised by everyone.
And the Italians who went to Brazil were northerners
@@taylor.london not only, my mother's family is from Venice (north) but my father's is from Naples.
@@viniciuscillaA BIG PART OF EUROPEAN BRASILIANS IN THE SOUTH OF BRASIL HAVE ITALIAN ROOTS IN SANTA CATARINA, PARANA AND RIO GRANDE SUL........
Because Brazil’s population was not majority Anglo-Saxon/North European…as simple as that. Brazil, along with Argentina, was also the destination of Germans and Italians fleeing Europe after WWII after what they did over there.
@@taylor.london Italians who emmigrated from Italy were mostly from the south...
The fact that history, like this has been kept from us, is the reason why the children and grandchildren of immigrants today will have hateful views towards other immigrants. If we were taught exactly where we came from, and how much are histories overlap, we all would’ve gotten along a little better, and ultimately lead to a better world. Thanks for sharing this.
Erasing history is why info like this is hidden from the public.
No, this was well known for hundreds of years both in the US and Europe. Hint! Multi culturalism does not exist in other parts of the world,nor is it wanted today. See Soviet Union, Africa (no Pan African unity), Jugoslavia and its failures. Once Chinese Communist fall out of power, China too will splinter and divide across 4 to5 different new ethnic based nations.
Add India, which was dominated by Muslims before the British.
Well, if you don't pay your dues, you can't join the club.
@@getlost3346 🐥
As a black man, when I saw this title, I was a bit thrown off. I had NO idea about this side of Italian history. I grew up in an area in Miami with a lot of Italians and this was never mentioned. Glad I learned something new today
Yea. *do your googles*
Once Italians became condidered honorary white they became rascist towards blacks too
It's because along with many "others" they are systemically racistly omitted from being taught about fairly and equally in the schools. The books have always been geopolitically manipulated .
Furthermore Christopher Columbus does not actually represent 99.9% of all Italian Americans.
@@IshbikesGoogle is a place to start but beware sone of that is,also omitted
Because Italians don't whine about stuff that happened a century ago
I'm a White American who grew up in a 100% Black neighborhood in Massachusetts in the 1950's and 1960's. I can't tell you how Blessed I feel for growing up where I did. It made me open minded to ALL People, not just on the basis of color but on every other social dimension as well. I've never understood how anyone who calls themselves a Christian can discount the humanity of another person based on superficial appearances.
What a blessing… I’m a black 50 sumthin woman that grew up in the 70’s 80’s in a military family but in a civilian (all white) neighborhood.. and I can honestly say, I had the BEST childhood and wouldn’t trade it for anything… This is proof that prejudice/racism is taught !!! I never once felt like I was treated differently… Our neighbors were our “FAMILY”… When anyone needed help .. each family showed up.. when one family had a crisis the entire neighborhood had a crisis… We HAVE to get back to this way of living… ❤❤❤
Massachusetts? I believe your experience would have been different, in say, Memphis. Don't believe me. Head on out there.
@@troycleek7394nah I’m black from Boston . Believe it or not we had a lot of black history . Specifically some of the first blacks to come to the states (slaves) were brought to mass.
@@NoDiddyllc That makes sense. They got big money to this day.
@@troycleek7394 not really bro check the household income for blacks in Boston. You wouldn’t believe it.
My mother-in-law is Italian and we did a deep dive into her ancestry a few years back. I'm glad we did. Found a cousin who had a ton of pictures and the record of everyone who came over on the boat. I recall my mom saying she was called slurs when she was going to high school and I couldn't wrap that around my mind. This video is very eye-opening, yet heart breaking. We're in Kentucky and much of this history is not shared.
My Sicilian grandparents came to America when they were 13 years old. They entered into this country at New Orleans. And picked sugar cane for a living. They moved to the Mississippi delta because there were a lot of Sicilians living there. They operated a grocery store and later on a restaurant. My grandparents taught me a lot about life. I wish I would have written down all of their history.
Picked? Holy moly, if only. Your ancestors cut cane. This means so much more than picked. You should watch some videos on it. That work caused revolts.
There's a great movie on this. Vendetta, starring Christopher Walken. Great movie.
@@tychris9464 Thanks bro
You still can write their history, there are all types of public records that can be used...
I went to Sicily last year June. The people were very friendly, welcoming and nice.
Im Sicilian American..this makes me sad but im so proud of my heritage. I wish more Americans knew this history ,and celebrated all heritage and groups. Thank you for this! ❤
American simply dont care cos they dont teach fuck all in schools here, they also think they so much smarter than the rest of the world!
Choose One: Sicilian or American. You can't be both, because being Sicilian means hating america and being American means hating the world
Italians were always considered white. the discrimination that Italians faced was not because they weren't considered white. There have always been ethnic hostilities among white people(Just look at the history of Europe), but that doesn't mean they didn't consider each other white.
@@jamesMcCarthy-uq3bn I understand your comment but growing up in the 70's I was considered a"black Italian" because I'm Sicilian. We may be considered white in America now but Sicilians were treated much different throughout history
And now they call us white racists
I am african... I studied in Italy, universita di Bologna, between 1998-2003... Sicilian people are just wonderful! I knew the information you delivered here by then. Unfortunately, the majority of Italians do not know how badly they were treated in the USA and not only there...
Thank you! I love what you are doing, and I do not struggle with myself when I listen to you!
Part of the price to admission to be "more American" and more white, especially for southern italians, was to become more racist against black people.
As a Sicilian girl, thank you so much ❤
Many of them became stone cold racist themselves against black people so let's not forget about them
Thank you for bringing this to light. My Grandpa was discriminated against in the early 1900's when he arrived in New York. We've come along way fighting stereotypes, but there's still much more ground to cover. When we realize we're ALL God's kids, then we'll make real progress. Thanks again, Prego Seniora
I don't mean this in a condescending way, there is nothing "unfortunate" about it. My grandmother is from Palermo Sicily and my grandfather from Naples. I liked the video, so nothing on that, but who cares if all Italians or Sicilians know what happened? It ain't like that now, what are we supposed to do? Piss and moan about stuff from the past? It was different times and all of those people are dead. Moving on, now if we could just get everyone else on board with that logic and agree we are now all Americans, we can move tf on to the important issues...
I had no idea of this History. I do remember my Grandparents saying that Italians or any immigrants that came to America were ashamed to speak their native tongue as they were horribly discriminated against. Although many, many immigrants didn't let those crazy people dictate who they truly were. Thank you so much for all you do to bring light to Identity and ancestors.
Same thing happened to my Italian family in Canada. We were prevented from speaking and practising our culture, many of my older cousins totally lost their heritage and identity. They know very little Italian. We were made to feel ashamed of ourselves. I remember that I was too, as a little girl growing up in the 80s in Toronto. There is still a lot of racism towards Italians in Canada, mainly from the BIPOC community and new immigrants.
My dad was Sicilian and I grew up in the Boston area . I was born in 1941 and experienced some really bad race prejudice as a child, even though
my parents forbade me to tell any of my school mates what my ancestry was. I grew up with severe emotional trauma, eventually leaving the white community and feeling more safe with black people. I totally believe that we are all one people, and am at peace with my identity as a human being.
Thanks for sharing, I really enjoyed your video. Love,
Nina
Wow! Never knew this. Truly sickness. Must be fought at every level. I grew up in Louisiana, didn't know about the Italians.
My Dad is also Sicilian! Our last name was a town in Sicily that is now called Henna. I had no idea there was even a difference until I was called a slur but didn’t know what it meant. When I learned more I was horrified. I’m so sorry you had to go through that, I have no idea what it’s like to be discriminated against and I’m sure it was hard.
Oh please cmon ! The moors invaded Sicily and what not , and planted their seed, no different from the Spanish in north, central , and South America , and no different from the US slave owner porking their African slaves.
This sucks. Imagine still going through similar shit today. It's rough man.
Morocco is a more white supremacist country than today's Germany, wish I was joking, and it always was one. Mediterraneans are self haters too, just because they hate anything making them remotely related to the south, even if the south are the innocent ones and the actual good ones
My family are Scandinavians. In the 1960s, my late older brother met, fell in love with, and married a lovely Italian girl. She was just the nicest person ever. My Dad was fine with it but my mom treated her like DIRT, called her all the pejoratives, and just embarrassed the rest of us. I still get sick to my stomach thinking about it.
But when the Roman empire was at its peak, the barbarians from the north had not yet come out from their caves
@@dominicj7977 amen
🎉😢Did you ever ask her what or who brainwashed her hate Italians?
Much of this is covered in a 2019 NYT article.
@@divynerosehealing8546 What about the franks, angles, saxons and britons?
The Irish and Italians were treated very similar, it’s amazing how both countries are now so influential in American society.
How?
@@VesperJester everything in nyc is either Italian or Irish
@@Nico_420 No it isn’t. So again how? The main things Italians/Irish in NYC are know for is being on the police/fire departments. And those departments have horrible reputations and are extremely corrupt.
@@Nico_420 NYC was founded by the Dutch that’s why you still have Dutch names of areas like Harlem.
@@Nico_420 does it bother anyone else that this lady cannot pronounce dago correctly??? 😂😂😂
The Italians are the real parents of Europe! Beautiful art, language and culture.....
Yeah they welcomed Adolf....good one????
more like older brother. The parents would have to be greece. Im both so i love both cultures.
@@channel-gt1cb l'impero romano è durato più di 1000 anni, voi luridi americani e inglesi nemmeno tra 100000 anni creerete un impero come quello romano
@@channel-gt1cb The Americans and the English were and are not better than your friend Adolf. They only used a different strategy to invade, steal and kill.
@@MrSpotface Not really, Greek and Romans had different but equal (in terms of strength) influences on European civilisation.
I swear history is so prevalent for every race. Leave nothing out, teach factual truths; no matter how difficult it may be. I’m black but my family consists of people from most races, cultures, and religions. We all love another and are stronger as a unit.
THIS!
She preaches racial bias against Whites and the United States who freed her ancestors from "Confederate" slavery. Their Black ancestors are the ones that sold Blacks into Slavery. If it aso wasn't for the slave trade these miserable, hateful Blacks wouldn't be alive and be in the 'FREE" UNITED STATES. This preaches and establishes the "INFERIORITY" and hate that is in the majority of Blacks in the United States.
To note the truth: there is ONE race, the human race. Many have been bigoted, but none are racist because there aren't multiple races, just one. The false teaching about there being "races" is actually used to perpetuate the bigotry and problems of the past. They simply changed the wording of their old teaching, the one that claimed some were "sub-human" to teaching the word "race/races/racist/racism," and we need to understand that "race" is used as a synonym for "species," and that different species can't interbreed and remain reproductive (examples are horse and donkey make mule, but mules can't reproduce, just as lion and tiger can make a "liger" but "ligers" can't reproduce) but all humans can. What we have are many lineages, ethnicities, and cultures, but only one race. When we use the word "races" or "racist/racism," we are continuing to teach ourselves and those that hear us that there are multiple races when there are not. The "race" teaching is used against us to divide us, to perpetuate the same divisions of thought.
Factual truths? This video lacks context and is mostly pseudo-historical nonsense. Italians didn't need to "become white" because they already were -by US law. That "Italians" (mostly Sicilians) faced some discrimination does not mean that any significant number of people thought they weren't "white".
@@cacatr4495 to deny there are races is to deny the atrocities committed by Caucasian men who created racism and classism bc they felt "racially superior" and that they inherited the Earth
I'm an Italian from Sicily, I was completely unaware about the New Orleans massacre and the segregation that Sicilians suffered in Louisiana. Thank you for letting me know.
It wasn't like that. My Catananna was from Agrigento and immigrated through New Orleans. The reason for the lynchings were because Chief Henessey was murdered after he got between two warring Sicilian clans who ran the docs. So, the townspeople naturally blamed the Sicilians who had all been arrested in suspicion of the murder. I'm related to the guy they wanted to lynch, who was most likely responsible, but he managed to hide under a mattress and avoid being killed. Sicilians thrived in New Orleans and for the most part, people there liked them.
It was for a great reason lol.
I grew up in a mafia area.
I once read a study the US did on the Italian mafia that covered the US and Italy.
The findings were that Southern Italians were extremely selfish narcissists who were only interested in their selves or immediate family. They would think it nothing to murder and create chaos in public as long as it was not in their area.
Meanwhile, Northern Italians, who are like Germans/Celtic people, hate Southern Italians too and want nothing to do with them.
A trait Southern Italians have with other troublesome groups is to deny everything.
Thankfully, things seemed to have smoothed out a lot in the US.
Stop it.
First the Irish were " slaves" now the supposed mistreatment of Italians.
Yes , anglos discriminated against foreigners, immigrants, however none of them were brutalized for 400 years like Blacks were in the US.
The Irish, Italians and others could assimilated by changing their names and speaking English.
The Black people could not change their skin color.
The Irish, Italians and others thrived after awhile, while Blacks didnt get their freedoms until the 1960s.
@@davegorko7647Bruh, what does the german heritage of northern Italy matter? Southern people got viking blood in their veins for all that matters.
Also, northern people doesn't hate southern italians, wtf are you talking about; just a small part of the northern italians is so fucking dumb to blame south for all the italians problems, just as some of the southern people blaming north for all their problems.
The fact that mafia exists doesn't automatically make all southern italians criminals you donkey
I am also an Italian as well as Sicilian. This presentation is eye opening
As an Italian, I do appreciate this video. It shows how Italians were considered just a couple of generations ago and it is quite sad that nowadays Italians do not know anything about these things...
I did a follow up video about the Italian-American prison camps in Montana during WW2. It shocked me. ua-cam.com/video/2W3CjKQx0f4/v-deo.html
Italians were always white if by that you mean European and Caucasian . Just because they are tanned dummy 😂.
Filipinos are worse. History wasn't much discussed in public schools. Most Filipinos never even heard of the Spanish-American war in the Philippines.
Purtroppo è così… da noi nessuno sa una mazza😢😢😢
Cause we're not like the americans that want to be the eternal victims?
74 people were massacred at the Calumet Italian Hall of the deaths 3 were Italian Americans while they were on a Copper mine strike. In Calumet, Michigan, there was a significant population of Italian immigrants who worked in the copper mines. It’s a tragedy and I believe another story to support your perspective. Great video.
Hannibal a African Ruler conquered Rome, hence the dark skin, eyes, curly hair of Sicilians, southern Italian's were not considered white because of their African heritage.
@@MarcelleSims Hannibal never conquered Rome, Rome conquered Carthago.
@@MarcelleSims povero ingnorante
la maggior parte erano finlandesi e croati, non italiani.
@@MarcelleSims lol, you’re wrong. Hannibal, and most Carthaginians, was racially Phoenician, so he was Levantine. Definitely not black or North African.
As a Greek American I appreciate your well researched podcast. My grandfather was most likely a victim of the Omaha burning of Greeks out of the city. We only know something terrible happened there that resulted in him moving to Chicago and starting over. He did everything after that to appear as “Anglo Saxon” and blend in as possible. As a result we lost our heritage and even connections to our extended family.
I am so sorry to hear that. I had a chance to hear a Greek language and clearly up close just a couple weeks ago (I live in very homogenous country) and I fell in love with the sound of it. Such a beautiful language. It sounds like a mix of romance language and turkic language spiced with an elegance. Wish I had more time to learn it.
This explains why the Italians and Greeks currently in America are the most racist creeps one can find. To fit in with the anglos, they act like the worst racist bholes.
A white person is any of the original peoples of Europe, Middle East, and North Africa, so that includes italians. Ameriva is even named after an italian, "Amerigo". There's two kinds of white people: those who get pink & red in the sun and those who get gold & bronze, every white community/country has both kinds, some just have more of one kind than the other.......
Damn bro im sorry to hear tht
So many stories like that 😥
Well done! About 10 years ago, I wrote a book on my own family’s Sicilian heritage. I did not want it to be simply a genealogy of names and dates, but a personal story told within fact-based historical context. I very carefully researched and included a lot of the information you presented in this video about the Italian immigrant experiences with racial, employment, financial, and societal discrimination. Many family members, who had assumed that we had always been “white” were surprised at what they learned. I firmly believe that when we know what our ancestors went through, we better appreciate what we have now.
Where can we see or read your book?
Can you post the title of your book? I’d love to read it, because my grandmother’s family were Sicilian immigrants.
Have you published your book yet? I would love to have a copy as I am Italian My family been here since 1902. Three brothers one wife one cousin Nicola, Micheli,Veto Glaviano they were from the mainland I just don't quite remember the name of the town. But as many Italians will tell you they were deported or left from the island of Sicily and so when they ask them where they come from when they arrived here they told them they came from Sicily or sometimes the Italians could not understand English and they would just simply put down their origin was Sicily . I guess in the rush of things so many coming over 4 million I think she mentioned I guess it's easy for some misinformation. Someone like yourself I'm sure we're clear these things up so that we can all be proud of our Italian heritage. Our last name was Glaviano
Zionists want you to hate yourself and everyone else.
Did you mention your African bloodline?
This comes with mixed emotions as on the one hand I feel sorry that Italian Americans were treated with bigotry in the early times of our country. However, knowing the full history we know how Italian Americans en masse look down on African Americans, treat them with the same bigotry once they became "white", ex. Italian parents and the community not allowing interracial dating or marriage with black persons. It seems everyone couldn't wait to throw off their culture and background to become like the oppressors. And Italians are not the only group with this strange, very anti Christ or anti judeo Christian act. The Irish, Mexican, native American, Asian , other Latino groups and Jewish community all looked down on the negro with the same hate and discrimination as the Anglo Americans.
*God's Chosen (ISRAEL)*
Hating black became a status symbol, - even with blacks.
What most Italians fail to realize is they have black blood in their lineages
Great comment.
@@thatguybill34 Crossed my mind today for some odd reason while driving. Just thinking how Zionists even today feel this to be true. Not necessarily secular Jews but the Zionists that mistreat Palestinians. For this reason, I believe that is why they cannot have their own homeland. It's sad.
Wow! So glad you turned up on my UA-cam feed.
I'm an Italian -Irish American who's always identified as Italian because I was practically raised by my Italian grandparents and relatives in a small north eastern Connecticut town.
Not only have I never heard of what happened in New Orleans, I never knew that ANY Italians had ever been lynched.
My first experience with racism, although I didn't recognize it as such, was being asked by a third grade classmate if my grandfather belonged to the Mafia. This would have occurred around 1953-54.
Having no idea what the Mafia was I told that boy that my grandfather worked in a factory.
My grandfather was born in Rome and was given away by his mother 3 days after his birth. He was brought to the "commune" with the name Latici pinned to him. The name does not exist in Italy, although it is the second half of the Tuscan name, Montelatici. All of my grandmother's relatives came from the Province of Ferrera with the exception of two aunts, one Bolognese, the other Piemontese.
I don't recall ever hearing anyone speak degradingly of Southern Italians or Sicilians.
Flash forward to 1966 when met the love of my life in college, a Neapolitan/Sicilian boy.
When I spoke of him at a family dinner gathering, I was shocked to hear my grandfather say,
"If he's Napolitano/Siciliano you better check his pockets for knives before you let him in the house."
I was so shocked I didn't ask my grandfather to explain himself. I ignored it. I went through three breakups and reunions with that boy before breaking up for good for reasons having nothing to do with his being Southern Italian.
I have lived in Italy now for 21 years. I first lived on the Bolognese pianura. At yhe place where I lived there were gardener, a married couple. She was Ferrarese, he was Tuscan. My bedroom was directly over their cantina and I heard their daily conversations. They referred to the husband of a woman who lived above me as a "mulingnan" a eird in dialect meaning eggplant, slang for a Sicilian or Southern Italian that referred to their alleged dark skin. The husband in question was Sicilian. The year was 2003. So the racism that led to the lynching of Italians in the United States was very much alive here in Emilia Romagna and Tuscany. BTW, the gardeners were horrid people. I won't go into details.
In my time in here I've been fortunate enough to travel around the country for work. My two favorite places so far are Puglia and Sicily, especially Sicily, for its beauty, culture and most of all, people.
I wanted to move to Sicily after my first visit.
Oddly, I never once saw a dark skinned person. I DID see in Sicily stunning faces that looked as if they'd jumped off of ancient Greek urns. When I say stunning, I mean literally breathtaking to yhe point that more than once I was unable to prevent myself from telling a few young women how beautiful they were.
I don't know where all the dark skinned people were hiding.
Same in Puglia. Not one.
I have Calabrian and Sicilian friends here. No one is dark.
I HAVE seen old photos of Southern Italians with what I suppose might be referred to as dark, but I would call it a shade of olive, a color so stunning I would trade my pale skin for it in an instant.
Interestingly, when I look back at myself at age 19 I realize that a paler shade of that olive hue was in my blood. I had a job working in Sturbridge Village, a recreation of an 18th Century village. I was obliged to wear a costume, and the costume I was given was a light purple. When I put it on I saw that my skin took on a pale shade of olive green. Purple being the complementary color of green brought that color to the surface of my white skin. I was fascinated, though it took me years to understand yhe the meaning of it.
As I've aged my skin has become increasingly devoid of any melanin. I don't even tan darkly as I did when young.
From the moment I understood what it meant to be Italian I was proud of what that meant. I still am.
Only after watching this video (I've subscribed) did something incredibly disturbing occur to me.
Having grown up in New England I had several WASP boyfriends
Taking dates to Church is the best way to find a keeper.
Wow. There are a lot of Black families in New Orleans who carry Italian names. My parents and many people from old New Orleans who considered them as “Dagos.” I never knew where that term came from. Thanks for giving light in this dark history. It’s so sad that people are treated so badly because of skin color
I heard Dago was originally a knock on Spaniards, keying off the name Diego. In Saint Paul Minnesota, some old-Italian-family-run restaurants embrace the term. A common item on the menu in these places is a "Hot Dago Sandwich".
Only white people created different laws to discriminate against people on the basis of their skin color. They're the ones who fostered hate against dark skin people, Jews, Italians, Greeks, and Chinese people. Whites are the architecture of racism.
Dago may have been derived from term "Diego", which means "Spaniard" ...The Romans laid the foundations for modern Spanish culture and identity, and Spain was the birthplace of important Roman emperors such as Trajan, Hadrian or Theodosius ...So Italians were Romans first, then Spaniards, then Americans, much like Hassidic Jews. However, WOP actually stands for "WithOut Papers" W/O P and would apply to many immigrants, not just Italians, but somehow it stuck to Italians.
@@philipethier9136 Dagonites .
Southern Italy was fundamentally invaded by Greek-Jews whom had invaded Eastern Mediterranean coastal line and had a substantial Northern African genetics .
@@dylannaenzo9737 Dago or Dagonites or Fish people is whom Jews and Roman Catholic Church venerates .Southern Italy like Eastern Mediterranean coastal line was invaded by Greek-Jewish SeaPeople whom had a substantial amount Northern African genetics hence when a so called “Greek” speak English will often have the same accent as a Spanish person just as Greek-Jewish SeaPeople would and do share common cultural and genetic traits that are different continental and pastoral,societies.
This puts me in mind of a story my Dad told me. He was born on Staten Island in 1918 (his parents immigrated from St. Martin, the Dutch West Indies in 1911). Many people from St. Martin settled in Staten Island around that time. A little later, Italian immigrants also arrived, and friendships and alliances were formed between the two ethnic groups, including going to church, going to public school, and even eating at each other's houses. My father, who was black, claimed many of his best friends during his childhood were Italian. In 1942 when they were drafted into the service for WWII, a group of these friends took the ferry to Manhattan to be inducted. Once there, they were split up by race ("whites over here, colored over there!") The war took over their lives from that point. When it was over, my Dad never re-established contact with his old friends. If he saw one on the street, he might nod a quick hello, but that was it. I always found that sad.
Black citizens in the US were treated badly after the CW and returning vets were treated abominably. The modern movement for blacks to get equal rights began as a consequence of the hurt and anger felt by these returning vets
@@Patriot1789not true BLACK folks have fought since 1865 for justice, WW2 made racism harder to defend morally
Really sad. (Even sadder is that without talking to each other, they would never even know if the other might have wanted to rekindle that friendship-but both too embarrassed/nervous to say anything)….I get it, but so sad
@@tesmith47ill do you one better and say black folks have been fighting injustice since slavery for hundreds of years whether trying to escape slave masters or trying to live free when "allowed"
I didn't know a lot of people from St. Martin settled in Staten Island, NY. Very interesting. NYC was settled by the Dutch as well. Cornelius Vanderbilt is buried on Staten Island in the Moravian Cemetary he was born on S.I. as well. I have family members from Staten Island and Brooklyn. My grandparents lived in Brooklyn, some of their children later moved to S.I., NY some moved to Long Island and some to NJ.
I found this very interesting. My husband is half-Italian. His mother’s parents were born in Italy. When I had asked him which part of Italy he had always said it was central or northern. When I did a tree on Ancestry I found they were from Campania which had been part of “The Kingdom of the Two Sicilies” in the 1800’s. I never knew there was discrimination based on which part of Italy a person came from. I knew my husband’s paternal grandfather wasn’t happy when his son married an Italian around 1960 in Pennsylvania. The discrimination I think tapered away as more Italians became “Americanized” and other groups became more demonized. René Giraud’s scapegoat theory is interesting to look at as part of why groups tend to create “us versus them” narratives and dehumanize each other.
It's funny how petty humanity is. One leader's insecurities can cause a whole movement. Turning on eachother because of skin tone, lifestyle, traditions, language, stuff that doesn't matter when all is said and done. We all go into the ground at some point. So we should just be respectful while we still have the time. Fighting over dumb stuff that doesn't matter.
Very good comment.
Columbus Day was launched as a marketing tool for the 1893 Columbian Exposition and continued as a peace-offering for the infamous 1890 lynching over that assassination of that New Orleans public official automatically blamed on the Black Hand, the forerunner of the Mafia.
Its a product of the Royals or actually Robber Barons who destroyed tribal culture to create a caste or class system controlled by the royal oligarchy. It was the original crime that created the mess of social disorganization we have today. All hate and racism result from the self hate imposed by patriarchal class society with sick people as the elites. Those who need others to look down upon to feel adequate are sick weaklings. This will destroy us all if we do not re embrace strong cultural or matriarchal communities.
To this day, Northern Italians refer to Southern Italians by the slur "terroni" (plural for terrone"). The country is still divided North v South politically and economically.
Just found you. what a wonderfully done piece. I had read about the inching but there was no “story” behind it. I look forward to seeing more of your videos. 🇮🇹🇨🇦
My great great grandfather immigrated from Sicily to the U.S. through Louisiana. Growing up I heard stories about my grandfather and his family being called dago niggers and being treated poorly. They left and ended up in Colorado. I had no idea how bad they actually had it. Thank you for the info.
Colorado, part of the territory they STOLE FROM MEXICO
SIMPLE : TO THIS VERY DAY, ITALIANS REMAIN DIVIDED. FIRST THING A FELLOW ITALIAN ASKS YOU : CHE PARTE ? ( WHAT PART OF ITALY YOU FROM )
THIS IS WHY ITALIANS CANT ELECT EACHOTHER... THEY'RE BOUGHT OUT WITH SOME DRIVER OR LABORER JOB AT WHATEVER MUNICIPALITY. LIKE BIDEN, NOT ONE ITALIAN ON HIS STAFF, CABINET.
America was and still is a wild place sheesh
Holy shit man Dago Niggers?! Forgive me as a black man I had no idea that Sicilians and Italians suffered the same shit that my ancestors and so many others went through weather they were from Africa Europe or indigenous . But hey your here due to his strength one way or another. I knew they went through some hatred but it’s definitely not taught in school like that.
Most of them are related to the Moors
Excellent content! As a 58-year-old Sicilian American growing up in NYC in the 1970's, I can tell you that we did not identify as "white". White people to us were white Anglo Saxons Protestants. My parents made sure that my siblings and I understood our roots and the treatment our grandparents received as dark-skinned non-English speaking immigrants in an effort to teach us to never judge a book by its cover. My wife who is a Peruvian immigrant and I have taught our children and grandchildren to do the same. As many have mentioned here, this is why the history of all Americans from all backgrounds should be taught in school. We really have so much more in common than in differences.
My family still refers to non-Italian Americans as “‘merican” as in “he’s a nice boy for a ‘merican”, meaning he’s not Italian.
I am patrilineally Sicilian, even though the rest of my ancestry is clearly from the more northern reaches of Europe.
I look about as Northern European as you can get, and I find this "otherness" Americans once thought of Italians extremely bizarre yet also predictable: Southern Italians were encouraged to leave Italy en masse because of the contempt Northern Italians had for them, and despite some of the animosity put towards them like this video suggests, life for those Southern Italians and their descendants is far, far better than had they remained in Italy.
Italians are white
@@Wasserkaktus I Own The Complete "Divine Comedy" by Dante Alghlieri. And I find it fascinating that Italians were classied as Black and White Race prior to the 13th century. 😮
I’m sure you know Fabrizio the Doorman. I met him in 2007 when I moved to nyc and loved his style. He was the first Italian who taught me that he wasn’t “white”
I’m a 4th generation Italian American born in Pennsylvania, but now lives in South Carolina. I knew there was hatred towards Italian immigrants at several points, but I had no idea some of us were lynched. It’s odd to think that I would be considered inferior to others in another time to people who didn’t know me and didn’t know better. Thank you for bringing this to my attention.
There is SO much hidden Italian American history, I am working on telling it all.
@@nytnplease tell it all. Though I’m glad to see the support here, there are some who don’t want this story told.
Imagine being black! How do you view black people now that you know your immigrant ancestors were considered less than black folks. Now that your 4 generations removed from the racial hate and now comfortable in the whiteness they didn’t enjoy, how does that make you feel? I’m just curious! Thanks!
@@ROMESKIable bro it's wild. I'm shook. I'm half German-half Italian, but even Germans immigrants during the World Wars era were being harassed and beaten. Mobs would go out and kill Dachshunds and German Shepherds. And I'm Catholic lol. In the end, it's just another reason why we're all the same.
@@bradleykramer316saying we’re all the same is just delusional.
Italians have always been White
Thing is the back in the late 1700s White's even hated other whites like the Polish or the Italians or the Irish etc. But it wasn't for their skin colors but rather mostly just for their Catholic beliefs
italians were olive (black) & only became pale from genes they got from interbreeding with neanderthals
@@KingMattTheGodeverybody was black/brown, even in northeurope
@@KingMattTheGod olive skin is still White, and also, that's not true neanderthals were actually brown skinned.
@@Anonymous-yy7ur research SL genes acquired from neanderthals.
@@KingMattTheGod ahhahahahah cosa stai dicendo? la pelle diventa scura a causa del sole, ignorante. è normale che gli italiani del sud sono più scuri, in Sicilia c'è molto caldo non è come il nord
Man, I'm an older black man, and I appreciate the education. You blew me away. Thanks.🥰
This was an amazing video. As a biracial Black woman from the South I literally empathize with the experiences you shared on the struggles of Italian-American immigrants. I pray that in my lifetime America will stop caring about having a racial and ethnic hierarchy. I think it’s important that we all have compassion for each other as humans because we all have more in common than many people think.
Well said.
America needs to have a conversation to get rid of racial hierarchies. A party is literally white washing history while erasing black history. It's really happening
👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻
I hope so too but sometimes I loose faith when I see South Americans come here and call themselves white. Then I realize people are still trying to play the hierarchy game.
Amen to that ❤
In 1999 I served with Italian troops under NATO command (SFOR V ). From day 1, I was shown nothing but the utmost respect, and in a short period of time I became their brother. Despite the fact that most of them spoke English, they appreciated my interest in learning Italian. I've always known of the oppression of Italian immigrants, but never heard of the scale of abuse they had endured. Among all of the Europeans I had the pleasure of meeting, it is the Italians that are perhaps my favorites . ( don't tell my French and Norwegian brothers and sisters! ) Thank you for bringing this ugly truth to light.
It's because Italians (by not being a defined ethnic group, rather a multitude of ethnicities all lumped in together) have always been taught to blend in with the rest of the population. Ever asked yourself why Italians seem to find themselves "at ease" wherever they go? Here's your answer.
Nato brothers? Jesus
@@Thenewbronzeagecollapse tra le regioni italiane ve n'è una che nel 1390 era una Nazione! La Sardegna! Lo studio del loro DNA dimostra che non sono veri italiani ma sono un etnia a parte! La più antica del Mediterraneo! Poi la geopolitica ha fatto il resto!! purtroppo..
Italians were always white if by that you mean European and Caucasian . Just because they are tanned dummy 😂.
Well your NATO “bro’s” are being slaughtered in Ukraine by the Russian military as we speak. Imperialist leaches. 🇷🇺🇷🇺ZOV
It is interesting that even in 1972 when I went to university in Southern California I was able to receive an Equal Opportunity Grant because as an Italian I was considered a Latin. However in 1973 I was told I was no longer considered Latin but my ethnicity was listed as White.
I was a Sicilian and Calabrese (listed as South Italian). 80 years before that my Grandfather coming to Ellis Island was listed as “black”. The irony of race has never been lost to me. In fact even today in Latin Countries Southern Italians are still considered as latins.
Southern Italians make up 95% of all the Italians in the United States. It is said that Italians took close to 100 years to assimulate in the United States. When I was At college there were mothers who would let me date their daughters because I was Italian . When I became a chef in the mid 1980s running a successful restaurant and catering business I had been hired by a large pharmaceutical company to cater a large party at their house . The president of this company and his wife were both Italian. They were very pleasant people. But the wife seeing my name was Italian wanted to know what part of Italy my family was from. I told her that I was Calabrian and Sicilian. She laughed and told me “Oh you are not Italian”. I had never heard that before . As a fiercely proud Italian American I was really thrown for a loop.
This post is important and our history and how we were treated is important.
Italian is not a race. Its a bit like "American". Is American a race? No.
What I believe happened in US was, because the majority of Italians that migrated to US are from a specific region of Italy (mainly from the south) they look alike and are "easier" to identify and stereotype. But Italians from other regions may appear different from those Italians that went to US, they have, on average, a different phenotype.
Making an analogy, if many Americans from Vermont would immigrate to Italy, Italians would be convinced Americans are all white. But that's not true, we know.
Also, in the sense that Americans give to the word, you are not "Latin", or better, you are not "Latin-American", because you are not from a Latin-American country, nor your ancestry is from there. That's clear. Latin is the origin of the Italian language, as well as all the Romance Languages. French people are latins... from a language point of view and... maybe, generally speaking... culturally.
Also, don't be offended, but you are not Italian also, because you are not born in Italy, nor you live there or are a citizen of Italy. You are an US American with Italian ancestry, an Italian-American.
Everybody needs to know the full American history, it’s not harmful but informative and fascinating.❤
It's also sickening, depressing, pathetic
@@Warm-qq2wowhat?
Tell that to today’s GOP who are trying to erase history. .
Thank you for spreading the word about the Italian lynchings. My grandparents were also immigrants from Palermo via New Orleans to pick sugar cane in the late 1800s. I would love to understand more about this history and look forward to seeing more from you.
I'm sorry sir but no one picks sugar cane they cut it That's what my grandparents did too and donaldsonville Louisiana when they first came here in 1902
I’m so sick of hearing about race and shit that happened 100 years ago which nobody cares about now
Somewhere, somebody fooled people into thinking that there is power in victimhood
That’s a lie. There’s power in Jesus and the Bible never mentions his race for a reason. Because it’s inconsequential and it’s a distraction just like endless lineage DNA studies.
Stop obsessing over melanin Content , and pigmentation. It’s not your identity.
@lee_9837 But don't also forget that North Africans are not the same things as Sub-Saharan Africans. You colonizers should leave North Africans alone too😠
@lee_9837 Europeans are Caucasian. Not white.
watch the movie (vendetta 1999) and you will know more...
I am familiar with the history of how Italians became white, as with others like Irish. I had a very interesting conversation with an Italian physician who was so bothered by racial injustice towards Black people who shared his story of growing up in Detroit. Italians lived in the same area as Black people and were subjugated to inequities and prejudices. Hearing these stories reminds me of the importance of sharing and understanding our history.
It also doesn't escape me the role of skin color and colorism plays into the construction of race. I now focus on the construct of whiteness as a standard that is used as a measuring tool towards acceptance. What if we turned our attention to the meaning of what it means to be white in the United States (and maybe European). I bet we would get closer to the root of why being white is such a powerful construct that even people have fought in court to be considered white. And when we peel back the layers of the white construct you'll find the caste hierarchical structures that reinforce power and control over even if those considered white.
Many Asians and Indians classify themselves as White and look down on the Black people.
It's bizarre that the irish were not considered white when they are the whitest of whites
Beautifully stated.
Italians were never black. Try checking DNA why are some blacks, so intent to change truth history to fit black. As. White, I have no need to change truth history to fit white. Because history proves it's self not color.
Of course, whites were the standard. They were the overwhelming majority in the country.
These Anglos were just jealous of Italy's rich history (Rome, the Renaissance, etc).
I was always of the understanding that northern Italians are the most prejudiced against their southern Italian counterparts
@@ArgHeloit still like that
Fascinating but sad history. As a Caribbean American teen I was aware of the prejudice faced by Italians when they came to America due research done for a term paper in high school. However, I don't remember reading about the lynchings. Thank you for bringing this to everyone's attention. It's time we all embrace, learn from , and appreciate each other as individuals and celebrate our diverse cultural backgrounds.
I never heard the term “Caribbean American” before.
Is that a Haitian, a Dominican, a Jamaican or a Puerto Rican? Most of those do not want to be compared with each other.
@@dietlindvonhohenwald448Everything you said is a load of unseasoned bull caribbean American is a thing same as aaian American.
@@tazzy4624 Relax buddy, they where just asking.
All over the place. Hundreds in Colorado. Like it was a sport. The Tampa ones make me the proudest
@@mrcocoloco7200 They were not just asking. It was a disingenuous, loaded, comment.
Same for my Sicilian family.. my grandfather’s nickname was “Blacky” because of his dark complexion. I just found your channel and look forward to listening to all of your content as I’ve spent over a decade studying the 1800s. Really terrific work!
Are you referring to Louie Argento?
did you know that the Romans had strong trade ties with Southern India, the Romans and Greeks also had trade settlements in Southern India, they amassed most of their wealth from their trade with south India. they used to take ships laden with gold in exchange for black pepper. The dravidians are the original mediterranean and sumerian people who were in the west and east . In the West they were mixed with the Akkadians and Amorites and also the Indo aryan Lydians(neo Hittites) who also went into the Mediterranean and are known as the Minoans and Etruscans, they were dark and fair and had striaght to wavy hair
quote” The word 'Dravidian' comes from the Tamil words Tbirai Ahvidar, meaning 'sea people'. A popular Tamil saying was 'cross the oceans and acquire gold'
Quote” The Mediterranean Peoples (Dravidians)
(Extracts from ‘The Original Indians â€" An Enquiry’ by Dr. A. Desai)
How the Mediterranean people came to be called Dravidians makes interesting story. The Pre-Hellenistic Lycians of Asia Minor, who where probably the Mediterranean stock called themselves Trimmili. Another tribe of this branch in the island of Crete was known by the name Dr(a)mil or Dr(a)miz. In ancient Sanskrit writings we find the terms Dramili and Dravidi, and then Dravida which referred to the southern portion of India.
South India was known to the ancient Greek and Roman geographers as Damirica or Limurike. Periplus Maris Erithroei (Periplus of the Eritrean Sea) in the second or third century AD described the maritime route followed by Greek ships sailing to the South Indian ports: “Then follow Naoura and Tundis, the first marts of Limurike and after these Mouziris and Nelkunda, the seats of government.â€
Dramila, Dravida and Damirica indicated the territory. Then it was applied to the people living in the territory and the language they spoke, in the local parlance Tamil and Tamil Nadu or Tamilakam.
-----------------------
The Mediterraneans or Dravidians were associated with the ancient Sumerian civilizations of Mesopotamia and of Elam (southern Iran). Authors have pointed out ethnic, linguistic and cultural affinities between the Sumerians (Mesopotamians) and the Dravidians of South India, and concluded that both probably belonged to the same ethnic stock. HR Hall writes: “The ethnic type of the Sumerians, so strongly marked in their statues and relofs was as different from those of the races which surrounded them as was their language from those of the Semites, Aryans and others; they were decidedly Indian in type. The face-type of the average Indian today is no doubt much the same as that of the Dravidian race ancestors thousands of years ago...And it is to this Dravidian ethnic type of India that the ancient Sumerian bears most resemblance, so far as we can judge from his monuments. He was very like a Southern Hindu of the Deccan (who still speaks Dravidian languages). And it is by no means improbable that the Sumerians were an Indian tribe which passed, certainly by land, perhaps also by sea, through Persia to the valley of the Two Rivers.â€
Hall is of the opinion that Dravidian people must have migrated to Mesopotamia from India, whereas others think Dravidians came from Mediterranean regions, which was their earlier home. KP Padmanabha Menon writes about their close relationship: “Orientalists, many of them, are prepared to concede that the Sumerians, the Mediterranean race, are branches of the early Dravidians.â€
Quote"Dravidians In Crete they were known by the name which the Greeks wrote as Termilai, in Asia Minor as 'Trimmili' or Trimalai (Sastri p60), and in India as Dramiza, Dravida, Dramila and finally Tamil. Their deity was "Mother-Earth" who gave them grain, vegetables and food. The 'Mother Goddess' cult belonged exclusively to Crete where it was known as Durgha (compare Trqqas mentioned in Lycian inscriptions in Asia Minor) as Uma or Parvati. (Sastri p61) They probably brought along with them to India this Mediterranean or Aegean Saivaism, Mother Goddess with her consort Siva.Dr K Loganathan
Inanna is the ancient Sumerian goddess of love
quote ⭐"Inanna[a] is an ancient Mesopotamian goddess associated with love, beauty, sex, desire, fertility, war, justice, and political power. She was originally worshipped in Sumer and was later worshipped by the Akkadians, Babylonians, and Assyrians under the name Ishtar⭐.[b] She was known as the "Queen of Heaven" and was the patron goddess of the Eanna temple at the city of Uruk, which was her main cult center. She was associated with the planet Venus and her most prominent symbols included the lion and the eight-pointed star. Her husband was the god Dumuzid (later known as Tammuz) and her sukkal, or personal attendant, was the goddess Ninshubur (who later became the male deity Papsukkal).
quote Astarte is one of a number of names associated with the chief goddess or female divinity of those peoples.[1] She is recorded in Akkadian as As-dar-tu (D), the masculine form of Ishtar.[2] The name appears in Ugaritic as ʻAthtart or ʻAṭtart (), in Phoenician as Ashtart or Aštart (), in Hebrew as Ashtoret (עשתרת).[2] The Hebrews also referred to the Ashtarot or "Astartes" in the plural. The Etruscan Pyrgi Tablets record the name Uni-Astre
quote"Astarte (Greek: Ἀστάρτη, Astártē) is the Hellenized form of the Middle Eastern goddess Astoreth (Northwest Semitic), a form of ⭐Ishtar (East Semitic), worshipped from the Bronze Age through classical antiquity. The name is particularly associated with her worship in the ancient Levant among the Canaanites and Phoenicians. She was also celebrated in Egypt following the importation of Levantine cults there. The name Astarte is sometimes also applied to her cults in Mesopotamian cultures like Assyria and Babylonia.
Quote"The Hyksos practiced horse burials, and their chief deity, their native storm god,⭐ Baal
Quote" The Canaanites and, whose language is very similar to the Hebrews worship (el) a ⭐bull god
Quote" Shapash is the Phoenician sun Goddess, called the "Torch of the Gods", or "Pale Shapash".
Tanit is also called Tinnit, Tannou, or Tangou. The name appears to have originated in Carthage (modern-day Tunisia), though it does not appear in local theophorous names.[4] She was equivalent to the moon-goddess ⭐Astarte
Quote `(Hittites This empire reached its height during the mid-14th century BC under Suppiluliuma I, when it encompassed an area that included most of Asia Minor as well as parts of the ((((Northern Levant and Upper Mesopotamia)))). After c. 1180 BC, the empire came to an end during the Bronze Age collapse, splintering into several independent "Neo-Hittite" city-states, some of which survived until the 8th century BC.
Quote Lydia arose as a Neo-Hittite kingdom following the collapse of the Hittite Empire in the twelfth century BC. According to Greek sources, the original name of the Lydian kingdom was Maionia.
Quote”The Hittites adopted many of the gods of the Sumerians and Old Babylonians
Quote
"The people of Akkad worshipped, as what is generally described as, the Sumerian religion, the mythology, rites, and cosmology of the Sumerian civilization, however there were differences between this religion and the one worshipped by the Akadians. These myths were passed down by oral tradition until the early Sumerian cuneiform was invented, and it wasn’t until the early dynastic period that religious writings became hymns and incantations.
The Akkadians worshipped the Sumerian triad of An, Enlil, and Enki, however they changed the names to Anu, Bel, and Ea. Anu and Ea were created between the union of Apsu and Tiamat, and along with them the rest of creation came."
Dravidians belief of India Thai Pongal (Tamil: தைப்பொங்கல், /ˈθaɪˈpoʊŋʌl/) is a harvest festival dedicated to the ⭐Sun God. It is a four-day festival which according to the Tamil calendar is usually celebrated from January 14 to January 17
Quote "Ancient Tamils worshipped the ⭐crescent moon on the third day (Kuruntokai verse 170). Tamil epic Silappadikaram has a prayer for sun and moon.( tamil is a Dravidian dialect)
You do realize that Sicily was under Arab occupation from the year 827AD to 1091AD? A minority of Sicilians are descendants of those occupiers. It was the Normans who actually liberated the island over a period of thirty years. The Greek speaking residents of the island welcomed them. This is a reason of why there are also blond haired blue eyed Sicilians, even though there are some blond haired Greeks.
I’m from SC, now living in NC, and I had always wondered why there wasn’t as strong of an Italian-American presence in the south as there is in the north, and only now do I have a plain and simple, clear to understand answer. And it really hurts, but it needed to be known and it needs to be shared. I really appreciate the way you presented the facts, here!
Italians don't do trailers
I find it rather paradoxical to define Italians in this way, considering that Italy has been the cradle of culture, art, literature, and science in Europe for centuries. Our cultural heritage has profoundly influenced many fields of European knowledge and life, from the figurative arts, with the great masters of the Renaissance, to philosophy, music, and scientific discoveries.
I’m born and raised in New Orleans. The top of my family tree is a Sicilian man and a mulatto women. By the world I’m considered black. I’ve been trying to find more about the Sicilian part of my family. My grandfather has been shedding light on a lot of it. I found your videos looking for more about him. If you want anymore info on the family dynamics with Sicilians and Black people my family has lived it first hand I’m sure they could help
Yeah maybe he was clever choosing a woman and not a dry white cornbread 😂 oh do I hurt the feelings of some wasp 😂😂😂 ??? - I have blue eyes and I am white but not one day I denied my Neapolitan heritage! Hunting someone because of a skin colour makes me sick even after breakfast.
Italians have played a huge part in New Orleans’ history
And they created the Muffaletta 😋
Africans and Sicilians lived virtually next door to eachother before coming here AND THEY INTER- married and traded with each other for Centuries before migrating here. Older PURE- blooded Sicilians who were not prejudiced are generally aware that their ancestry has African Ancestry as well. Check the DNA to see what the per cent age is.
@@bonitahobbs2374 awesome thank you.
@@studiobencivengamarcusbenc5272 I’m not offended , I’m also not offended because you’re an ignoramus
My grandmother spoke of being harassed on her way to Polish school. Most immigrants were and are vulnerable to attack and being taken advantage of. Thank you for this well done video.
That is so heart breaking. I did one on the Polish as well, they had a hard story here. ua-cam.com/video/Jd0vKaIpM6A/v-deo.html
I've learned that the Italian, Irish and Polish were discriminated against because when they immigrated over to the US, the greatest plurality of them were Catholic, and members of Protestant denominations felt threatened since the US was founded on grounds of religious freedom from the Catholic Church.
Then become the abusers..
@@terencelee7761I was JUST about to say that! How can you expect us to feel bad for them when they turned around and did the EXACT same thing to black people? I don’t, and that’s that!🤷🏽♀️
Europeans are celtic, not white.
As a person outside of America, it's always been so interesting to me just how much Americans see the world as black and white. I'm Polynesian and when I lived in America it was like, no one knew what to make of me. In New Zealand we call ourselves brown, but even then that's such a broad category. We tend to just say what we identify with when we discuss our race. White people will say Irish, or German etc. Asians will say Chinese or Korean etc. Polynesians will say Maori or Samoan etc.
It's sad to me how much Americans have erased from their heritage. People are definitely much more proud of their roots in other countries.
You are right. The Wasps had a narrowed sight, but now comes the contrary like M.Luther said:" Mankind is like a drunken peasant trying to ride, he is falling first on the right sire and then on the left
Italians were Katholics, a horror to Puritans.
@@ragnapodewski4694calling the natives of your host nation an insect is a narrowed sight. You should appreciate Anglo Saxons/ native Americans instead of resenting us, we built the cities and states that you moved into out of wilderness.
@@jame9277 which cheek person used my name? Humans are images of God and never like insects, that is an affront for HIM
@@ragnapodewski4694 then don’t call people wasps
Thank you for sharing this ... I shared this with my father who is of Sicilian ancestry... This broke my heart
It is great to see so many Italian Americans proud of their Italian roots, particularly after all the prejudice we endured in the USA. Unfortunately, many of us lost our connection with Italy and our Italian culture in order to fit in and “ Americanize.” Several years ago, I applied to the local Italian consulate and was recognized an Italian citizen “de jure sanguinis “ ( by blood) . I now have an Italian passport, Italian birth certificate, and I vote in all the Italian elections. I studied and speak fluent Italian, and visit Italy every year. Yes, I am American by birth, but I am also a proud Italian. Viva l’Italia ! 🇮🇹
BRAVO!
Sempre wwww l'Italia ❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤
Good for you! My papa (grandfather) made the conscious decision not to speak Italian because he wanted to fit in with the rest of America (his mother was fluent in Sicilian). This video helps me understand maybe why that was, but I had never understood it. So much of the culture was lost in that decision as now all of my American relatives from Sicily are deceased and my papa died before I was born. Since then, I've been learning it all on my own and have been using Duolingo to learn the language. I've been wanting to look into getting Italian citizenship but I don't think I could afford to travel there anytime soon, haha!
@@cappyvas congratulations to you for for wanting to learn about your family’s culture and background. Sicily is one of the most beautiful and historic places Italy with its ancient roots in Greek culture and language. While you may not be able to go to Italy now, you still should checkout the possibility of Italian citizenship, there are all kinds of information online. Continue with your Italian language studies as well. “In bocca al lupo!” ( Good luck!) Viva la Sicilia! Ciao.
Sorry, it is impossible to have an Italian birth certificate and an American birth certificate. Were you born twice!?
I really appreciate the time and care that you took with putting this video together. You really hit the nail on the head with the racist structure that is set up and used on different ethnic groups over time. My dad's side is Italian (from Anzi) and my great grampa came over from southern Italy in the early 1900s. He worked on the railroads as a line walker--a very dangerous job and lived in the slums in Cleveland. He had to give some of his earnings back to the company for the "privilege" of having a job there. My grampa worked in the rail yards for a bit and was called slurs daily. Even after he was successful he was still stereotyped by some. He also had to let the mafia know that he wasn't their guy. Maybe it is because of their experience and learning how the system uses the same tactics towards different groups in time, but I don't understand how any Italian American can be callous to the current plight of African Americans, Latinos, and other marginalized groups.
We should all have self ~ esteem. Insecurity may undermine this, even make a person doubt themself, not particularly like themself, or others. This is one reason that people lash out, criticize others, as a matter of personal rote, routine, "put down others," including slurs, as you mention, and more aggressive behavior, when this is unnecessary, and perhaps illogical. These are also behaviors learned by observing other people. If, when a person has self ~ doubt, this may be assuaged, if briefly, by thinking, "Well, I'm imperfect, but at least I'm better than, superior to, this other person." {Thoughts such as this usually don't provide personal improvement, are very temporary, "fixes."} A source of overly aggressive behavior, conflict, misunderstanding. We many times, intrinsically want to associate with others who appear to be, "like myself, us," visually, audably, mannerisms, habits, & so on. Can we understand, appreciate, even like others who are not, "like myself, us," at least part of the time? Be positive? We can try to do this! Not just indulge in knee ~ jerk criticism!
I'm 3rd generation Italian American from a small town in Ohio. So much of what this video discusses runs in my family history and raises deep emotions. My great grandparents were Southern and Northern Italian and only spoke their native language while living in a combined Black & Italian neighborhood. The next generation only spoke English in public unless asked to translate. About half of them married German or Irish Americans. There were Catholic schools and Churches, one for Black Catholics and another for 'everyone else'. There were Blacks who were 50% Italian in the Black Church and surrounding towns. Italians and white Italian mixes began moving to other neighborhoods and trailer parks. A few Black Catholic women bravely came to the other 'white' Church with their daughters. No one every saw or mentioned who the girls' fathers were. I went to school and Sunday classes with those mixed girls and though we were all part Italian, I was definitely considered 'white' and they weren't. Both my grandmother and mom married 'out' to white men who were then completely enfolded into the community. My grandmother remembered working with Black women as a housekeeper or server but quit her job when she was allowed to use a public bathroom but her Black coworkers were not. My grandfather supported her choice. She went to work in war time factories then. Part of my early childhood, I was raised in the original Black Italian neighborhood and my parents and my generation always kept our friends from there. White Italians, relatives and friends, did not support this and it caused problems during school sometimes. My town actually had a Black mayor so was fairly progressive but the only legally married mixed race couple I knew of kept it secret and would meet in the next county. During college, when I began exploring my Native American and African heritage from my Dad's southern Carolina, Tennessee, and Georgian family trees, I felt a lot of resistance from the family and community. I attended Pow Wows with Native friends for years who introduced me as fullblood Italian bc 'fullblood' was important in that community. When I tried to correct them it was just passed over. When I attended so many African studies classes I could have gotten a second minor degree, I never dared say I was anything but white. I had a few Black folks tell me I wasn't dark enough to be Italian, who they considered Black. When I tried to explain the differences between Northern and Southern Italy it didn't seem believable to them. When I questioned the celebration of Columbus day, I was called a race traitor by Italian cousins. I really stepped back then. No Pow Wows, no going to Church, no more race studies classes. I understand how connected we all really are historically and biologically. I understand why people "pass" racially in the US and it's interesting to see the popularity of so many aspects of African American culture swamp popular culture now. Mixed couples on TV everywhere. Times have changed, haters can't stop it or legislate it out of existence. I was very angry initially how racist many white Italian Americans are towards Blacks and immigrants considering our own struggle in this country. Anger isn't my food anymore though. Compassion and a sense of relation is. Thank you for posting this video. We need to hear our real story, not the whitewashed one.
You sure got some dumb black friends
Crazy considering how racist modern italians in italy can be. Just goes to show that ppl everywhere are the same. When there is a perceived threat, or ignorance stemming from having no idea about newcomers, this is naturally what ensues: barbaric hatred. It is really sad. America has been one of the worst toward anyone not "American" even though these white Europeans were the true invaders!
Damn all this colorism and Racism really did a number on ppl this was a Sad story why does it have to be like this? Why does being of whiter skin make ppl feel they can look down on other ppl this world is in need of a Serious wake up call !!!!
Wow
Make a video
This is fascinating stuff I’ve never heard of before. So cool. Thank you!
This was a very good podcast. I'm black and I didn't know about the mistreatment of Italians until I started digging up African American history about 12 years ago It actually came up in a lot of the historical documents I was reading and watching. I actually live in a town where it's heavily populated with Italians. And I had this Italian security officer at my job. He had just found out the history of Italians himself. And we talked about it and I remember telling him that so many Italians were mistreated because they were considered black but another thing and it's in some areas may make it worse than being black, Is that white supremacist people thought Italians were sneaking in black genes. And in some cases that would actually make it worse than being black. I just thought that was an interesting cuz I don't think another non-black group experienced that kind of racism way back then. But a lot of people don't know the history of Italians I'm inclined to believe most of Italians that I live around don't know.
I dont think most do. We all really need to dig into history on our own and not trust that the powers that be will tell it straight. I did a video on the italian internment camps in Montana during WW2 also: ua-cam.com/video/2W3CjKQx0f4/v-deo.html
@@nytn oh wow I got to look that up! White supremacist groups had large contempt for Italians thinking some of them could pass for white and sneak in black genes by mixing in with "pure whites" (whatever that means) . Did they ever get reparations I wonder?
Not for the prison camps, no. All of this is craziness to me
@@nytn oh wow, do you think the reason for not giving them reparations was bc they can be classified as white? Some people will argue that being classified as white is a form of reparations?
blacks were never treated better than Italians. that's ludicrous all lives matter propaganda. they could pass for white.
I grew up in a largely italian community and have been called a dago my whole life in both good and bad ways. I was under the impression that I was not italian because I had no known italian lineage, but my mother never knew who her father was. I never claimed to be italian and would refute being identified as one by explaining my father is part greek and lebanese and that’s why i have mediterranean features. I definitely thought being italian would’ve been awesome and would’ve made me fit in more with community but i didn’t think it was my heritage to claim. After both me and my mom did dna tests, I did ancestry and she did 23 and me to cover more grounds on relatives, we found her father. He was an Italian man with roots in caserta, campagna and palermo, sicily. My maternal grandmother had an affair with her best friends husband. She kept my moms biological father a secret out of shame. All those years I sat back wishing I could join the community. I even took italian in high school for four years because I loved the language and culture. I really appreciate videos like these that help me learn more about our heritage and ancestors’ stories! thank you!
Wow I would love to be Italian to, Italians are cool. I came up to age in the era of Lady Gaga, Colby O'Donis, Jersey Shore. I most likely might have some Dago Blood in me from British American slavery, and I recently found out that besides the British, France & Spain owned the Deep South where my family is originally from before it was given up to the United States in 1796. They came up from Old Mexico, the Southwest, the Gulf Coast, French Canada, the Caribbean, the Mediterranean, Macaronesia and settled the swamps where my ancestors lay, ❤ 🇮🇹🇪🇦🇫🇷🇹🇷🇦🇲 🙂
Ur family history reads like a porn story thanks.
@@lawtonsfinest8622 --That Sounds COOL ALSO !!
Mediterranean/southern europeam = white but unfortunately americans are mostly of northern european descent (german and english) that's why we were looked like "lesser white"
My mother was an Italian war bride who married my dad and moved to the US in 1945. We were taught to be very proud of our Italian heritage, which is of course very easy to do. My mother did not run into anti-Italian sentiment, but we were in Washington D.C., a liberal, diverse, and fairly educated city. My mother spoke impeccable English, but never lost her accent. She didn't really like English vowels.
When President and Mrs. DeGaulle visited the U.S., a reporter asked the Mrs. what she wanted most following the war. She smiled and said just two words. As the female reporters giggled, the President leaned over and whispered: “Darling, I believe it is pronounced ‘appiness’.”
I love italian americans who speak italian and keep our culture
You acting like liberals aren't racist. That's so stupid
Italian can mean sicilian and blonde with blue eyes... so when you say Italian, what do you mean? North, South, Central or the two isles of Sicily and Sardinia?
My mother's family is from Ancona, which was a Greek settlement before it was Roman. From my DNA testing, we are about half northern, half southern Italian, with some Greek thrown in. One of my great-grandparents was Socrate Montano! We are all brown-eyed and brown-haired.
Thank you so much for sharing this
I remember my grandma telling me a story when she was a kid, (she didn’t live down south though, she lived in Newark NJ) she was playing one day with another little girl who had blond hair and blue eyes, they where getting along and having fun together playing, the little blond haired girl invited my grandmom over to her house, when they got there the little girl told my grandma that she couldn’t come in because her mom said that my grandma was “dark”. I never forgot that story and neither did she.
I hope the next generation will be a little bit better in realizing how silly these binary groups are for people. This made my heart hurt so much.
That is so heartbreaking
I experienced this as a child from an Italian family. My mother said this might be due to me having a physical disability and that some people believe this happens because of a curse or wrong doing. Fortunately my family did not hold this belief and it was only one family which treated me this way.
I'm not even 50, and I remember kids racially teasing me when I moved to NJ from Queens, NY. It wasn't subtle. My dark knuckles fascinated... 😅
That is sad to hear this happened.
You do realize that Sicily was under Arab occupation from the year 827AD to 1091AD? A minority of Sicilians are descendants of those occupiers. It was the Normans who actually liberated the island over a period of thirty years. The Greek speaking residents of the island welcomed them. This is a reason of why there are also blond haired blue eyed Sicilians, even though there are some blond haired Greeks.
Years ago I met a woman from Sicily. I was shocked. She was very dark, much, much, darker than me with auburn hair. I and my family are considered African American despite our American Indian heritage. To be honest I had never seen anyone like her or since. I was absolutely floored at her appearance and probably stared. As I got to know her (as much as you can at work), I found out about her heritage. Plus, I had opportunity to study this and the way Italians, Chinese, and Mexicans, were treated in America along with African Americans or Negroes. However, southern Italians were elevated to “White” whereas African American despite being here for four hundred years with mixed ancestry are still considered Black. America is a racist country. Maybe not person to person but it is certainly baked into the system. The same can be said of our current immigration of people from India. They too are very dark people but are considered “White.” And those that made it to this designation of White quickly forgot and lacked compassion for those considered permanently Black even if Black skin is much lighter. Interesting and destructive to say the least. It would be beneficial if we were all Just Americans and judged by the content of our characters. But maybe that would be just too difficult.
Anyone considered different could have been lynched 100 years ago in some parts of the country. Those White folks didn't play. Don't get it twisted you say Mexican but what you should say is Latino. I agree overall though.
I remember in the 70s a tv commercial about pollution showing a Native American crying and them I found out he was Italian.
My mother was Southern Italian and, like me, had brown skin. I have never been fully comfortable with being considered white. I think some of that comes from knowing how my people were treated, some of it comes from the fact that overall, I’ve been treated better by non-whites than whites, and some of it because my skin is more like someone from Mexico, the Middle East, or North Africa.
I don’t know anyone who considers Indians as White 😂😂
Don’t spread fake stories .
@@AndrewUnruh They meant only the Southern Italians .
Northern and Central Italians were considered White because they looked like Germans .
Northern Italians were tall , white , Blonde hair and Well built .
On the other hand , Southern Italians were physically small , brown skinned .
I have Italian ancestry on my father's side, and you've answered so many questions that I've always wondered about my great great grandparents that immigrated here in 1904. I appreciate the research you have done.
I appreciate that. Hidden history is often the most incredible
You have South Italian ancestry at most and this video shows what happened to some of them non to all Italians. North and Central Italian didn't undergo anything of the kind, first because very few and second because they were feature and cultural wise different from South Italians.
Mine too. I doubt that we're cousins though as I know all of them from the offshoot of that side and it's extremely small, unless you are a 2nd or third cousin, that's possible.
wow. this explains so much. thank you for sharing 🙏🏼
I'm black and from New Orleans, grew up in a neighborhood with Italians and Sicilians, and I've definitely seen all forms of discrimination. People draw imaginary boundaries to insulate their insecurities. I didn't know anyone thought we were different until (at school) I overheard some adults talking about my friend and his family. Irish Catholic nuns discussing my friend's Sicilian family. You can just guess how that convo went.
I always say that outwardly bigoted people harbor the most insecurities, and merely project it onto numerous scapegoats.
The way you put it, though; insulating their insecurities, cuts very deep indeed.
A video like this and it's affirming comment section is the dark side to the internet and free speech. There's nothing much that's pragmatically true about it. I grew up in San Francisco, and me and every member of my family were physically and violently attacked by blacks for no reason. I don't think they really gave a rat's ass that we were Italian..... in relation to being Irish, Slovenian, Armenian, Croatian, German, etc! We never experienced any discrimination from anyone.... except BLACKS. It wasn't even discrimination; it was violent racist assaults. Sure Irish people could come around in 2023 and say they were slaves.... or Slavs, Jews, etc. But pragmatically it's no longer relevant in anyone's mind. Basically a video like this attracts the rats now slithering through the comment section. Tell us all about it sbupt9413... we just need YOU to protect us from the Irish! What fkg universe do you live in? It kind've sounds like you and your friend were a couple of simpletons who latched onto each other for mutual support!
@lawrencedaniels9231 did they liberated us italians? From who? from ourselves? No more fairy tales please: America defeated us, invaded and occupied. On the other hand, it was Italy that declared war on the USA, and we lost. I don't want to be polemical, I'm just saying it because that's how it happened: we lost WWII.
@@Nome_utente_genericoItalians in America gained hwite status because ITALIAN AMERICANS took down Mussolini. You forgot huh?
“Liberated Italy” ? From who/what? Italy declared war on the US during WW2 cause they were National Socialists. Benito Mussolini was the Italian Hitler.
An excellent video. Thank you for making and posting it. So many of the comments that have been posted are very insightful. I am of 100% Italian heritage, fourth or fifth generation, and even growing up in the 1970s and 1980s, in a town in NJ where about a quarter of the residents were at least partly Italian, I was subjected to some nasty comments. And yet what I experienced was nothing compared to my older relatives. Though both sides were from the same sub-region of rural Campagna, my mom's family was generally "dark" and my dad's "fair." In the 1930s, my maternal grandmother was sent to work in a tobacco factory at the age of 17, and was literally spat upon by people she walked by to work...especially by the Irish maids to the wealthy WASP families who lived in the good part of town. As for my mom, who tanned quickly darkly, as a young teen in the 1950s was regularly harassed and kicked off of public beaches. On the other hand, many members of my dad's family visually "passed" as German, Irish or WASP. My paternal grandfather had red hair, and gota good job during the Depression only because he lied about his last name. My aunt on that side was even paler, and a classic looking ginger, and because people would never imagine in 100 years that she was of southern Italian heritage, perfect strangers would sometimes share really nasty comments about "wops" and "guineas," expecting her to commiserate! In light of all this, it truly pains me when Italian Americans behave like the people who hated their ancestors!
I worked and studied in Louisiana. I even published a book about the French derived languages of Louisiana. When I first arrived there, I was surprised by the number of people of Sicilian descent. I just wanted to ad that Cajuns had also been victims of discriminations (and those people traditionally speak a langue derived from my own and come from my land). The were called "coonass", and were also considered "on the same level as negroes". On the other hand, Louisiana had a fair amount a free people of color too.
Opelousas, Louisiana had one of the largest free mulatto populations in America prior to the end of the Civil War, in 1865. Many of which were plantation owners and owned enslaved Africans. New Orleans is always the center of stories like that or historical events but as much can be said as in the town of Opelousas.
This video was very informative. As an Italian, born and bred, I wasn't aware that Italians were subjected to attack from the KKK, and were the second most targeted background after african-american. On the disparaging of Southern Italians, I can confirm that the social stigma of being from Southern Italy still persists today, albeit generation after generation, and it is waning. In other regions of Italy, people from the South were considered slackers, good for nothing and prone to committing petty crimes. On top of that, coming from a particular Italian region would see you treated differently and had additional racially-motivated stigmas applied to you: people from Naples were thieves and conmen, people from Sicily were automatically identified as being affiliated with organised crime, and so on. I grew up in a rural and pretty bigoted community in central Italy, and the whole environment I was growing up in reinforced these false stereotypes. When I moved to the South for work and spent time in Naples and several places in Calabria, I saw most of them were entirely untrue, and some, unfortunately, were true. From an ethnic point of view, people from the South of Italy have a higher appearance of appearance details from past arab and Greek ancestry. All of Southern Italy was colonised throughout history by whoever was the leading naval power in the Mediterranean Sea, bringing a genetic background different from Northern Italy.
What an eye-opening video! As a first generation Mexican who grew up in the Midwest, I clearly remember how my father had this undercurrent of love for the Italians in our neighborhood in Chicago. He would even root for the Italian team in the World Cup!
This made me so happy to read for some reason
Similar culture cause of southern europe. Both groups are not anglo saxon
70% of Spanish and Italian words are mutually intellegible as both languages are an evolution of vulgar latin.
Then WHY do some Italians practice the SAME bigotry against Black people?? There are SO many immigrant groups that practice this same bigotry once they’ve transitioned into the so called American dream??
Italy and italians no matter the pregiudices, mafia, no white, pizza and spaghettis ect, ect, ect, has been one of most important and influencia people in human history in all sense , art, science, culture , Rome , florrence, Milan ect, ect, no matter what people who knows history said or not, At the end of this day and the ones to come , the country that it self (USA) named AMERICA , was discover for the New world by a italian Cristoforo columbus) the name tha they use for calling they self AMERICA , is Am italian fermale name, the first european man that arrive to colonize de capital of world (NY) was an italian ( VERRAzZANO) and the every one of them , keep goin eaten italian pizza, spaghetti, buy ing a Ferrari and drive ir with Dolce Habana or Bulgari suite, a gelato,lasagna ect, ect, ect, seaten confortable see ing a Robert deniro or al pacino in taxi driver or the Deer hunter movies or maybe hearing “in my way “ for Frank Sinatra and franki Valli , thats mean maybe for sure , a lot of parta that they proclame of their greatness of AMERICAN to the world , is a bebts the they have with ITALIANS greatness.❤️🇮🇹🇮🇹🇮🇹❤️
Italians are such wonderful people and have contributed so much to this country...their cuisine, their art, their music, their architecture, their natural beauty! I think this hatred stems from pure jealously!
Stereotypes. Italians are normal humans like everyone else. I say that as an Italian. Romanticizing Italy was what exacerbated the problem in the 1950's. Let's put it an end.
Don’t forget beautiful Italian Sophia Loren
Well you are right sadly in my case I’ve encountered racist Italians it is quite ironic 😅
They are very racists, not all but many. Especially those from the North. My mum worked with a black woman who was invited to Italy by her Italian work colleague, the girls grandma was horrified that her granddaughter allowed a black person sleep in her bed. She told her to throw away the bed sheet. Sounds extreme but a it’s a true story.
@@Roseau112Italians are horrible and so racists. I follow a black American travel page. They were treated so awful. Changing my plans. I’m ok with seeing Big Ben a Fifth time.
My family told us these stories. I was fortunate to be brought up close to the older generations and geographically close to where we started out in America. It wasn’t easy for us Italians to become part of the American story. But we never gave up or stopped contributing and that’s why we are so proud.
My grandparents came to the US through Ellis Island as children. They traveled West to California along with many other members of their families. After getting married, they bought 23 acres of apricots and supported their children from the harvest. We were not taught Italian because they wanted to learn English. I am returning to my roots. Italy had always been and will forever be in my heart.
Hi there Ms Romero, great video!
I’m Adam Romero from Nola & south louisana
Keep our Italian roots rolling!
How awesome!
EVERY single Time!!! As an African American,I feel that we should come together and change this status quo. Instead of acclimating to "society" because it's easier..
You really sound like a black immigrant !!
@@natturner465 yes he does… black Americans need to come together as a lineage and get ourselves together… we are the ones who made it possible for other to come here then crap on us like they had these rights before we made it possible with the sacrifices our ancestors made
Come together? Get out of here with that nonsense! Italians we're only attacked because they were believed to be Black or possess some amount of Black blood .
Oh please, many Caribbean immigrants did just as much as AAs did for black people in America but you don’t know your own history so continue to believe that MLK did everything. The Africans did nothing for black people but Caribbean folks like Marcus Garvey, Hazel Scott, Malcolm X’s mother, Stokely Carmichael, CLR James etc. in fact it was certain high ranking self hating blacks and mixed race persons in the NAACP who helped destroy Marcus Garvey’s movement, but you don’t know that either because ADOS also love revisionist history…. Do some homework and come back and prove me wrong. I’ll be waiting. Let it also be known that many of the first slaves from the original colonies in America were also from the Caribbean, mainly Barbados.
@@charleeshaw7423 wow where do you get this wild info, you’re so sadly far off the lines it’s sad, nonsense
I never knew this, my family came to America before 1900 and they talked of discrimination, but I had no idea how bad it had been. I think this is partly because as Italians ascended the ladder of social acceptance, especially those I knew, they became more than willing to pass along prejudice to other groups. I always felt that there was no justification for that…. Wrong is wrong
Remember too that the original English settlers were Protestants while many groups afterwards wer Catholic. The prejudice against Catholics (Irish and Italians) and their allegiance to the Pope was held right into the election of JFK.
Never knew about this either.
@@Patriot1789 I'm an Irish/Italian mix and yes both were discriminated against so don't be hating on today's immigrants they are no different than our grand parents and great grand parents.
"had been" Well....
Yea, and the largest mass lynching in American history was against Italian-Americans in New Orleans. Because the chief of police David Hennessy was cracking down on the New Orleans mob and he had evidence that would exonerate one crime family and incriminate another. He was assassinated in October of 1890 and 18 men were initially arrested. 7 were cleared as innocent but the 11 remaining were dragged out of their jail-cell(due to a ruling that the 11 remaining would likely be released) by an angry mob and lynched.
I think it’s really important that Irish, Italian, Polish, Ashkenazi Jewish, and broadly Slavic Americans learn that only 100-150 years ago it was their ancestors being treated horribly and that they would not of been considered “white”. Which obviously sounds insane because they’re also European but thats a glaring fallacy of the system that whiteness can be granted or taken away depending on convenience. Maybe gain an understanding for more modern immigrants for Latin America or Asia.
You understand that each group in America was treated in the same manner. I grew up in an Italian neighborhood in Brooklyn in the early 70s. An older Italian man told me about Italian history in America. They were lynched, beaten on a regular, and even deported in masses. There were hardships like all other groups. This is why I do not understand DeSantis wanting to remove Black history from books and schools since he would not want anyone denying him his history. Everyone's history in America is American history. Everyone's history should be taught to the generations. Learning the history of each group is not about making anyone feel bad about themselves. It is about understanding. Great video. Thanks for sharing.
This video is amazing! Being Italian and European, I have never imagined such a situation in the US! In Italy, we tend to think that we have been discriminated in the US only (and solely) because of exporting mafia. Which is hated by all of us, we hate mafia. So we tend to say that we have been discriminated because of a small group of dishonest people! I learned a lot! Thank you!
In Italy they tell us nothing about this story.
I remember that in primary school I was told that Italians who migrated to the US and other countries got to be appreciated by locals because they were funny and friendly.
The reality is completely the opposite and very harsh.
Only later on I find out about Marchinelle and other episodes in which such story came out to be nothing more than a fairytale.
@@hellboy0189 I'm Portuguese, and I have learned that too many people have inferiority complexes and want to be a part of the "White" club. White meaning Anglo-Saxon-Northern-European. Israelis and Zionist Jews are another sad example.
@@hellboy0189 Also the columbus day was born due to this type of discrimination, since they led to the death of Sacco and Vanzetti, which caused tensions with Italy and therefore the Mayor of New York established the columbus day to celebrate the Italian who discovered the 'America, which led to a smoother tone between the two countries.
A white person is any of the original peoples of Europe, Middle East, and North Africa, so that includes italians. Ameriva is even named after an italian, "Amerigo". There's two kinds of white people: those who get pink & red in the sun and those who get gold & bronze, every white community/country has both kinds, some just have more of one kind than the other....
@@Refref1990America was already discovered, there were great civilizations here that were even more advanced than those in Europe
I had not heard of Italians being lynched in the South, before, and I grew up in East Tennessee. So your video is very interesting! My dad, whose family was from Northern Italy, SW of Turin, had a childhood experience he only related to me once. A classmate asked my dad to go home with him after school and help him with math (my dad was really smart and ultimately earned a Ph.D. In Chemical Engineering). My dad was happy to do that. They were working on math peacefully until the kid’s dad got home, cursed my dad as an expletive Italian, and threw him out of the house. In Clinton, Indiana, the town was “racially “ divided between whites and Italians- and, I guess, God help any black people who lived there. Clinton ultimately became famous for it’s annual Italian Festival.
Thank you so much for sharing this. I have a few other videos on the Italian experience here in the US, and it's part of a bigger story I am hoping to tell. Their prison camps in the US during WW2: ua-cam.com/video/2W3CjKQx0f4/v-deo.html AND school segregation issues in the South: ua-cam.com/video/xbz1D0v5dYg/v-deo.html
That was over 100 years ago... How many people did the Mafia kill since?
Italians are western Europeans we are white, but the Irish always hated us! Lol... not exactly sure why, but they can kiss are ass! Jealous, I'm sure of that! And they had a lot to do with all the hate! We come from the Roman empire and they come from the land of nothing and no significance at all but endolence of Drinking 🎉 sorry not all but alot!
Most lynching victims were white.
Indiana was actually run by the Ku Klux Klan for a while.
As a half italian I never suffered some of the stories mentioned here but my dad and uncles did back in post WWII in the 1950's when they migrated to Australia. They used to tell stories of some of the fights they used to get into because some strangers wouldn't accept they spoke a different language or, probably the real crux of the issue, risked taking their jobs away.
I actually lived in Italy for over a decade and there is also there a certain level of discrimination between northerners towards southerners but overall they all feel proud of being italian and would laugh away at suggestions of being inferior by anglo/germanic people experienced by migrants. The biggest racist in history, Adolf Hitler, actually admired italians and their history, feeling contempt towards them only at the end of WWII because of Italy's weakness as a military force which was mainly due to the fact italians weren't united or mentally and militarily prepared to fight in wars after 70 years from unification with some territories finally re-uniting only after WWI, 20 years earlier.
Substantially, I found italians in Italy quite arrogant and so proud of their nation's history that trying to diminsh their heritage and race would get ridiculed and laughed at. A race of people, a population that produced so many historic figures in human history such as Michelangelo, Dante, Da Vinci, Galileo or historic moments such as the Renaissance, Roman Empire, the Republic of Venice and so many other famous personalities, too many to mention, don't need anyone's approval for what or who they are.
Very interesting. Thank you.
My friend's family is from Northern Italy. She said they have a saying that there are no Italians below Rome.
@@panamasrose My dad was from Northern Italy, less than an hour drive from Venice and that's where I lived for over a decade. I never heard that saying. Actually, they felt less italian and more regional "Veneti". But deep down below, from the North to South, they all feel proud italians, except probably in the top Northern Sud Tirol region where the majority of the population is of Germanic heritage and feel italian because they live within italian borders but obviously don't feel ethnically and racially italian.
@@ScotitalicWhat can I tell you, these were the words out of her mouth.
EXACLTY they don’t need anyone’s approval for who they are and, were a super power, at the forefront of technology, architecture, art and military might which is why Rome was so great. But empires rise and fall and to see what was happening that the video creator mentioned is just crazy. Situations change and racial categories is an ideology. From super power to kkk seeing them as nobody and want to kick them out the country shows human behave at play. Even the Chinese growing as a nation financially in less than a 100 years. A rate no empire has ever achieved but in her video they showed a news paper of some one carrying a Chinese person by the long pony tail. Thinking people are dumb, inferior just baffles me
Fun fact: during the unification of Italy a lot of Sicilian farmers rebelled against their owner, thinking the unification was a sort of social revolution when it wasn't, so Garibaldi executed most of them.
When the unification was over, there was no longer a lot of people in Sicily to take care of the lands so Garibaldi moved some of the Piedmontese workforce on the island.
So, this means that a lot of people that today we perceive as Sicilian are actually of Piedmontese origins.
Thank you to keep History alive! Better never forget these monstrosities, because they could happen again. Proud to be an Italian!
The correct pronunciation for "dago," is "day-go." My Sicilian great, great grandfather came from Palermo here to New Orleans in about 1869 from what I can tell. He married a lady from Berlin Germany, my great, great grandmother. He was a baker according to our family genealogy. I also have Irish ancestors that came here during the potato famine in the early 19th century, and they were treated pretty terribly too. I really like your videos now that I've found them, please keep the interesting material coming.
Yes sadly if you say this to your average black person of the woke victimhood type they try to erase the history and suffering of our ancestors as “not as bad” as theirs. SMH
I was hoping someone would correct this as well. Even though the word is of derogatory slander it should be pronounced correctly so people know.
Da in romance language than sounds Ay ?
This surprises me.
@@Nissardpertugiu It's the singular consonant following the vowel that dictates the Ay vs Ah. The way she is pronouncing it is as if it were spelled "daggo"
Thank you for letting people know the correct pronunciation.
I Love your videos. My father who is Puerto Rican often times hung out with Italians in NYC. In no way did he identify as white. However, he felt more accepted by Italians in NYC than any other group. They embraced him and he was made to feel part of the group. My father always said my Great Grandfather was Sicilian. My Mom was always thought to be Italian. But the racism amongst and between migrants and immigrants is so deep. I grew up and hung out with all types of people. Thats what i love about NYC. We are so diverse. It is a beautiful melting pot of culture.
Hmmm 🤔 so you’re saying blacks didn’t accept a rican? I’m from New York &!I highly doubt that. Maybe it was the other way around. You father probably didn’t want anything to do with us. So your father was dishonest with you..
There are a minority of Puerto Ricans who are white. They are Spaniards - true European Spanish, like the former actor Jose Ferrer.
Italiani e Portoricani sono latini; hanno usi e costumi molto simili e la religione cattolica.
Americans should be grateful to Italians. An Italian (Cristoforo Colombo ) faced a difficult journey to discover their unknown land. Another Italian (Amerigo Vespucci) was kind enough to baptize them with his name.
Colombus was an evil mass murderer though
Thanks for sharing
Unfortunately with their new acceptance into the
Larger white community, Italians and the Irish , both with similar American origin stories, turned their backs on those black communities they were once relegated to. Often being the most violent in opposition to integration into northern communities. Places like Cicero, Illinois , Bensonhurst, and Howard Beach serve as sad reminders of how this “assimilation” pitted great communities against one another. I agree that this history be taught to ensure the divisions that separate us give way to the ties that bind.
Right! From being the oppressed to becoming the oppressors..smh great example of how people change
Use Black with a capital B, when it refers to a racial group. It’s not a skin color, because most Black people have BROWN skin, not black skin. 👍🏽🇺🇸
Fantasy revisionism.
@@josephinetracy1485 care to elaborate?
Look at Israel, the oppressed become the oppressors.
My father was Irish my mother was Sicilian both first generation Americans. They were married in 1956 my mother had said if it had been 20 years earlier it never would have happened because it would have been considered interracial at the time I thought she didn’t know what she was talking about. As I get older I hear more stories that make my family stories make sense.
Yes! I have a good friend from college who's mother and father's situation was similar, except her mother was from Palermo and very dark and her father was Cajun. Both my friend and her mother used to always be mistaken for Black Creoles but they were Italian and Cajun!
That’s interesting because the Irish in many places were not considered “white” either and categorized as an ethnic minority in parts of Europe too.
@@lthomas3623 yes I have heard that as well. Unfortunately both my parents have passed so I am working off of memories of stories I was told. I kind of get the impression that people of that time focused on every difference of everyone in order to justify their bad behavior keeping everyone in order by fear.
@@lthomas3623 Both Irish and Italians were always legally considered "white". Just check old census records for starters. Why after a few generations could populations like the Irish blend in and become part of the mainstream American population? Could it be due to the fact that they had white skin? Also where exactly were the Irish considered an ethnic minority? An ethnic minority just means a population within a larger population that has a different culture and tradition like the Russians in Estonia for example.
@@lthomas3623 they didn't like us because we were Catholics.
I learned about this some 20 years ago, regarding the Italians and lynching in the Jim Crow south. I'd totally forgotten about it until you brought it up. I also remember the late dancer, Josephine Baker's husband talked about his Italian family, whom were from southern Italy, talked about them being discriminated against in Italy because they were darker. It'd came up, because Josephine had talked about her frustration with the racism back in the States.
I don't know if you brought it up yet. Because I haven't gotten towards the middle of the video yet. But most of the Europeans during the Ellis Island years, whom were from Greece Italy, eastern Europe or any European whom came here during that time, whom were dsrk skin. Had their racial identity question by the whites from here. This issue lead to creating a new law on whom were white and whom weren't classified. After the law was passes. Pretty all of the Europeans stop saying that they were German, Italian etc. They'd started saying and stating that they were white.
Last. A lot of the Italians and Sicilian people have Arab roots as well as Black African.
WOW, this is news to me. Thanks
Not African. The indigenous swarthy ( black ) European people that were killed off or sent to America. Tell the whole truth.
@@josephinemoten345 yes its true..Some Sicilian will fight tooth an nail that they have no other ethnicity in them but you cant refute how dark they get and majority have dark hair..i come from a multi diverse background..so i get it
@Josephine Moten Look up the history of the Moors from Africa and their relationship with Italians.
@@6689wonderfullyblessedAlso Hannibal,s history and relationship with the Sicilian's
Thanks for tour contribution. As an italian teacher in Italy,it's important to learn the immigrant's stories and how they were treated by the "locals". Grazie mille e buon lavoro!
This is the same with the Mexican race. I’m 60 years old and my birth certificate identified me as white. My Beloved Father who was a World War Two Veteran and whose Father also was a World War One Veteran would tell me stories of how not just the blacks were racially discriminated and abused but so were Mexican’s and Italian’s. I, at so young an age couldn’t understand why people of other ethnicities that fought for America could be treated differently because of the color of skin or ethnicity. Thank you for sharing.🙏🏽🌹✌🏻😎❣️
Because they were used for the benefit of a false foundation. I encourage you to dig deeper to actually understand who your ancestors were and are. You just might realize what was forcefully taken and I could only hope you reclaim it one day.
Yes, many Mexicans were lynched also but no one talks about it. I dunno if it’s because Mexicans often identify as White so now they don’t want to talk about it or what.
In Mexico I can never own land or vote , participate in protests against government policy .
@@MaryLou913 FyI Mexicans are being lynched daily in Mexico . Mexican police just found 45 garbage bags filled with the body parts of an entire call center.
Mexicans are not a separate race, we’re an ethnicity composed mainly of Native American and European blood. My belief is that when we are forced to categorize ourselves most of us do not check off the “Native American” box because typically that applies to Native American tribes of the US, which we are not. So, that really only leaves us with the “white” box to check off since nothing else really applies. Sometimes we get the option to elaborate a little further and have an additional option to select Hispanic/Latino which I presume most people do. I wish they would just add a box we could check to say “human “
Thank you for telling more of the story that goes unheard and erased - replaced with something more palatable. Mille Grazi - non dimenticare mai!
Thank you for bringing this topic to light. I was raised in New Jersey were Italians are everywhere. I now live in West Texas and I only know one Italian family living here and they too came from New Jersey. Now after hearing your documentary do I understand why few Italians live down here in the South. Funny how a lot of West Texans are of Mexican descent have similar last names as Italians. Thank you again, please bring more, it is a blessing to know the truth of history so we do not repeat it.
Mexicans in Texas have Italian last names? Maybe Cavazos, Trevino, Sada? Yeah you find them in Monterey and surrounding areas. The state of Nuevo Leon (South of Texas) was founded by Italians and Jewish. Another common last name in that area and in Texas is last name Cantu.
Cavazos sounds Spanish, not Italian.
@@roderickstockdale1678Italian & Spanish are essentially the same thing. Italians in Boston speak Spanish.
@@bucktooth002 are you from Boston?
@@bucktooth002 Do you speak Italian and/or Spanish?
Wow! I'm an Italian-American born and raised in Florida. English is my language . I'm light olive skinned, dark curly hair, dark brown eyes, experienced mild discrimination growing up but didn't understand what it was until I became an adult. Worked in the Florida school system for 28 years and experienced extreme prejudice by mostly white Anglo women. I have never been treated as an American. Always a minority. Funny thing I'm Sicilian and I went to Italy and was discriminated as an American which I found a little shocking. My grandparents on both sides of my family of course were from Sicily. If only I understood what was happening to me back then.😢
Traveling in Northern Italy, I noticed prejudice against southern Italians (similar to prejudice here, against Mexicans). I knew a woman of Northern Italian ancestry, who shared this prejudice even though she was born in California (she had never been to Italy). My Italian ancestor migrated from Northern Italy.
I am from northern italy(piedmont) and i can say that the prejudice is not very present anymore in younger generations. The fact is that northerns and southerns were VERY different from each other back in the day; and maybe to a lesser degree, we still are. Which translates in xenophobia in the less open minded older generations. While its factually true that southern Italy drains a lot of economic resources from the more developed north(as it happens, and should happen, in every country) theres a certain unwritten southern italian philosophy that everybody, expecially in the western world, can find very appealing. Family, friends, good food and being happy with less is what everybody needs in their life.
Similar to Mexicans?? I have never seen any Mexican specific prejudice, what are you talking about! I have seen racism when people speak Spanish, but Spanish is NOT unique to Mexicans or Mexico, and not everyone who speaks spanish is Mexican! So that was just such a dumb comment! Not every Latino is Mexican man, read a book! If Mexicans face racism, then that means that Cubans and Pureto Ricans face lynchings right now becuase Mexicans have always had betters rights them in the entire history of this country. Im guessing you did not know that or will claim it is a lie becuase you live in red neck town where books dont exist!
When I was in college I had a girlfriend who shared an apartment with a blonde-haired blue-eyed woman from Northern Italy. When one of the women in the upstairs apartment, an Italian-American, found out that an Italian was living downstairs she came down to introduce herself. When the Italian woman asked the upstairs neighbor where her family was from her demeanor instantly changed when she said that her family was from Sicily.
This was 35 years ago. I hope the current generation isn’t as bigoted.
It's the same thing in France. I lived in the south for a long time and there s definitely between the more Nordic northern France and the south. There's both ethnic and linguistic descrimination. In France they know where you're from based on your accent.
We have too many Mexicans in this country though. They don’t learn English and they don’t assimilate 😫. I SHOULDNT have to learn Spanish because you liberals are letting the ethnics take over and not assimilate. Mexicans should be speaking exclusively English and baking casseroles by this point. But we’ve failed to assimilate them AT ALL.
I was born in a private Italian hospital in NJ. Found out later my father had a very close relationship with scicilians because his octoroon father from Louisiana had a deep relationship with them as well.( my dad also worked in thw hospital as a dishwasher and they paid for him to get a nursing degree).fast forward my mother in law is scicilian and my father and her hit it off right away. My son definitely shows all of it in his features.
That is amazing! I love that you have the Sicilian/Louisiana connection as well.
They meant only the Southern Italians .
Northern and Central Italians were considered White because they looked like Germans .
Northern Italians were tall , white , Blonde hair and Well built .
On the other hand , Southern Italians were physically small , brown skinned .
Heinz 57 Varieties! Welcome to the club!
My grandparents came from Napoli to NYC in 1905. Im half Italian and Puerto Rican. I knew about how Italians weren’t considered white until the 20th century but had no idea about the violent history in New Orleans. You hear so much about Italian immigrants settling in areas like NYC, NJ, and Boston.
Same, my family went right to NYC and stayed in NY. I had no idea some Sicilians made it down South. I think some of my dad's family came from Napoli as well! I remember seeing that on a manifest.
Your grandparents probably went to NYC because they were wyt Italians
None of those cities (maybe NYC) received more Sicilian/Immigrants than New Orleans.
It was hard for jews too. Being beat up a lot. New york was better but not great but they had each other and made successful kids. In the midwest it was horrible. Henry ford and father coughlin.
@@judymoss1363
Some Jews were very prosperous slave owners in the South
Thank you for shedding light on this event.
You barely touched on HOW Italians became White in America, except for briefly talking about Columbus Day.
Add more of your complex heritage, I'd love to hear about it.
BTW The slur is pronounced "Day-go". I've been the butt of it and you don't forget.
Excellent presentation, I’m Italian/Irish, and we heard stories of “Irish need not apply” from my grandparents on mom’s side. My Italian family hails from Tuscany and Abruzzi. Viva Italia!!
Stop trying to speak Italian, you can't even pronounce the region from wich your relatives came from
@@James12361 There are more Irish people in America than in Ireland, cope.
Tuscany is in the North, you can't be part of this oppression reflection.
I am from Abruzzo! Greetings from Italy❤
Guglielmo Marconi was Irish Italian like you
This was very interesting. My grandmother and grandfather on my mother’s side were Sicilian immigrants. My grandmother said she experienced a lot of prejudice when she came as a young child because she couldn’t speak English. My great grandfather had trouble finding work because he was Italian. When my grandmother married a fellow Italian, they lived in an area that was mostly Italian and Jewish. I know my family would sometimes refer to themselves as Dagos (pronounced day go) or wops, but it was a huge insult to hear it come from someone else. I never knew about the lynchings or the connections to Columbus Day. I’m proud to be an Italian American.
As you should be
Sign on a shop decades before your granny arrived: "No dogs or Irish allowed."
@@xhagast Every immigrant group has their hardships.
@@dawnlovescouture2644 Just showing the irrationality.
I think your channel is very fascinating. I am glad you were able to find these instances of Italian discrimination in the United States and publish them on UA-cam. Far too often, many either don't want to admit or just don't know these acts took place.
It doesn't fit the narrative agenda.
What's the agenda?
@@GeorgiaViking still haven’t told us what the agenda is
Thank you for this very enlightening video! Most of my non-Italian friends have no clue that Italians were ever discriminated against in this country.
I am an Assyrian American (indigenous people of Iraq) and the same experience was shared by my earlier ancestors, similar to Italian Americans. In fact, many cities such as Brooklyn, NY: Philadelphia, Chicago and so on: Italians, Assyrians, Greeks etc. lived together in rough neighborhoods. Assyrians especially, with their daker complexion, were considered non-white, while enduring racial slurs by white Anglo-Saxons. Luckily, because of skills in farming, agriculture and Merchant trading, Assyrians prospered by starting businesses that were passed on from generation to generation. Some of my relatives also faced discrimination due to their darker look. It is quite interesting, as you had pointed out, how a century earlier, it would be a completely different story.
Yet its okay for countries like yours to openly discriminate and kill people based on their religion, or ethnicity and nobody questions it.
You simply want to be white Assyrians are purely biblical.
I heard this on a hip hop station years ago. The host was Italian American. Northern Italians who are close to Swiss boarder hate this controversy. My father worked construction in NY from late 60s to early 80’s and he told me that Italians came in various shades but all spoke Italian with different accents and colloquialism.
Great video. I'm gonna show it to my wife. She acquired Italian citizenship a few years ago thanks to her grandad who spent 8 years collecting paperwork etc. She is Brazilian from Sao Paulo a city that has an enormous community of Italian descendants. Not surprisingly, Brazilian-Italians pride themselves of their heritage and many arrogantly proclaim themselves as belonging to an European tradition/race probably ignoring the fact that their ancestors had to ran away from war famine and poverty. Thanks for the upload.
Thanks for sharing this. As a Canadian, I learned about lynching in the context of African-Americans, but not in relation to Italians. I had definitely heard about anti-Italian discrimination.
I married into an Italian family and I was appalled to hear the stories of police officers mis-treating Italian-Canadians in the 1960's and 1970's.
By contrast, I have spent a lot of time in my in-laws native village in southern Italy. I have never felt anything other than acceptance there. Yes, I speak Italian, but with a French accent.
Italians are far from being open minded people, immigrants have a hard time over here and will never be accepted as Italians even after spending generations in Italy…and we are not exactly a country that doesn’t know what racism is…your experience is very limited unfortunately