Originally Posted by
Fabricius
Yes, there is something subjective and limited by cultural references, on the other hand there is something objective as well, which prevents us from extrapolating the considerations.
Well, I'm not a relativist or a nominalist, I think there's the absolute and the essential or universal. That some biological man feels like a woman does not imply that everyone is obliged to recognize him as such (In fact, I think that no one should be forced to agree to something); and if a man feels like a dog, he needs psychiatric treatment.
But the racial issue is not so clear: what does it mean to be "blond"? What does it mean to have "fair skin"? To those who read it, it seems obvious even to consider the spectrum of many layers of human types.
The ethnic question, then, is the closest to relativism, the most justified by subjective identification. A Sudeten German could have 75% Czech DNA and be "German." A woman who is 25% Jewish, if she has a Jewish maternal lineage, she is Jewish in relation to their criteria (hers and her people). The objective side is that it makes no sense for a Brazilian without East Asian ancestry to feel Japanese because he likes anime.
I am aware that I do not belong to a specific people (and I am not limited to DNA).
Any honest one has to admit that there is no such thing as "Brazilian culture" (a place that fits all countries in Europe excluding Russia). The attempt to force a "Brazilian identity", which I don't know when it began, intensified with Getúlio Vargas, and was dully insisted on by open television networks, especially at sporting events and during the odious carnival. When the two unifying principles of Brazil, namely the Imperial Crown and the Catholic Church, ended or were corrupted, "Brazil" became a definition reduced to the extent of land, being arbitrary beyond this geographical limit.
As for me, I like and identify with European culture in general: art (music, architecture, painting, literature and poetry); philosophy; traditional religiosity; the European History; languages (I love the Portuguese language); beauty in general). I feel pan-European.