Years ago I had some who were from a casino tribe, they came to my lan game shop and were there so much I just hired them on, they always had wads of $100 bills so all they wanted was access to my internet and play video games all day. They were some good dudes and stupid good at any game they picked up.

As the article points out, it gets even more extreme if you go further back:

> According to the census, the Native American population in the U.S. has grown from 552,000 in 1960 to 9.7 million in 2020, a growth of over 1,600%.

The article mentions a lot of potential reasons for this increase, but it seems like a major reason is that in the past people with partial indigenous backgrounds felt more comfortable identifying as white, but in more recent times, claim indigenous heritage (even if it's just a distant connection).

While some of it might be “1/32 Indian Princess” syndrome, the U.S. census only started allowing for selecting multiple races since 2000, and between the 2010 and 2020 census that option has massively changed demographic reporting across the board in the past 10 years.

census

and on the flip side, as stated by others, there is the issue of blood quantum not being a suitable measure for enrollment anymore (because we're certainly not going to accomplish much by inbreeding), and due to other failings of the enrollment and legal systems, I know people who have a very high blood quantum who can't be enrolled anywhere, but they're certainly involved in culture and community

the question of "what makes someone indigenous" beyond what your genetic make-up is a rather large deal in tribal communities

Good question, I honestly have no idea

It's weird because I have friends who are clearly of native American descent, who's kids are clearly of native American descent and they can't gain membership to their associated tribes but my family all has their membership; through an ex cheif, from the 1800s from one of our tribes here. We're what I can only describe as Caucasian.

🤷‍♂️.

If the tribes would like to keep their status as soveirgn nations they are going to have to change their constitutions in the next decade.

Probably idiots doing it in a Bill the Butcher sort of way.

How many even have 100% quantum now? Like 2000?

when I was in college there were only (as far as I know) 12 other students besides myself that were indigenous (out of around 7000 total students)

a portion of those were certainly people who found out they were 1/128th something and changed their whole demeanor because of it. they tended to be just using it as a quirky fact to stand out, and knew nothing about their cultures

but finding out your heritage later is not always necessarily a bad thing; I also have a (newly-met) relative who found out his tribal ancestry and as a result he put enormous effort into learning cultural practices, became fluent in the language, etc, and knows far more than I do, even having grown up in a tribal community

Why cant a person point at the map?

You get free government cheese and maybe a reparation of $500. Getting accepted into a tribe that has a casino on their land, even with blood quantum is pretty goddamn difficult.

They know what you're about and no they don't wanna share their tribal money with you.

Several tribes changed their constitutional standings around 2010-2012.

They opened up their tribes to accepting "Any direct descendent of a living tribal member".

Meaning If you had a grandma or grandfather in the tribe but your blood quantum was minimal and not enough to claim tribalship on your own you could still apply and become a tribal member.

This has since been overturned but it is once again in talks as native Americans in general are becoming extinct in the terms of blood quantum. There will no longer be living members of tribes with a blood quantum of 50% to 100% in the next 50 years and tribal numbers will become obsolete unless laws change.

Strawman argument. At no point did I state any of my beliefs. You have created a point of view and assigned it to me.

Oh sure. It’s a huge advantage to be disadvantaged.

But this is not that. These are people who are suddenly identifying as NA solely for their own gratification… which is weird if you ask me.

Except for internal consistency. People generally aren't hippocrits if it doesn't matter. Do you really think there has been an 86% increase in the native American population when native born American population is on the decline? Don't be so naive.

Might be in the same vein as that octopus who knew who was going to win matches at the FIFA World Cup several years back...

Maybe the monkey just liked pointing at a certain part of the map and the guy - with some hellishly impressive mental gymnastics - assumed "Titan... TitanIC!! He's pointing at the Titanic!"

There are many examples of more ridiculous shit spouted in human history, just look at youtube's documentation of how low some people's IQs have been just in the past 17 years!

Strawman argument. They said that there isn't a lot of benefit in identifying as Native American ON THE CENSUS. An important distinction that you've overlooked.

Elizabeth Warren vibes.

That is true. But to say there is no benefit in identifying as native American is disingenuous.

What you call yourself on the census will have no effect on that.

A few years ago, I found out that I am /64th Taíno. So far as I know, there is no payout coming my way

But there is value in certain tribes for things like college.

I previously worked with an individual who discovered a Native American ancestor in his family tree. He was researching if there were any benefits to be gained from by identifying by that heritage. I don’t know what the outcome was but he was the type of guy who always was always looking for a quick payout or money for shady reasons.

Not a lot of money in identifying as Native American on the Census.

Poor Jack Grimm, he really did try. By “try” I mean at least his new expedition actually existed. He’d had no luck finding the entrance to the center of the Earth or the Yeti (seriously).

Although, even with the monkey, I suppose it didn’t give him too much scientific credibility to conduct a North Atlantic research expedition by setting off from Florida.

On the third try, he found an odd shaped … something… called it a propeller, declared he’d found her, and quits.

He spent the rest of his life claiming ownership of the wreck based on that ‘propeller’. I imagine it must have been very annoying when he realized he’d passed over Titanic and missed her. Not so bad though, a few years later the French spent over a month slowly combing the ocean floor before later realizing they’d missed her in the first few days by a few hundred feet :)

For those interested, the history of attempts to search for/find/recover Titanic is crazy. They started almost immediately after the sinking and only got more insane until 1985 :)

Sure, they aren't scammers. 🙃